Writing Exercise

Mycelial microfiction

Hello again! I’ve had a good long break, and I’m feeling up to posting something again!

Recently I read a brilliant book of dark, exquisite short stories by Julia Armfield, called Salt Slow. I thoroughly recommend it. I shall shortly be guzzling up the rest of her work ASAP. She’s written two novels I’m excited about!

Anyway, reading her work gave me an idea for a writing exercise which I tried out today:

Write a list of words you like, and then find surprising ways to craft sentences around them. Simple!

My list was made of adjectives, but you can choose any of your favourite words.

Irascible
clandestine
exiguous
covert
dainty
pious
parsimonious
diaphanous
salubrious.

This was just an exercise, sentence by sentence – I didn’t think about a story at all until I realised it worked as I was writing the penultimate sentence…

Irascible weather.

Clandestine, exiguous gestures behind the backs of classroom chairs.

Covert puddles in the grass – knee-high socks drenched and muddied. Sports shorts barely escaping with light spatters.

Miles-long, miles-deep fungi cast their dainty genitalia out through the rich humus that surrounded Richard’s body. More quickly than you’d think – it was subsumed. Much more quickly, in fact. Too quickly.

The pious striving upwards of shivering, eurythmic trees. 

Parsimonious breaks in the cloud echoed crown-shyness in the trees below, allowing only seconds of sunlight at a time. Diaphanous wings hung there, see-through and silken, between the forest and the clouds.

The school children picnicked nearby, salubrious and wholesome, in an open glen.

I also wrote a more simple version for people who don’t know all those long words (myself included! I only learnt 4 of them today! …thanks wordhippo.com!)

Irritable weather

Forbidden, furtive gestures behind the backs of classroom chairs

Secret puddles in the grass – knee-high socks drenched and muddied. Sports shorts barely escaping with light spatters.

Miles-long, miles-deep fungi cast their dainty genitalia out through the rich humus that surrounded Richard’s body. More quickly than you’d think – it was subsumed. Much more quickly, in fact. Too quickly.

The pious striving upwards of shivering, slow-dancing trees. 

Miserly breaks in the cloud echoed crown-shyness in the trees below, allowing only seconds of sunlight at a time. Etherial wings hung there, see-through and silken, between the forest and the clouds.

The school children picnicked nearby, innocent and wholesome, in an open glen.

Which version do you prefer?

I’d love it if you shared your own version of this exercise too, if you’ve got the time.