Exercise 4 — Emotion Without Labels Goal: Convey emotion via action, perception, somatic detail, and thought — with zero emotion words. Prompt: Receiving life-altering bad news over a crackly phone line. Target Length: 1,200 words I had been sitting on the couch all morning, staring blankly at the bare walls. Whenever lucidity came…
Exercise 3—Biased Observation Goal: Demonstrate how worldview filters description; what the POV omits matters as much as what they note. Prompt: Walking through a night market in a foreign city with a secret agenda. Target Length: 1,000 words Some things are unchanging. Flipflops clapping, shoes tapping, heels clacking, children’s feet shuffling, four-legged creatures…
Exercise 2 — Voice Deep Dive Goal: Create a narrative voice inseparable from the POV character — diction, rhythm, metaphor, syntax. Prompt: Return to the childhood home after years away: meticulous, control-obsessed POV. Target Length: 1,000 words I turned the corner and expected to see the banyan tree, but only a fat stump…
Exercise 1 — POV Purity & Sensory Anchoring Goal: Absolute discipline — no POV violations, no floating camera. Build trust through strict sensory filtering. Prompt: Packing a suitcase after a breakup — the other person is in the next room, silent. Target Length: 1,000 words I can hear her bare feet shuffling across…