Publisher's Synopsis
What the heck, you may ask, is a one-sentence story? A good definition: a story told in a single sentence. It could be a short, very short sentence or it could be a long, very long sentence. For the purpose of this anthology, the specified number of words is between 200 and 2000. "Any sentence can be made longer..." according to Professor Steven Pinker, Ph.D. And that's what started this idea of constructing a long sentence that tells a story. Never mind what Teacher warned about "run-on" sentences! Never mind what writing professors tell you. Just put your pen to paper or fingers to computer and W-R-I-T-E! As for merits? That's up to the writer, anyone who writes - whether writing for business or for telling fictitious stories for fun. We write to inform, question, describe, document (relate what happened), and to express our souls. How do you write? You hear it all the time. "They do it with movies; they do it with television shows; they do it with jazz music; and they even do it on Broadway!" They believe that when the first - the original - presentation is well received, it's time to produce another one. This book is the second presentation of One-Sentence Stories, starring many of the original cast of writers who wrote noticeably longer new stories this time, and also starring many new writers who have added new and exciting stories. The fun doesn't stop! One-sentence story writing originated with a challenge from the noted Dr. Steven Pinker, MIT professor, linguist, and author of such books as The Language Instinct and The Sense of Style. In both books, he cited long sentences in literature with "as many as 340 words," adding "every sentence can be made longer." Well, what writer can ignore such a challenge! That's when the fun began. Writers soon began to come up with their own extraordinary ways of writing a sentence. In this book you'll discover how Benjamin Lukoff uses the International Phonetic Alphabet-derived Lushootseed alphabet to represent native place names. And how holly woodie eschews capital letters and punctuation altogether - and both express intriguing stories. Writers report that this word-doodling has been going on for some time, and whether you call it word-doodling, playing with words, sentence-stretching, or silly sentences, it has its advantages. One of them is reducing stress; who can't use that? Another is re-focusing, as in what to do when a writer hits that well-known writer's block. Still another advantage is emptying the mind of words that have congregated in the head and need expelling. But the fun comes with the realization that you're writing those much-maligned "run-on sentences" that Teacher warned about back in grammar class. Some English teachers are using one-sentence writing to teach ways to use the English language. Now therapists working with patients under mental stress are using the project in a different way. When they encouraged patients to write down their dreams, they discovered the lack of punctuation, which often made clear the brain's confusion. But wait! There's more! Writers can use one-sentence writing to develop an idea into a story, or take apart a story by separating the scenes. Yes, the one-sentence story offers potential to all people who write. Have you ever sat in a dull meeting and wished you were on a beach somewhere? Use your pen (to look as if you're taking notes) and write how you would feel on that beach. You'll walk out of that meeting with your head held high and a good story in your briefcase. It's also good medicine to ease your mind while waiting for a dentist's appointment, or in the midst of a day wrangling children, or anxious over an upcoming exam, or just plain weary of daily problems.... For sheer fun - the run-away-and-forget-daily-woes kind of fun - you won't find an easier activity than word-doodling a one-sentence story. Write it; stow it away in a file; and when the file is full, publish Your Collection of O
