My letter Q stands for Questions and Quality—something representing a positive trait or feature. I always have questions running around in my head, and I love the Quality of written words.
Questions to ask in Writing
As a writer, it is imperative to ask questions—the important ones are What, Where, Who, Why, and How.
What are you going to write? A memoir, historical fiction, or mystery, to name a few.
Where will your story take place?
Who are the people in your story?
Why are you, the author, motivated to write your story?
When is the timeline to take place?
And finally
How will you carve out time in your already busy schedule?
For me, as a writer of my first memoir, Chosen, What was easy. I have an excellent memory of the stories of my childhood. The Where and When were my first fourteen years in the islands of the Caribbean. For the Who, I wrote a long list of the people and incidents I had strong memories of. (You have to buy my book and read my story to find out about the people in my story, available on Amazon)
And finally came the How—for me, the most difficult. I joined groups, went to classes, and, finally when time allowed, I wrote, rewrote, and found Beta readers, proofreaders, and editors. It was quite a process, but in the end, the effort was worth it. I owe my success in finishing my book to friends and family, who encouraged me to continue writing. In the two years since Chosen came out in 2022, as we recovered from the pandemic, I have researched, collected my memories from thirty years in England, and put them together in my second memoir.
Quality Inspiration: Books and other bloggers
At the end of February this year, I discovered Elske Howeler’s blog: https://elskehoweler.com/tag/creative-writing/ Elske had almost finished her Alphabet on ‘writing-related topics.’ I was fascinated and decided to take up the challenge. Through Elske’s blog, I discovered her book Left Behind, a heartfelt novel I read and loved. Another writer Lana W. Holden, https://historicalslant.com/ also took up the Alphabet challenge using the letters to promote the historical novel she has written, Catalyntje Trico, A Life in New Amsterdam, Which I also read and thoroughly enjoyed.
Blue Bottles Writing Studio prompts
In Eske Howeler’s letter Q, she writes about the ‘What if’ questions a writer should ask and sets a challenge for her readers to ask that question as they go about their daily lives. For the last gathering of the Blue Bottles Writing Studio group, I set the prompt, What if? Below are two different stories using the same prompt.
What If? by Elizabeth Jane Pryce
I am strolling along the beach. It is early morning, and the tide is out beyond the rocks. The sun is already up—I feel the warmth seeping through my clothes. I smile as I watch a man and his dog walking where the sand meets the water. The tide is a long way out because it is an extra low tide. I think of the oozing sand and understand I will never walk out to meet the incoming tide. I love the quiet, serene atmosphere. But as I step over some large rocks meant to stop the incoming tidal flow, something unexpected catches my eye. Resting on a course grey fiber mat with the pattern of a white anchor in the center is a solitary sandal with black cross-over straps.
I walk closer and realize it is a lady’s shoe, and it is dry, which indicates it couldn’t have washed up in the last high tide. I look around. What happened here, I think? There is no sign of another shoe, and questions flood my mind.
I begin with the details I can observe: It is a lady’s shoe, which isn’t wet. There is only one shoe—and rarely does a lady walk off only wearing one shoe. The mat is meant to prevent slips and falls, which could have come from a boat. But where is the vessel? The mat isn’t large enough for a cozy twosome on a late-night rendezvous.
These observations trigger a series of “what if?” questions.
What if the woman was abducted? Was it a planned kidnapping or something even more outlandish, like an encounter with extraterrestrial beings? While the latter sounds far-fetched, I can’t help wondering what the real story is behind this mysterious scene. The rational part of my mind tells me that aliens don’t exist, but the writer in me is tempted to explore this strange occurrence. Should I write about it? Is this the start of an intriguing tale waiting to be uncovered?
So here is my story to unanswered questions about a lady’s shoe and a coarse, grey-fibered, non-slip mat.
ON THE BEACH
A train rattles by—
I imagine,
passengers, sleepy from an early morning rise
propping elbows on window sills
gazing through fogged glass at
the ebbing tide of the Puget Sound.
Another passenger walks jerkily towards
the restaurant car—thoughts and smells of food
revives his tired mind.
Small children stand at the closed windows
bouncing excitedly
on their mother’s exhausted knees.
I watch the train thunder past
on the track along the shoreline,
hear a scream—just the whistle
I think—
as the train continues to Fairhaven and on
towards Seattle, Portland, or further still.
But there is an unsolved mystery
of a lady’s shoe and a non-slip mat
nestled in the undergrowth beneath the track
along the beach, where I walk
with my untethered dog,
picking up stones in the slippery moss.
The offshore wind blows in cool from the
Lovely Puget Sound.
What if it is a murder?
Is there a body wrapped, still under a train seat,
on its way southbound to California?
Or was it tossed out onto the tracks?
Along with the shoe and the mat?
Who can solve this mystery of a barely worn shoe
and a grey-fibered, non-slip mat,
which I saw in the weeds?
What if? by Deborah Hanuscin
My grandmother taught me a lot of things including how to dance (showing me how to move with the beat to Sesame Street Fever on the record player), how to write in calligraphy (which she was learning at age 60), and how to make a pie crust (though, sorry Grandma- I use a King Arthur Flour recipe now!). While some would say she taught me how to hold a grudge, she also taught me how to be a good person with a simple variation on the question “What if…?” “What if EVERYBODY did that?”.
Let’s imagine I’m hiking, and I want to toss my apple core into the woods– it’s a plant, right? It’s just giving back to nature….Well, what if EVERYBODY did that? There’d be piles of rotting food all over the trail attracting raccoons (or rats?) and flies and stinking up the place. OK, hang onto my apple core.
Now imagine I see a piece of litter on the ground. It’s gross. I don’t want to touch it. I’ll think I’ll just walk on by. Well, what if EVERYBODY did that?
It works the opposite way, too—I see that litter and think I should pick it up. What if everybody did THAT?
Rather than providing a list of rules or commandments, Grandma taught me to reason out my actions myself. By considering the consequences of my actions (albeit, in a magnified way), she helped me understand why I should behave in certain ways (not just because God or my parents said so).
Though Grandma Bernie is long gone, her sage advice has lingered. What if everyone had a grandma like her?