dawn.vogel | February 22, 2019
Sometimes, where we think a word came from is not necessarily the true story. According to Merriam-Webster, folk etymology is “the transformation of words so as to give them an apparent relationship to better-known or better-understood words.” This article talks about a number of cases of folk etymology, including the source of the words and […]
dawn.vogel | February 15, 2019
I’m a very visual person, so it’s not entirely surprising that I get a lot of mileage out of images of unusual things. It might be something as simple as glass-like flowers. The description I found for them says “A flower whose petals turn clear as glass when wet… Diphylleia Grayi otherwise known as the […]
dawn.vogel | February 8, 2019
Some days, the words just aren’t there, the well has run dry, or one of several other metaphors about not knowing what to write. When you’ve reached that point, this list of 31 ways to find inspiration for your writing might be helpful! While not all of these techniques work for everyone, odds are that […]
dawn.vogel | February 1, 2019
As January winds to a close, it’s time to start looking at writing prompts for February! For this year, I’ve still got some love-themed prompts, but I’m also taking some in very different directions. As always, use your own interpretation of the prompts! Check back on the last Friday of each month (or occasionally the […]
dawn.vogel | January 25, 2019
If you’re as fascinated by word origins as I am, you might like this list: Etymologically Speaking. It’s one of the more extensive lists I’ve found for word origins, plus it also does some cool things with looking at the same word in several languages, showing how those words wound up similar or very different! […]
dawn.vogel | January 18, 2019
The awesome folks at ServiceScape Incorporated recently contacted me to let me know about another list of writing prompts. They offer 301 writing prompts on their website! They’re sorted by broad genres, so that some of them might be taken in different directions, and they also offer a list of “story starters” that would make […]
dawn.vogel | January 11, 2019
Why doesn’t anything rhyme with purple? Or orange? It might have to do with the origins of those words. This article on Gizmodo talks about the etymology of colors, or how they got their English names. But did you know that not all languages have words for every color? And there’s also the belief that […]
dawn.vogel | January 4, 2019
I’ve been writing a lot of flash fiction in the past year, so I’m always excited to find flash fiction prompts. Here’s a list of 50 flash fiction prompts in a variety of genres. For an extra challenge, see if you can take one of these prompts and change the genre!
dawn.vogel | December 28, 2018
2018 is drawing to a close, and it’s time for the first writing prompts of 2019! For January’s words this year, it’s words about winter and the coming of a new year. But I’ve focused on words with more than one potential meaning, so you can interpret them in different ways. Check back on the […]
dawn.vogel | December 21, 2018
If you’re stuck in a rut and need a creative writing prompt that will get your brain thinking in new ways, check out this fun creative writing prompt from The Write Practice! Your end results may be more poetic than prose, but even that can lead you in the direction of a story or something […]
