A Summer of Writing Prompts

In homage to the Summer Projects of my childhood, and the book I wrote when I was five

It’s almost summer! At least, it’s almost the school summer holidays, which is the rhythm I tend to work to, ever since I married a teacher.

When I was a child, my mum always made me do schoolwork during the summer holidays. Not to the same extent as I would have done at school, but just enough to ‘keep my hand in’. Usually, this involved a couple of workbooks that I’d make my way through over the six-week holiday (one for maths, one for English, maybe one for science), and a Special Project.

The Special Project was always something I looked forward to, because it was a chance for me to unleash my inner geek and really dig down into something I was interested in. Somewhere, I still have my first one: a book I made when I was five years old, called It’s Not Fair!. It’s made of folded sheets of cream A4 paper, with a front cover I designed myself, and with the story and illustrations across every page.

I don’t remember what my other Special Projects were, as I think they’d stopped by the time I reached secondary school, and summer holidays got taken up by youth theatre productions and music camps and then eventually by summer jobs.

But I remember the feeling of deciding what my Summer Project was going to be. I remember the excitement of embarking on a new one, the knowledge that here was something I could properly throw myself into for the next six weeks.

It’s the same feeling I get when embarking on a new writing project. That sense of possibility. The deep breath before you dive in, which sends the oxygen sizzling through your blood. I often think it’s the most exciting moment in any project, when it could become literally anything.

In many ways, it’s also a dangerous feeling. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s guilty of abandoning half-completed projects to the lure of the Bright Shiny New Thing…

I’m not the only one - right??

Nowadays, my projects tend to be less seasonally prescribed. Gone are the days when I felt confident in my ability to write a whole book in just six weeks. Now, creative projects take years.

But I haven’t lost that feeling that the school summer holidays bring. Something about the break from normal routine – and even though the world of work doesn’t necessarily follow the same timetable as school termtimes, I often think it’s still there for many of us. An intrinsic feeling that something is different over these next six weeks – even if it’s just the fact that so many people who are connected with schools take time off in the summer holidays to go on holiday and/or to look after kids.

Summer often feels to me like a time apart from the everyday. There’s a sense of freedom to embark on something new. The feeling of possibility. The lure of playful creativity.

So that’s what I’m planning for the next five weeks.

Five writing prompts, each designed to take you out of the groove you might be used to writing in. Each suggesting a new project, a new possibility. And hopefully, each of them tapping into the playful side of writing.

After all, we write because it’s fun, right?

So here goes. A summer of new stories, poems, or fragments. A summer of writing fun.

Who’s with me?