Noise

I found a writing prompt I thought I would share. Too often, new novelist (referring mainly to myself here) focuses too much on plot. We forget that the beauty of a story comes not from the strength of the plot alone, but in the language through which it's told.

So take Noise. It's everywhere. As I'm writing this, my iPod is blaring. There is an airplane overhead, the dog is barking, and the birds are busy just outside my window (it is still spring). Characters also hear nosies, but we forget to share them with our readers.

Write about a noise your character hears and tie it into the plot. Have the noise advance the tension and raise the emotional stakes. Here's a sample of what I did with this writing prompt. The character (I've written about her before) is stranded in a snow storm. No power, no heat. But the kitchen clock has a battery.

Tick. Tock.

The metronome of life. How it beats away each moment always and forever. But then I wonder, between feelings of hunger and frustration, if time would stop if every clock did? Absurd, really to even suppose for a moment that a man-made device could stop the divine unwinding of time.

Ticking and tocking and never stop-stopping. The void in my ears is engulfed like a snail in an undertow; where noise whitens my senses, dulling the tiny ticks until I no longer notice. Time, a silent killer, through a human invention becomes a constant drum .

Of all the things in this cabin that work, it's the battery-powered kitchen clock. I'm tempted to silence and embrace the fully (wo)man-powered life of chopping wood and melting water to drink. The basics of life - heat and water.

So I've left the battery alone. It seems almost cruel to remove the heart of the only working machine. Or maybe it's not compassion that compels me, but spite; to not trudge through these endless days alone, even if my only other companion is a tick-tock clock.