Writing Prompt Story Starter: Cherries


Writing Prompt: Cherries

Life is a bowl of cherries. The cherry on the top. As American as cherry pie.

Just three sayings about that luscious little red fruit. And three different stories starting right there, I’ll bet.

Lips like red cherries. Eyes like black cherries. Two more evocative images to work as a writing prompt.

How about songs?  I tried googling it and there are lists upon lists…

I’ll be honest and say that this one’s not doing much for my imagination, so I’m challenging you to show off and show me how well it works as a writing prompt for you. It’s a pretty image and I’m keen to use it (plus the fact that they were the first crop off Mr Fiction Ed’s tree….)

Cherries = cherry blossom. Weddings. I’ll keep working at it, but in my own time, not yours.

I wonder if you find your imagination ebbs and flows with the seasons? Mine does. In these dull, damp November days – and they have been especially dull and damp this particular November –  it’s definitely more sluggish. Perhaps it’s the lesser daylight. Maybe it’s that the weather too often inhibits my lunchtime walk. Exercise is so invigorating.

Is it that we have so much other stuff in our minds fighting for attention at this time of year? We’re so busy being creative about presents and decorations and food, and keeping warm and dry, and filling the dark evenings, that it’s all used up.

What do you do to keep your imaginations firing on all cylinders all year round? Or don’t you? Certainly the stories submissions slow at this time of year, which is great for the fiction team because it gives us the chance to make serious inroads into the pile of manuscripts. That’s built up at this point because we’re working on a compressed schedule to allow us time off over Christmas and New Year.

And then come January everyone’s resolution to write more kicks in….  And that’s the cherry on the top!

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Shirley Blair

Fiction Ed Shirley’s been with the “Friend” since 2007 and calls it her dream job because she gets to read fiction all day every day. Hobbies? Well, that would be reading! She also enjoys writing fiction when she has time, long walks, travel, and watching Scandi thrillers on TV.