#90. To Handwrite Or Not To Handwrite? Plus a New Dreampunk Short Story

Your weekend is not weird enough without Brainstoryum! Brainstorming and writing short stories has never been so rich in discovery and surprises. Listeners’ words are drawn from the legendary Socks of Destiny and mixed into writing prompts which lead to the most unexpected story ideas—and a fascinating exploration of creative writing craft. Listeners are also warmly invited to share their own microfiction and poetry based on the previous show’s prompts. Today’s show showcases the latest of these, followed by another three laugh-out-loud rounds of Exquisite Corpse, which this time lead to a magical dreampunk tale with a touch of darkness.

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Hello imaginative people. I’m Anna Tizard and this is episode 90 of Brainstoryum.
 
Now, in the last show, I talked a bit about “imagination compost” as I called it, and the ideas that we inevitably lose in the process of developing an early brainstorm into a fully-fledged story, especially, if you write like me, transferring initial, handwritten notes onto a laptop or computer, as part of that development process. And having just had a difficult clear-out of my hideously messy notepads, of which I still have too many, I put the question to you: To handwrite or not to handwrite? Does handwriting give you an inspirational edge for that first draft, compared to typing? Is there something about the tactile page that helps draw out your innermost thoughts; do you find it comforting to take time for creative inspiration away from screens?
 
I was also scouting for some tips on how to better manage my own ever-growing pile of notepads which are, yeah, always difficult to chuck out.
 
The responses I received from my fellow writers were quite definitive.
 
Alessandro Bozzo said: “For me, the laptop is just more convenient. I'm able to save my file to the cloud so if inspiration hits me while I'm out without my laptop, I can access my draft on my phone or from another computer if available. I also have terrible penmanship lol.”
 
Eric Montgomery said, “I’m all for direct into the laptop myself. I can’t read my handwriting! Plus, because of how I keep my notes/ writing, I can also pull anything I write up on my phone (and vice versa). And it’s all fully encrypted.”
 
Patrick Towey said, “I don't hand write, because my writing is messy.”
 
I can sense a pattern forming here… What is this mysterious pattern? 😉
 
In a way, it’s reassuring that I’m not the only writer whose handwriting is a disaster zone. Eric brought up encryption. Well, I’m tempted to add that our messy scrawl might qualify as a form of encryption, if it wasn’t potentially rendered useless by us not being able to read it ourselves. (Now that’s encryption.)
 
But what I’m trying to get to is: Is there anyone out there who still believes in there being something special about the physical hand-to-pen, pen-to-paper connection. I’ve certainly read threads on social media in the past on the psychology around this, the way the simple act of putting pen to page harps back to our first, magical memories of learning to write and realising we could create worlds this way, and even surprise ourselves with the ideas that seem to flow out of us with a simple twirl of a pen.
 
But… If we’ve been typing for enough years, I’d argue that this will also inevitably become a muscle memory that carries the exact same associations, over time. I learned to touch type when I was about 17 or 18, and I now type faster than anyone I know, except my mum (who is FAST); and I can type much faster than I can handwrite, probably double the speed or more, so I can more easily keep up with the flow of my thoughts, whenever I get a sudden flurry of ideas.
 
If the romanticism around handwriting still exists, well, it may have faded in a lot of us writers for practical reasons. Handwriting a card or a note, or even a letter, is one thing, very personal (presuming the recipient can actually read your very personal thoughts) but when it comes to creative writing, maybe the best method is the one you feel most comfortable with and that gets your words down in the most efficient way possible.
 
I think for me, what the physical page does is it gives me permission to scrawl down something that is probably rubbish. Those very first impressions, as I brainstorm ideas, are “allowed” to be messy and all over the place—just like my handwriting. It’s kind of appropriate! Things begin to take a clearer form in both senses of the word, when I’m typing up those scrappy notes and starting to take them in new directions on the neat, digital page.
 
