I posted weekly (or every-few-weekly) Friday Writing Experiments for a year or so, and I now post new ones occasionally. See the chronological list below.

In addition, Field Work is a notebook practice of using brief but intense writing experiments that I often recommend to help writers explore the depths of their stories.

This resources page will lead you to other useful links and practical advice about writing, publishing and the writer’s life.

1: A Novel In 1,500 Words (storytelling; narrative structure)
2: Poison Pen Portrait (character)
3: Variations On The Form Of ‘I Remember’ (memory; voice; tone; lists)
4: A Date With An Artist (creative companionship and sustenance)
5: Borrowing From The Bard (Shakespeare; starting points and inspirations; epigraphs)
6: Writing Good Sentences (sentences; syntax)
7: Ghost Story (ghosts; chance operations; writing by candlelight)
8: NaNoWriYear (planning a novel)
9: A Word (etymologies)
10: Saint’s Day (names; saints; story)
11: My Life As A Musical (life writing; inspirations and imaginings)
12: The Power Of Four (writing in sections)
13: Filters (new life)
14: Popping Pills (drugs; character)
15: Tell Me A Short Story (short stories)
16: People Of The Stars (astrology; character)
17: O, Just-spring! (inspirations; invocations; gratitudes)
18: Candlelit Tales (lighting conditions)
19: Ode For A Special Occasion (ode; commemorations)
20: Lists, Lovely Lists (lists)
21: Dream Come True (dreams and reality)
22: Voice 1: Listening (overheard dialogue; listening)
23: Voice 2: Tone (tone; emotion)
24: Voice 3: Passion and Purpose (purpose; fire)
25: Voice 4: Other Voices (first-person point of view; character)
26: Distinguishing Features (character; physical attributes)
27: My Own Private Heidi (Right Speech; utopia; love)
28: Plantings (flora; setting)
29: Great Annotations (revising; rewriting; annotating)
30: Wardrobe Masters And Mistresses (character; attributes; behaviour)
(30a) Summer Hiatus: R&R (Reading And Refreshment) ** (reading)
31: Get Thee To A Library (I Remember; libraries)
32: This Ordinary Magic (magic in realism; the everyday)
33: A Little Bird Told You (ekphrastic writing; animals)
34: Windy Ditties (inspirations; weather)
35: Bring In The Light (the light in your writing)
36: Second Homes (home in your writing)
37: Old Friends, New Faces (characters, settings, situations)
38: Adventures In Time And Space (constraints)
39: Self-Help (self-help books)
40: Friday the 13th (reversals)
41: The Still Point Of The Sun (solstice; the past meeting the future)
42: Resolve Nothing (the power of observation)
43: Dawnsong (aubades)
44: Once Upon A Time (storytelling)
45: Thrice-Told Tales (narration)
46: Gossip Drops (gossip)
47: Love Is Blind (Valentine’s Day; Love)
48: Tales Of Your City (setting; character)
49: More Tales Of Your City (an encounter)
50: Spring Is Sprung (spring; happiness; commemorations)
51: Locked In (prison stories)
52: Happily Ever After (fairy tales; biography)
53: Breaking Up Is Never Easy, You Know (break-up letter; voice)
54: Write! A Manifesto (manifestos; intention)
55: Dear Diaries (keeping a diary; voice)
56: Fanmail (letter writing)
57: Off Your Chest (emotive writing)
58: Spring Clean-up (revising)
59: Words Words Words (words; constraints)
60: Word Power (words; revising)
61: Raising The Tone (tone; politics; tricksters; love)
62: Receiving, And Giving (cultural appropriation; gifts; give vs take in writing)
63: A Gift On Every Page (revising and editing; gifts)
64: The Wrong Envelope (reversals of fortune; plotting; story prompts)
65: An Archive Of Belonging (writing about home; gifts)
66: Copyist (models and inspirations; somatic writing)
67: I Don’t Remember (character; going deeper; secrets and lies; subtext)
68: Putting It Through The Typewriter Again (revising)
69: We Are A Muse (inspirations)
70: Character Questionnaire (character)
71: Characters Sparking Joy (character)
72: Sitting (And Walking) With Your Characters (character)
73: ‘Heart’ Words vs ‘Head’ Words (words, style)
74: Only Connect (plotting, alternatives to conflict)
75: Tulip Fever (inspirations – names, characters, stories, settings)
76: Childhood Revisitations (fairy tales, childhood influences, retellings, vectors)
77: I Never (character, voice)
78: Express Yourself Without Feedback (sharing, instinct, voice)
79: Looking for the Four Elements (Four Elements, intuitive writing)
80: Writing Utopia (Four Elements, Fire, energy in writing)
81: Yours compassionately (Four Elements, Water, feeling in writing)
82: Earthly Exchanges (Four Elements, Earth, materiality in writing)
83: Clear Thinking (Letters, Air, thinking in writing, letters)
84: Acknowledgements (gratitude, building support)
85: Voice Notes (voice, expression, confidence)
86: Suffering (purpose and intention)
87: Gnarliness and Writing (challenges and difficulties in your writing)
88: Can and Can’t (Field Work)
89: Must and Mustn’t (Field Work)
90: I Want (A Dyke For President) (Field Work)
91: Days of the Dead (shrines, memorials)
92: Worlds of Work (character, memoir)
93: Rites and Writes for the Autumn Equinox (revision, rewriting)
94: Field Work (broader advice on this notebook practice)
95: I Am A Delight Song (list poems, Field Work)

And more:
* Charles Bernstein’s Experiments
* Jack Collom’s Ecosystem Of Writing Ideas in The Alphabet of the Trees and (with Sheryl Noethe) Poetry Everywhere
* Kelly Link’s 34 Transformative Prompts to Unlock Your Writing
* Bernadette Mayer’s Writing Experiments
* A Month of Daily Prompts from the National Writing Project
* Contemplative Pedagogy Trainings from Naropa University

And the following books also contain lots of writing exercises:
* Natalie Goldberg – Writing Down the Bones is a classic, but most of her books contain plenty of prompts. Old Friend from Far Away is particularly good for life writing/memoir
* Lucy Van Smit, The Writer’s Journal Workbook
* Robin Behn & Chase Twichell, The Practice of Poetry
* Laura Deutsch, Writing from the Senses
* Sherry Ellis, Now Write!
* Kate Grenville, The Writing Book
* Constance Hale, Sin and Syntax and Constance Hale’s Lesson Plans For Teachers
* Brian Kitely, The 3 AM Epiphany
* Josip Novakovich, Fiction Writer’s Workshop and Writing Fiction Step by Step