Writing Prompt: Update a Classic

Sometimes in American cultural history a work of art is released unto the world and it so perfectly represents a region, a people, and a heritage that it must be remembered forever.  One such work of art is the iconic 1977 movie, Smokey and the Bandit.  It starred the greatest Florida State University alumni of all times, Mr. Burt Reynolds. 

Burt Reynolds (photo by Watkinssportswear [CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)])

The plot involved a plan to drive from Atlanta, Georgia, to Texarkana, Texas, and return with a truckload of beer within 28 hours.  The Bandit would run interference in a Pontiac Trans Am and Snowman would drive an 18-wheeler full of beer.

The Bandit's Pontiac Trans Am (Photo Pat Loika [CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)])

As a writer, today's challenge is to write a scene from Smokey & the Bandit updated for contemporary times and people.  Today you writing prompt is to 

rewrite a scene from Smokey & the Bandit so that it features a modern Bandit's Toyota Prius.  

 

Writing Prompt: Choices

It's 2 a.m. and a stolen Honda Accord is flying down an American interstate away from the suburbs and towards a big city.  Inside the car, four teen boys with over 80 criminal offenses between them are looking nervously over their shoulders and in the rear view mirror at an endless parade of flashing blue lights that lights up the sky behind them.  In their wake, the boys have left a dead convenience store clerk, three car crashes, and a wounded police officer.  In the backseat, one of the boys looks down at the pistol laying in his lap.  They see more flashing lights on highway overpasses and on-ramps up ahead.

It's a little late for them start to thinking about their choices now, but as a writer you can think and write about the choices that these young men made.  For today's writing prompt, write about a scenario where one of these young men could have made --

 a different choice for a different destiny.   

Setting Writing Prompt: The Cave

A great setting can be vital to a great story.  Caves make for the best of tales from Cornwallis Cave in Yorktown, Virginia, to the caverns of the Blue Ridge Mountains to Missouri's Meramec Caverns which reported was a hideout for the outlaw Jesse James, I've long been fascinated by caves.  They've always been havens for pirates and outlaws.  In fantasy fiction, the possibilities of cave adventure are endless.  Caves are an excellent setting.  For today's writing prompt, write us a short piece of fiction that is set in a --

Cave!

Grjótagjá caves near Mývatn lake, Iceland - Photo by Chmee2 [CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)]

Writing Prompt: The Trial of the Descendant

Just five or ten years into the future, there is a high profile trial.  Thanks to online genealogy services and DNA databases a person has been identified as being related to people who committed an atrocious human rights abuse that occurred seventy, one hundred, or even 150 years ago.  This person is now on trial where the government aims to take much of their present day assets and redistribute them to the descendants of people who survived the 19th or 20th century atrocity perpetrated by their ancestors.

Mural on a Slavery Museum in the Netherlands (photo by -JvL- from Netherlands [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)]

As a writer, you pick the country, the atrocity, and the time period.  Your writing prompt is to write a short courtroom drama that centers around the -

defense or prosecution of 

the descendant defendant.