Fantasy Favourites | This or That

Once Upon a Time in Another Dimension …

ToT Challenge for Fiction Writers

My mother used to write fiction, in most of the same genres which I enjoy writing and reading. When she was deep in writing mode my family would fondly describe her as being “away with the fairies”. It was not meant as an insult, more an acknowledgement that her attention was slightly “elsewhere” when she was worldbuilding.

One of the fun things about writing fiction, is that it is very immersive. To write it well your characters become real to you, their dialogues, their speech tags and their native locations become almost tangible.

I even convince myself! When I wrote Love Letters Straight from the Heart it felt as if I visited the Prickly Pear Cafe every time my MC went there for a coffee and to study. Several readers commented that they wished they could go there too. What a compliment, I must’ve done a good job setting the scene.

If I’m not in the middle of a serialised piece of writing, publishing a new chapter weekly, there are competitions or mash-up to write for. It may be necessary to include certain elements, a premise or a grammatical style to earn points or some have a wordcount limit. The more adventurous fiction writers devise stories where another writer then picks up the baton of the existing storyline and runs with it. There are no limits to the imagination!

For me, participating in BJ’s varied This or That challenges works as a palate cleanser, between stories. It’s also helped me get to know more about some awesome writers. Now I have created this fantasy fiction themed challenge in the hope that I can coax some of my favourites from the fantasy genre into participating.

C’mon guys, I have customized 20 magical questions honed for our comfort zone. But I don’t want to create a clique, please writers of essays, and more contemporary fiction, join in! Perhaps some will be reminded how much fun ‘creative writing’ was at school and be tempted to dip a toe in the water of make it up as you go along genre ~ that is my happy place!

For those of you who have not done a ToT prompt, here’s how to play:

1. Copy and paste this list of questions into an article, you can use this for your sub-title or kicker: “Fantasy Fiction This or That Challenge”
2. Answer all 20 questions. You must choose one of the options for each question. Try not to use the hideous answers of “neither” or “both”, it’s not really in the spirit of choosing.
3. Publish your article/response wherever you like. In BJ’s ToT — The Gathering Table. or a publication that allows challenges, or under your own name.
4. Use This or That as your first topic, maybe Fantasy Favourites could be our topic!
5. Please tag me — Jacinta Palmer in your response but also the Wizz of the West Brett Jenae Tomlin (the @ symbol then “theanxiousenthusiast”), AND BJ’s This or That — The Gathering Table somewhere in the body of your article.
6. Feel free to share this challenge with any of your Fiction writing friends, I’d love to get to know more of my ‘team’ on Medium!

Now pull up your chair / magic carpet / toadstool and sharpen your pencil / quill / hack into the mainframe, let’s recite the incantation and reveal your choices.

1. Dystopian or Enchanted
2. Vampire or Dragon
3. Sword or Bolt of Fire from your Fingers
4. Mind Reading or Crystal Ball
5. Broomstick or Winged Creature
6. Runes or Tarot Cards
7. Under an Oath or Stolen Memories
8. Rainbow or Waterfall
9. Enchanted Object or Cursed Object
10. Seer or Warlock
11. Dungeon or Banishment
12. Soul Sucking or Demon Torment
13. Portal or Time Travel
14. Undiscovered or Forgotten
15. Enchanted to Sleep or Cursed to Ride
16. Diary or Grimoire
17. Kraken or Mermaid
18. Haunted or Re-programmed
19. Historical or Future
20. This World or Another Realm

Thanks for playing — happy this or that-ing you mystical mages!

I’d love to see responses from: Jonathon Sawyer Sieran Lane Kathy K Jay C Wells Bradan Writes Stories JF Danskin Ravyne Hawke Paul Combs Sam W. Samuel Kenneth Kauffman Rayne Sanning Cathylouise CleverandWtf Eric Pierce E. Ardincaple Arpad Nagy Merr Gumm Lonely Book Corner Patrick Metzger Celia McKinley Michael Thorn Raine Lore Tovah Rainsong Paula Shablo FJCMontenegro Mark Tulin Marcello Sweet Chaos FJCMontenegro KL Simmons JA Vassili Nevena Pascaleva PJ Jackelman SLSnow88

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