GCSE Creative Writing: First-Person Narrators. How to create a compelling opening. Read these two openings and see how the writers create their characters and entice their readers. Part IChapter II… Read More »GCSE English Creative Writing (Bolton English Tuition) First Person Narrators and Compelling Openings.
GCSE English Creative Writing- ‘Hot Seating’: Tips for the Development of your Characters. This technique is touted widely as a powerful yet simple way of deepening your characterisation. It is… Read More »GCSE Creative Writing Tips (Bolton English tuition) Hot-Seating your characters.
Here’s an example of writing a story under timed conditions when you have been given the last line. As I suggested in my previous blog post, knowing the ending can… Read More »Creative Writing Ending Prompt: ‘You have grown so wise, grown so terrible.’ (Ted Hughes) Unthank Writers.
Octavia Symonds’ first love was the XK engine. She owned several garages or ‘sanctuaries’ as she sentimentally called them, scattered throughout the city, where her beloved racing cars enjoyed the… Read More »Creative Writing(GCSE English Language Tuition Bolton Manchester) How 300 words can tell a story!
Here’s a simple task that works well under timed conditions. Confine yourself to 300-words and set a timer for 5 minutes. See how far you can pursue an idea and… Read More »Creative Writing 300-word story: GCSE English Tuition Bolton Manchester
I enjoyed writing this in response to a title and a student’s outline. I’m also taking the FutureLearn class on screenplay which is excellent and free. I would thoroughly recommend… Read More »Creative Writing Year 6/7/8: ‘Stories happen because someone wants something and has trouble getting it.’ ( David Mamet)
On going down in the morning, I found my auntmusing so profoundly over the breakfast table, with her elbow on the tray, thatthe contents of the urn had overflowed the… Read More »English Tuition Bolton: Why reading David Copperfield helps us to read(and write) ourselves.
Emotional Excavation! ( Inspired and indebted to Donald Maass’ Emotional Craft of Fiction and Damon Suede’s Verbalize). The problem. How do you make readers experience your characters’ emotions? Feelings are… Read More »GCSE English Tuition Bolton: Creative Writing Task. (Why emotions drive your stories)
Strangers on a Train: Creative Writing Prompt GCSE English. Imagine a crowded train heading home to a city or town. It’s nearly Christmas Eve. The weather could be better. There… Read More »English Tuition Bolton: Creative Writing-Strangers on a Train.
Bring out the tall tales now that we told by the fire as the gaslight bubbled like a diver. Ghosts whooed like owls in the long nights when I dared… Read More »GCSE English Tuition Bolton : Best Christmas Writing Ever?
Kate Atkinson visited Bolton Library last week and offered an inspiring(and wry!) discussion of her new novel, Transcription as well as many fascinating insights into the writing process. I was… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition Bolton Manchester: GCSE English Tuition/Tutor
What do you think the ‘story’ might be from these examples? Give each one a rating out of TEN and explain why. Remember the more you recognise the effects that… Read More »GCSE English Tuition Bolton Manchester: How to create a compelling opening.
Tell me a story to soothe my head. Tell me a January ghost story, please. So this is what she heard more or less. A ghost story in January, the… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton Phoenix Writers and Nanowrimo Goaltrackers!( English Tuition Bolton Manchester)
Here’s a fun creative writing exercise. It involves Free writing and caged lifts! This exercise works best if you write using a timer. Working against the clock liberates your mind… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition GCSE Key Stage 3 Bolton Manchester: Free Writing and Caged Lifts!
I must say a few words about NaNoWriMo. It has boosted my writing productivity enormously and is great fun too! NaNoWriMo is the worldwide, motivational competition to write a 50000-word… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition Bolton, Manchester and Bury: NaNoWriMo 2017!
Coup de Grace. The woman smiled at the tiny plasticine figure sprawled on the passenger seat. “You enjoy yourself there whilst you can.” She nudged his head with her finger… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition Bolton Manchester: GCSE English Tuition/Revision
Phoenix writers met for a critique session last week, before the summer break. I wrote this in my sunny yard, trying to make a conversation between two people carry an… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition: Bolton Manchester and Bury.(GCSE English Tutor Bolton)
The writer Ann Caldwell delivered an excellent session last week about dealing with time in narratives. She gave us several exercises and prompts. I tried ‘ I thought I heard a… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton Manchester: Phoenix Writers Horwich with Ann Caldwell
The cul de sac prompt at Phoenix Writers’ Group a few weeks ago brought up a vivid recollection of being ill as a child; specifically being ill with pneumonia. The… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton GCSE English Tuition :Writing Prompt -The Cul-de-sac or Avenue!
Today, following on from Anne’s unicorn on the bus, we are going to create another extraordinary story world. This world will be shaped around an AVENUE or CUL… Read More »Edward Gorey Creative Writing Prompt Summary: English Tuition Bolton Manchester
Pictures can provoke writing in many different ways. Last week we enjoyed a fascinating session using old photographs including this one which is apparently the old Co-Op in… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton: Phoenix writers. ( English Tuition Bolton Manchester)
Writing a story or an analysis essay can feel very difficult. You look at a blank screen or a blank page and feel the ticking of the clock. You… Read More »GCSE English Writing TIP: WRITE RUBBISH!!! (Best Tip for stress and writer’s block! (English Tuition Bolton Manchester Bury)
I am currently enjoying an excellent Creative Writing Course (Online) with Stephen Carver and the UnThank School of Norwich. It is inspiring and very well constructed. Excellent support from Stephen Carver… Read More »English Tuition Bolton Manchester: Characters who have inspired, amazed or irritated me!
Last week at Phoenix Writers, we had a session on endings. I realised after I wrote this piece, that it would serve rather better as an opening, though I am… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton Manchester: Openings
Running with an idea and allowing your writing to flow gives you freedom. It stops the editor in your head censoring your writing straight away. We all… Read More »English Tuition Bolton Manchester: Creative Writing-Run with an idea! FLOW!
This has been the summer of Preston Child. A friend recommended the novels because of their co-authorship and because he knew I would love Preston Child’s hero. The FBI protagonist… Read More »English Tuition Bolton Manchester: Reading Summer of Thrillers-New and Old!
Mansfield’s mind is beautifully captured here! I love the way she could so naturally catch an idea and chase it , allowing expansion and playfulness, but never losing the reader’s… Read More »Creative Writing Tuition Bolton Manchester: Katherine Mansfield and Snakes!
For a long long time Frankie felt shy. Shyness ruled her world like a shadowy grim faced dictator. She felt trapped behind some grey prison wall; occasionally glimpsing through the odd tiny chink, a world… Read More »Creative writing Bolton: Frankie and the Holy Grail of Confidence.
”Moving a guy as big as Keever wasn’t easy. It was like trying to wrestle a king-size mattress off a waterbed. So they buried him close to the house. Which… Read More »English Tuition Bolton Manchester: Lee Child’s Model Opening to ‘Make Me’.
( I started this last summer drinking coffee and watching an ambitious spider. I know in the back of my head lurks Mansfield’s brilliant, yet miserable late story‘ The Fly’. This… Read More »Creative Writing Bolton Manchester GCSE English tuition : ”Cobwebs”.
