SciFi/Fantasy – June 9

Joshua Ali Quare’s bank account was emptied on this date in John Barnes’ 2003. Writing prompt: Write a scene in which your protagonist meets a total stranger who loves him/her so intensely that the stranger will die for your protag.

SciFi/Fantasy – June 8

John W. Campbell, who launched the Golden Age of science fiction, and his pseudonym Don A. Stuart were born on this date in 1910. Writing prompt: Write a scene in which your protagonist cannot determine if her/his closest ally is real or an imposter.

SciFi/Fantasy – June 7

“I’ve always had a sense of Bigend as someone who presents himself as though he knows what’s going on, but who in fact doesn’t. It’s just my sense of the subtext of the character: he’s bullshitting himself, at the same time as he’s bullshitting all of us.” -William Gibson, creator of Hubertus Bigend, who was born on this date in 1967. Writing prompt: Write a scene in...

SciFi/Fantasy – June 6

“Your worst enemy, he reflected, was your own nervous system. At any moment the tension inside you was liable to translate itself into some visible symptom.” -George Orwell in 1984, published on this date in 1949. Writing prompt: Write a scene in which your protagonist is betrayed by his/her nervous system.

SciFi/Fantasy – June 5

The Apple II computer launched an era of private computing when it went on sale on this date in 1977. Writing prompt: Write a scene in which your protagonist has to do the old-fashioned way something that machines have made easy in the world you’ve created.

SciFi/Fantasy – June 4

Bruce Dern was born on this date in 1936. Writing prompt: Write a scene in which your protagonist must enforce an unjust rule or law on a friend who is doing the right thing, who then destroys him/herself rather than suffer your protag’s enforcement.