Or … Mad Libs Can be Your Friend!

I am always trying to think of a new way to wake up my muse…spice up my prose…get the mental juices flowing. Christmas, I received a Mad Libs card game in my stocking – okay I bought it and put it in there, but I NEVER get anything in MY stocking so yes, I did it myself!

Anyhoo, I digress. If you have ever played Mad Libs, it is similar, however you draw cards to form funny sentences rather than inserting words for a story. (If you have no knowledge of this ageless pop-culture game this reference may seem weird, but I think you’ll catch on.) The deck of cards comes with 24 cards each of verbs, nouns, adverbs and adjectives. (There are a couple of other cards specific to the game, but I didn’t use those.) What I did: without looking, I drew three cards randomly from each category and wrote them down. Then I used the words to create a scene in a WIP I am in desperate need to finish.

As a challenge, I loved it. As a scene builder it helped me past a block I had presented myself. And I plan on using the scene in the book. (Though I may take out the “ly” words, as I try not to use many in my work and the sentences work as well without them.)

Would you like to read what I came up with?

Mad Libs words:

Adverb Verb

feverishly threaten

bitterly record

horribly burn

Adjective Noun

sticky hot dogs

heartsick hard drives

enormous dummies

From WIP Desire Me(Alex is the heroine – she thinks just blew her boyfriends singing career out of the water)

Heartsick and lonely, Alex trekked down the block to the convenience store on the corner to buy enormous amounts of ice cream. Her room didn’t have a refrigerator, the rooms less then $35 a night rarely did, but she didn’t think it would be a problem. After several pints, she chased the cold treat down with a couple of lukewarm hot dogs.

An hour later, hands and face sticky with Chunky Monkey and Cherry Garcia Alex lay starring at the ceiling. Her stomach rumbled horribly as the feast any teen would envy threatened to come back up.

Tears burned her eyes. She loved Drew and wished she could tell him again, but those dummies with Cowboy Weekly magazine had wasted no time printing her outburst. Every person with a camera, shoot even cell phones, set to record one moment she wished she could take back. Hell, she’d bet their online magazine was burning up folks hard drives with country music gossip.

She tried not to think back over the day bitterly, but is was all she did 24/7, since her misspeak. She feverishly wished she could forget it, but even in her sleep Drew haunter her.

My challenge to you for the new year – think of a way to do the same – let me know what you did and how it works out!