>>> Item number 30726 from WRITERS LOG9405E --- (41 records) ----- <<< Date: Sun, 29 May 1994 18:35:02 JST Reply-To: WRITERS Sender: WRITERS From: Mike Barker Subject: EXERCISE: And the SOB was a... 1. Pick one of the following (no fair peeking ahead, pick one first!): shapeshifter, were beastie, alien, sasquatch (big feet, I think?), devil, brujo, monster, ghost, demon, jinni, angel, telepath, mad scientist, elf, zombie, or other favorite critter from beyond? If you went with one of the loose ones (like monster), fine it down - make a choice, note the slobbering teeth, elevated antenna, cute little dewlap claws polished in black or whatever points your choice has so that you would recognize your creation in an alley behind the gravestones during the dark of the moon... 2. Your character, in a moment of madness (okay, whatever reason you want to dream up), has married someone who belongs to the selected ethnic group. Without really understanding that they are really and truly a member of that grouping, you perceive? One of those little secrets that newlyweds sometimes keep from each other... 3. Your assignment, Writer, should you choose to accept it, is to portray the end of the honeymoon when your character realizes just what is sharing the conjugal slab. You may, depending on taste, continue with the descent into horror, either arriving at a final reconciliation, perhaps a somewhat grotesque compromise to stay together for the baby's sake, or even a separation. But work with it, make us feel the clash between the bonds of matrimony and the lash of terror... who knows, you might want to do a dark fantasy romance! Incidentally, this exercise is based on a review of Bruce Boston's SF POETRY collection "Accursed Wives." I've expanded the list and let you pick whether the bride or the groom on the cake was taken from a box of animal crackers, but thought I should mention that responses to this do not necessarily have to be in story form... WRITE! tink