A few months ago, a LegendFire member going by the screen name Scintilla asked an intriguing question. Is creative writing truly self-expression? She posed three particular questions to the forum:

What role, then, should personal emotions have in fiction and poetry? Does your writing have a self-expression component, and how has your life affected what you write? How can a writer make use of personal emotions while still writing well?

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms in the audience. Here’s a bouquet of writing prompts for you to enjoy.

For April’s bonus idea, imagine a trade guild. If you’re not familiar with these organizations, you may want to briefly read up on the medieval trade guilds of Europe or today’s labor unions.

The scenery outside the train brightened as it ascended on elevated tracks toward Mason Plaza. The city spread around and beneath them like a well filled with warm electric lights.

A lawyer’s job is more than stirring speeches and courtroom theatrics. There are legal precedents to research and analyze, and briefs to carefully write which lay out your arguments before you ever get to present them verbally in court (if it ever gets that far). This story will focus on the more mundane adventures that make up a lawyer’s career.

I spent most of my free time in March doing some long-range planning, primarily about the handful of novels I’ve been bouncing between since 2020. Reclaiming the City is one of them. One of the reasons why it took so long is because I got distracted with reading advice from other authors. I spent more hours than I want to admit trying to figure out how I could walk their path and follow their writerly life.

What I should have been doing is determining what I really want and how to carve a path there. I needed to be honest with myself that, in my heart of hearts, I really don’t want to follow any of their examples. I needed to recognize that the best path for me (at least for the foreseeable future) is going to be far from conventional.

It’s this uncoventionality that led me to write this post. Like with the manifesto I wrote in January 2019, it’d only be fair to tell you where I stand so you know where I’m coming from and what my ultimate mission for Apprentice Wordsmith is.

Happy Easter! Here’s some prompts for you to enjoy.

As the train sped away from Broad Street station, David realized that there was no use in lying anymore. Bern knew too much. It made no difference whether the rest believed him or not. He had to tell the truth.

“Now headed toward Nielsen Quay. Next stop: Mason Plaza,” the recording announced.

David began, “Mia, I wasn’t honest with you earlier – about where I was before all this started.”

Here’s your monthly set of writing prompts, as promised. I’ll settle back into my normal posting order in April.

I’ve written a fair bit on the theory behind conscious inspiration and the the differences between it and the unconscious inspiration most of us are familiar with. I’ve yet to talk about what this conscious process actually looks like. Today, I aim to finally tackle that aspect by demonstrating how I come up with writing prompts every month. I’ll talk in general terms and go step by step through the creation of a specific example. With that much detail, I should be able to illuminate how these conscious processes play out in my brain. Plus, give you a bonus writing prompt.