Real-Life Communication -- Solution
THE PLOT:
In the woods, a boy meets a
coyote that has saved him from an attacking bear. They become friends, but
the boy wants the coyote to live with him in his family's house.
The
coyote doesn't like living in civilization and runs away several times.
The boy, angry because he thinks the coyote doesn't like him, stops coming
out to visit the coyote in the woods. His father is happy because he doesn't
want his boy hanging out with the mangy mutt anyway.
The coyote, meanwhile,
thinks the boy doesn't like her, because he won't come out and visit.
They both are miserable because both have to live in different places, yet
both miss each other's company.
Then one day the boy's father
is out collecting firewood in the woods when he falls through some ice. The
coyote rescues the father and helps him to a nearby den where she keeps her
pups. The warmth of the coyote's den keeps the father from dying.
During
his stay in the den, the father also warms up to the coyote, whose care and
hospitality saved his life. The father is a changed man. The boy and his family
become lifelong friends of the coyote and they all live happily ever after.
Now
you have to invent characters: What is the boy like? What kinds of things
does the father say? What kind of personality does the coyote have?
Decide
what point of view you're going to take. Is the story going to be told
in the boy's voice (this is called writing in the first person) or will
there be an all-seeing narrator (third person)?
And don't forget
about the infinite number of details you'll want to fill in.
While
the above example is there to get you started, go ahead and play around with
it. Change the ending, make the coyote a cougar, or, better yet, write your
own outline, based on something you know a lot about or something you are
interested in. The possibilities are endless.
"Once you've got
that all important idea, you can go anywhere and do anything," says novelist
Michael Turner.