18
I used to ignore the 'character flaw' part of prompts, but a story I wrote last month changed my mind.
For years, I'd just pick a cool plot idea from a prompt and run with it. Last month, I finally tried one that said 'write about a hero whose greatest strength is also their fatal flaw'. I wrote about a detective in Boston who was so detail-oriented she couldn't see the big picture. It took me three drafts, but that single constraint made the story feel real in a way my old ones never did. What's a prompt element you used to skip that actually helped you?
3 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In3 Comments
the_oscar7d ago
So what was the actual case about?
9
noah_webb5d ago
Looked into this case a while back. The actual dispute was about a detective who kept pulling over the same guy for minor traffic violations trying to build a drug case. Turned out the cops had no probable cause for the first stop and everything after that got thrown out. Most people miss how the whole chain of evidence collapsed because of one bad initial stop.
2