This week’s prompts involved comparing a person to an inanimate object, creating a metaphor and then extending it.
Jen’s object: Obscene Marionette
Sexually, Francine was an obscene marionette, preferring bondage games, and always allowing her puppet master to dictate her behavior, pull her strings, and force her to perform on a tiny stage in front of a young audience.
Rune Skelley novels tend to contain quite a bit of sex. How graphic it is, and how kinky, depends on the project. Not all stories call for any, and the decisions about where to draw the line on details are for each author to make for themselves. Like anything else that happens to your characters, though, it should be rendered convincingly.
It’d be too easy to drop in a joke here about writing what you know. Joking aside, how does any of us really know what sex is like from the other side? (In the case of gay relationships, the “other” side isn’t any different. So this post doesn’t really apply.) A female character should approach romantic or hedonistic situations from a fundamentally feminine viewpoint, while a male character’s viewpoint on such matters should be informed by a different set of factors. We’re all familiar with general stereotypical differences between men and women; falling back on those tropes will probably just distance readers from your characters. But there are real, honest differences. You want your characters to exist as individuals, complete persons of whom gender is only part of their makeup. You need to give them honest feelings and desires, not the flimsy sham of a cliché.
Writing with a partner who happens to be of the opposite gender offers a chance to explore intimacy and physical pleasure more fully (at least on the page). But if you and that partner aren’t comfortable being frank with each other about the experience of sex, then it’s probably best to focus on stories that don’t call for it. That would also be true if we replaced “sex” with “politics” or “religion.” If talking about the issue would involve incessant giggling or reliance on euphemisms, then you’re not ready to write together about it.
Jen and Kent both took a stab at this prompt. Who do you think did a better job? Why?
Kent’s Take
Spike always loved climbing in the old cities, clambering over all the ornamental stonework and making faces at the other gargoyles.
But he mostly hated climbing hotels. Other buildings’ occupants could usually be counted on to be thoroughly sick of whatever sad excuse for a view lay beyond the window, but in hotels everyone is still getting used to the scenery. And paranoid as hell that some lunatic might come in over the ledge and do some hideous thing that the papers will hush up to protect tourism.
At the fifth floor of the Prague Hilton, Spike heard moaning. Slowly he pulled himself high enough to glance in. The first thing he saw was the camcorder on a tripod. The next thing took him some moments to comprehend. It was something that had never occurred to him, although it looked like fun.
He climbed on, secret witness to an invention of passion.
Jen’s Take
By Eastern European standards, the room was luxurious. By Misty’s Vegas standards it was merely not squalid. But it would do.
The light on the camcorder blinked steadily, letting Misty know that her every move was being recorded for later broadcast by Czech television.
Shifting her weight entirely to her left hand, Misty slowly, slowly lowered her knees toward the floor while pointing her toes toward the gilt ceiling and flourishing madly with her right hand.
The chandelier she hung from swayed slightly and Misty worked with the movement, augmenting it until she was swinging several inches in each direction. Her movements stabilized the arc, controlled it, and she was ready for the final motion, the twist that would make this move her own.
Taking a deep breath, Misty thrust her feet outward and her head down, while simultaneously rotating clockwise.
It was beautiful.
Prague would forever be known as the city where “The Nightingale” was invented.
Character – ghost of a bartenderCerise surveyed the interior of the zeppelin gondola with some amusement. This was going to be her best installation yet.
Of course, the zeppelin itself symbolized the hopes and wishes of an earlier, less ironically self-aware society. Once its interior was wallpapered with used condoms collected through a year’s worth of dumpster-diving and hard, artistic sex, it would sing. Cerise couldn’t wait to get started.
She hauled the crate of prophylactics up the stairs and set it heavily on the bar. She hoped she had enough staples in the staple gun.
“Remember not to puncture any of the reservoir tips,” she said to herself.
Her words echoed slightly before settling to the floor, and were replaced by a soft scuffing from behind the bar.
Mice would add a certain je ne sais quoi to the statement she was trying to express, so Cerise wasn’t too worried.
“What’ll it be, lady?” came a raspy whisper.
Cerise startled and then saw a vaporous human form behind the bar. He was dressed in a vest and bow-tie, with his shirtsleeves pushed up to his elbows. He shimmered and wavered as he went through the motions of polishing a glass.
“Damn!” said Cerise. “This completely overshadows the complex interplay of hope, death, globalism, and ecology I was going for!”
Character – recently hypnotized male college student“I never should have gone to that frat party,” Josh grumbled. The situation he found himself in grew stranger and more worrisome by the second. Josh tried to remember what had happened.
At Kappa Delta Rho house, the brothers had decided to try something different. Instead of a band, which inevitably led to noise citations, they hired a hypnotist for entertainment. Josh thought that it was supposed to be the girls who were hypnotized out of their inhibitions (and clothes), but he wound up being one of the first “volunteers.”
Next thing he knew, he was here, wearing a frilly, pink and white teddy and holding an oversized pink balloon.
And now the balloon was buzzing.
Josh gave the balloon a shake and the buzzing grew angrier. Something inside thumped against the taut membrane. Josh frantically ripped at the white ribbon which connected it to his arm, to no avail.
The red velvet wallpaper and faux-fur bedspread added to Josh’s unease, as did the rhythmic creaking of bedsprings and regular grunts from the other side of the wall.
Josh drew his knees up to his chest and hugged himself, the balloon bobbing just above his head.
Moments later a hidden door opened and two people entered. One was a middle-aged woman in a long silky robe and fluffy, high-heeled slippers. The other was the university president, wearing a cowboy outfit.
“Thank you, Miss Kitty. This one looks mighty purty,” the president said.
“Don’t you go hurtin’ this one, Tex,” the madam replied.
“I won’t, I won’t. Are all the bees in there?”
Josh glanced worriedly at his balloon.
“All 25,” the madam said, and left the room, closing the door behind her.
The university president peered down at Josh while slipping out of his spangly, fringed shirt. “Well now, Missy. There’s no need to be so worried. As soon as I get my bee fix, we’ll get down to business.” He popped the balloon.
Josh screamed.
Character – porn star named Turkish DelightTurkish Delight worried the bullwhip in her leather-gloved hands. Where on earth was the director? This was going to be her big break, the movie that showcased her acting skills along with her enormous breasts and insatiable appetite for kinky sex. Desmond had assured her it would be tastefully done, but now no one could find him.
Her costars tried to convince her that the cameraman could be relied on to bring the vision to fruition, but Del just didn’t trust him the way she trusted Desmond.
They had flown all the way to Scotland to film the special scenes with Nessie yesterday. It had been freezing, absolutely freezing, but Del had lived up to her end of the deal. Last night Desmond just kept staring at her. He couldn’t even get it up.
He must be having a midlife crisis, Del decided.
Character – split-personality jugglerLooking down at the pile of sawdust, Simone laughed. What sort of fools would build a prison with wooden bars? She hoisted herself into the window and shimmied down to the ground outside.
It was all just a big misunderstanding, of course. No one had told her it was illegal to juggle piglets within city limits. But ignorance of the law is no excuse. She’d been found guilty and sent to prison for two years. Normally Simone was a law abiding citizen. She would never dream of escaping. But she’d be damned it she’d let her baby be born in prison.
Dr Jacoby had warned her, “One of your personalities is male, so you should always use protection when you masturbate.” But the warden hadn’t listened, and Simon had been so lonely…
Character – Dick Clark’s evil dopplegängerSigns point to yes.
“Excellent,” breathed Click Dark. “Excellent.” He tried to cackle, but it didn’t work. He carefully rested the Magic 8 Ball on Morrison’s tombstone and stepped back. The crowds were always thin this time of day in the fall, but he’d need to work quickly.
His blow gun made short work of the gendarme, and Dark was able to begin drawing the arcane symbols necessary for tonight’s ritual.
A group of Australian tourists was the first to fall into his trap. They quickly disrobed and began their gyrations. Dark started the video camera and smiled, feeling his own arousal. A lone French student and three Germans completed the group.
Dark watched the steam rise from the twelve nude bodies, and completed his calculations. The blond boy. He would be first. Dark stepped out of his trench coat and joined the group.
During October we will be sharing passages that we’ve written independently from the same prompt.
Jen’s Take
Margaret stared at the TV in horror. She was watching the new DVD release of Season 1 of her favorite childhood cartoon, “Crustacean Clay and Seashell Stew,” and not until that moment did she realize how heavy the homoeroticism on the show was.
Seashell Stew gave Crustacean Clay a massage while Crustacean Clay was in a robe of some plastic fabric that made disturbing rustling sounds under Seashell Stew’s hands. Later the duo went to the gym to wrestle, and their moans and their heavy breathing sounded unmistakeably sexual to Margaret’s scandalized ears.
She caught her own reflection in the mirror above the TV and was surprised to see she sported the bared teeth of the cornered carnivore.
“To anyone who wishes to relive their innocent childhoods, let this be a cautionary object lesson!” Margaret cried in horror.
Kent’s Take
I recognized Milton and Dante by their moans and their heavy breathing before I entered the room and saw them entwined in an old shower curtain. They were like a tantric Hindu god in a robe of some plastic fabric.
“Now that is one kinky object lesson!” I crowed. Then I cackled and ran out the back door and into the surf, my feet churning the clay and seashell stew, seasoning it with acute discomfort.
In the failing light, it took me too long to understand what the receding tide had done. The cove was cut off by a sandbar about 30 yards out, and in the pathetic little lake of saltwater it embraced loomed a strange dark shape. A killer whale trapped in the shallows.
The bared teeth of the cornered carnivore gleamed in the moonlight.
about stichomancy writing prompts
try our stichomancy writing prompt generator!
What do you think? Who handled this prompt better?
During October we will be sharing passages that we’ve written independently from the same prompt.
Kent’s Take
It is the place of the courageous and the beautiful to lick ice cream and savor sugared almonds, and it is their right to do so in Easter-Rabbit costumes. For Mexico’s most beautiful señorita, these pleasures are an art form. When you look upon her, with her frozen treats and her floppy ears, your mind is aswirl with splashing waterfalls and frothing rivers, and your stomach is invaded by butterflies. Courageous and beautiful butterflies.
Jen’s Take
“Welcome to the land of splashing waterfalls and frothing rivers, the place of the courageous and the beautiful, otherwise known as Las Vegas, Nevada’s legalized brothel, Madame Ibernia’s!” cried Ibernia Patience, waving her arms broadly.
Behind her, two sultry ladies in Easter-Rabbit costumes winked and gyrated.
Frank Pax smiled. Bernie always knew how to surprise him.
Fatima entered, wearing a gypsy-like costume.
“Tonight,” Ibernia said, “you will enjoy Mexico’s most beautiful señorita,” she indicated Fatima, “from whose body you will lick ice cream, and savor sugared almonds from her navel!
“And your stomach is invaded by butterflies at the thought, isn’t it Frankie?” murmured Fatima.
about stichomancy writing prompts
try our stichomancy writing prompt generator!
What do you think? Who handled this prompt better?