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Instigation: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side
Brimming with over 500 prompts, INSTIGATION: CREATIVE PROMPTS ON THE DARK SIDE is a treasury of twisted tips, strange scenarios and disturbing sparks to help ignite the fuel in your creative furnace. Its aim? To push you into the danger zone of your imagination, by thinking in unconventional ways and trying things you never thought — or dared — to try before in your writing, art, or dreams.
Writers, especially, will benefit from this book of "story starters" that can shatter writer's block and possess your fingers with an impish creative spirit. Arnzen’s Instigation — filled with unique prompts drawn directly from his fiction workshops at Seton Hill University, his columns from Hellnotes and his Bram Stoker Award-winning newsletter, The Goreletter — has already helped hundreds of horror writers, dark “creatives” and unconventional artists…many of whom have not only crafted original material, but published it as a result of responding to these twisted prompts.
Contents include: Prompts: 365 Sick Scenarios | Spurs: 31 Turns for the Worse | Resurrections: 13 Radical Revisions | Memoir Mayhem: 151 Prompts for Journaling | The Devil Made You Do It Yourself: 6 DIY Exercises | Essays on Writing on the Dark Side: "In the Mood: Getting Ready to Write"; "Binge Writing and NaNoWriMo"; "Discovering Your Hidden Intentions"; "Question-Storming"; "Making Modern Monsters"; "What Corrupted Me"; "The Five Laws of Arnzen" | Tips For Further Instigaton | Apps, Websites, Related Readings, and Writing Communities
Instigation is distinctive not only in the way it focuses on drawing out your dark side, but also in Arnzen's provocations across the entire writing process, from brainstorming ideas, to starting on the blank page, to resurrecting a stalled novel or approaching revision from an alternative angle. You'll also get plenty of advice in a series of articles that round out the book with tips about the writing life and creativity from a longtime professional author with over twenty years in the business, who has taught graduate writing courses on the dark side for just as long.
Whether you’re a thriller writer feeling a twinge of block, a gothic artist hoping to paint yourself out of a dark corner, a horror novelist stuck in your nanowrimo haze, a writing teacher looking for unique classroom activities…or just anyone looking to prime your creative pump, this book is sure to instigate the devil inside of you as you grope deeper into the darkness within and discover the unexpected.
For sample prompts visit Michael Arnzen and subscribe to his newsletter at http://gorelets.com/
Writers, especially, will benefit from this book of "story starters" that can shatter writer's block and possess your fingers with an impish creative spirit. Arnzen’s Instigation — filled with unique prompts drawn directly from his fiction workshops at Seton Hill University, his columns from Hellnotes and his Bram Stoker Award-winning newsletter, The Goreletter — has already helped hundreds of horror writers, dark “creatives” and unconventional artists…many of whom have not only crafted original material, but published it as a result of responding to these twisted prompts.
Contents include: Prompts: 365 Sick Scenarios | Spurs: 31 Turns for the Worse | Resurrections: 13 Radical Revisions | Memoir Mayhem: 151 Prompts for Journaling | The Devil Made You Do It Yourself: 6 DIY Exercises | Essays on Writing on the Dark Side: "In the Mood: Getting Ready to Write"; "Binge Writing and NaNoWriMo"; "Discovering Your Hidden Intentions"; "Question-Storming"; "Making Modern Monsters"; "What Corrupted Me"; "The Five Laws of Arnzen" | Tips For Further Instigaton | Apps, Websites, Related Readings, and Writing Communities
Instigation is distinctive not only in the way it focuses on drawing out your dark side, but also in Arnzen's provocations across the entire writing process, from brainstorming ideas, to starting on the blank page, to resurrecting a stalled novel or approaching revision from an alternative angle. You'll also get plenty of advice in a series of articles that round out the book with tips about the writing life and creativity from a longtime professional author with over twenty years in the business, who has taught graduate writing courses on the dark side for just as long.
Whether you’re a thriller writer feeling a twinge of block, a gothic artist hoping to paint yourself out of a dark corner, a horror novelist stuck in your nanowrimo haze, a writing teacher looking for unique classroom activities…or just anyone looking to prime your creative pump, this book is sure to instigate the devil inside of you as you grope deeper into the darkness within and discover the unexpected.
For sample prompts visit Michael Arnzen and subscribe to his newsletter at http://gorelets.com/
142 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 15, 2013
7 people are currently reading
36 people want to read
About the author
Michael A. Arnzen
81 books280 followersMichael Arnzen has won multiple awards for his fiction and poetry, including four Bram Stoker Awards and the International Horror Guild Award. He teaches horror and suspense writing at Seton Hill University, as faculty in their unique MFA degree program in Writing Popular Fiction.
To catch up with Arnzen or hunt down collectable editions, visit the author's website, GORELETS.COM Or tune in his new podcast: 6:66 w/Michael Arnzen at http://6m66s.com/
To catch up with Arnzen or hunt down collectable editions, visit the author's website, GORELETS.COM Or tune in his new podcast: 6:66 w/Michael Arnzen at http://6m66s.com/
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 15, 2013
I own a couple of books on prompts that were good but was never tailored toward the dark side of things that I love so much. This book offers that and so much more. From prompts to start you off to prompts that will help you when you get stuck in a certain idea you're trying to convey.
Highly recommendable book that I will have close to me to be my air freshener in those moments of brain farts.
Highly recommendable book that I will have close to me to be my air freshener in those moments of brain farts.
April 8, 2013
Peculiar. Delightfully Disturbing. Brilliant.
This book will follow you - actually it will run ahead of you shouting: "Hey! What do you think about this?!!" Perfect for those times when your creatures or inanimate objects want something to do.
Instigation: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side - Thank you, Mr. Arnzen!
This book will follow you - actually it will run ahead of you shouting: "Hey! What do you think about this?!!" Perfect for those times when your creatures or inanimate objects want something to do.
Instigation: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side - Thank you, Mr. Arnzen!
January 25, 2024
Fun and twisted prompts and ideas for those of us who write horror.
February 4, 2020
Wow! Dr. Arnzen is for real! And his sense of humor aligns with mine, and that is rare to find another person who can "Speak My Language!" Not only is this book chocked full of prompts, but he has ideas for when you get stuck in stories, prompts to pick up your failing plot, and so many other things.
If you think you need a bit of a boost from time to time, and you usually peruse the Dark Fiction sections, Get This Book! I already am working on three stories due to his prompts!!k
If you think you need a bit of a boost from time to time, and you usually peruse the Dark Fiction sections, Get This Book! I already am working on three stories due to his prompts!!k
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews