Monday, June 30, 2008

100 Jam-packed Story Sentences: 1-25

I signed up for a swap on Swap-Bot.com called "100 Jam-packed Story Sentences." You write, obviously, 100 sentences that tell all or part of a story, then send the list to three partners for them to use as "inspiration or a jumping-off point." I just wrote the first 25 this morning and thought I would list them here for my own use, and maybe to inspire some of my writerly friends.

100 Jam-packed Story Sentences

1. The doctors said he would never walk again, but two years, eight months, and five days after the accident, I came into the kitchen to find him standing on his own power, reaching for the cereal on the top shelf.
2. "Pirates!" the boy screamed, and scrambled down the ropes so fast his hands and bare feet had bright red burn marks when he touched the deck.
3. "Mr. Willikins!" cried Mary Anne, affronted. "I don't believe I've had enough wine to allow that sort of talk."
4. Jane winced as she climbed into the car, saying, "The hike was great, but my shoes are about half a size to small; it's been to long since I hit the trails and I guess my feet grew."
5. He reached for the bottle and topped off her glass, making her giggle.
6. "Yes, I'm an American," James sighed, running a hand through his hair, "but try not to hold it against me."
7. I gripped my father's shotgun more tightly as the rain came down in torrents, pounding the tin roof of the house as if trying to break through it.
8. William assured Lord Grey that everything was ready: the tables were set, the musicians in place, the dancers awaiting their cue.
9. This was the longest her nails had been in months; working fast food was not conducive to pretty fingernails.
10. "Again!" she cried, laughing, and Daddy swooped down, grabbed her, and tossed her into the air, making her shriek with laughter and a little bit of terror.
11. "You're killing the planet!" the girl screamed, chasing after a woman with a paper cup of coffee in her hand.
12. "Can you make pies out of these apples?" the withered old man asked, pointing to a row of laptops as the associate in the blue shirt glanced around for security.
13. Grace stopped short only a few steps into the entryway, doubling over and clutching her stomach, unable to go any further because of the pain.
14. She folded the last tiny dress and lay it in the trunk, then closed the lid and locked it, knowing it would never be opened again.
15. Lying on the sand, the couple was oblivious to the blinking light in the sky which came steadily closer, picking up speed as it approached them, until the roar of the engines startled them out of their lovemaking.
16. "And this one," said Nana, pointing at a square of green and red plaid near the edge of the quilt, "was a pair of your daddy's pajamas, the kind with the feet."
17. No one understands me, Sarah thought heatedly as she stomped down the front path and into the street, not noticing the cherry-red Mustang until the screech of its tires made her head snap around to look at it, her blue eyes wide with shock.
18. "We come in peas," proclaimed the gelatinous green being after consulting some sort of small computer held in one tentacle, but it frowned, thinking that couldn't be right.
19. Billy stood at the sink, his gaze proud and defiant through their sheen of tears as he bit down on the bar of soap in his mouth just hard enough so it wouldn't slip out.
20. She watched the milk swirl into the darkness of her coffee cup, white on black like seagulls at night, then stirred, watching the two blend into a rich, creamy brown.
21. "There!" he shouted, and stood back to admire his masterpiece: a white canvas nearly as tall as he was with a single thick, red line of paint bisecting it horizontally.
22. It was the sound of the hailstones on the roof of the car that did it, the machine gun-like racket that sent his father into a state of shock, his eyes bulging wide as he screamed over and over again while his son struggled to weave through four lanes of traffic to pull off to the side of the road.
23. This is all that's left of my house, this pile of crumbling stones at my feet.
24. "Did I scare you mom?" asked little Todd from behind his ghastly white mask.
25. "Are you sure you've never been horseback riding before?" Joe asked, watching her with a smile on his weathered face.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Wow! I love these! Real attention grabbers. Are you going to use them for prompts for your college pupils? I long to hear the rest of the story.