So I think I have to carry on as I have been, except… I’m determined, now, to label things up and cross a line through pages once I’ve finished moving that story onto my laptop, so my future self has no qualms or concerns about chucking the blooming thing out. It’s all about being kind to your future self, which is easy to lose sight of when your present self is whipped up in an inspiration frenzy.
 
****** 
Now, before we move on to some new rounds of Exquisite Corpse, the writing prompt I invited your stories and ideas on in the last show was the curious word combination, ‘the buzzing diner’. I wasn’t sure if this might lead to stories about strange creatures, or if there might be more realism-based interpretation. I received a mixture: as ever, I find that the only thing you can predict about my fellow writers’ responses is their unpredictability, and the sheer range of unique interpretations. Such is the power of your imagination.
 
Eric Montgomery wrote:
 
“The booths filled with jurors fresh from the courthouse, their voices bouncing off chrome and tile. Plates clattered, spoons chimed, and by the lunch rush the whole diner buzzed as if the walls themselves were in on the gossip.”
 
I enjoyed this, you’ve found a way to interpret the buzz as part of a building atmosphere. It’s like a snapshot. Thank you, Eric.
 
Alessandro Bozzo wrote:
“Tessa sat in her booth salivating over the hamburger on the table in front of her. The smell of fries and ketchup permeated the air. The busy diner was abuzz with the sound of patrons gossiping. An old light fixture above her head made a buzzing noise as its bulb flickered. She had placed her cellphone on vibrate - nothing was going to interrupt this lunch. As if to mock her, the phone buzzed to life with a text message. Tessa sighed and glanced at the screen.
 
‘It escaped! Need you back in the lab ASAP!’
 
As she finished reading the message, a strange looking insect buzzed past her ear, alighting onto her burger. Tessa's eyes opened wide with concern.
 
‘Now how did you get out?’”
 
I love how we’re sort of nudged in all these different directions as to what is causing the buzzing: is it the lights, is it her phone, and then we get a glimpse of what’s really happening. Some of kind of experimental species of bug. Through the warm scent of burger and fries, I’m picking up signs of a creepy backstory already. Thank you, Alessandro.
 
Paul McMillan aka Bookmarksloveandlore on X, wrote:
“The diner had always been a little odd, but now the air itself hummed, vibrating with a soft golden shimmer that seeped through the cracks of the storage room door. Locals whispered it was just faulty wiring, but those who lingered long enough swore they saw winged shadows darting across the linoleum floor. Strangers came, drawn by the strange hum and the taste of pie that somehow always reminded them of their happiest memory. Mrs. Kettle, still mourning her husband, found herself steadied by the laughter of new patrons and the unseen magic that poured warmth into her heart. Perhaps the gateway hadn’t opened by accident, perhaps it knew she needed saving, too.”
 
Ooh, lots of hints of different elements going on here: a winged shadow, and pies that fill you with nostalgia. Finally, a gateway. This scene feels like a gateway opening, to something more. Thank you, Paul.
 
Nick Vracar wrote: “The diner had looked ordinary on the outside, but Claire knew it wasn’t. Inside there was a door. A special door. Sitting inside, in one of its red booths, unnerved her. The other customers were still. There was a constant buzz, not from the lights, but from the people.”
 
A sense of mystery building here. It feels quite scifi. In a way, is it scarier if people themselves are buzzing, literally, as opposed to a creature? Thank you, Nick.
 
Paul Monteith, aka Mostly Paul or Quantum Fairy on Bluesky, wrote:
“In a dining room, a cloud of flies coalesced into a man. Server Gwen approached the unexpected diner.
 
‘I'm sorry, Sir, but you need a reservation.’
 
The man looked at Gwen. ‘Check your reservations. You'll see a Lord B.L. Zeebub, table for one at one.’
 
Gwen was sure the diner had a mouth full of flies and was forming his words by shaping the buzzing sound with his lips. When a fly landed on Lord B.L. Zeebub's table, Gwen instinctively swatted it with a menu. Lord B.L. Zeebub whimpered, and his body buzzed with agitation.
 
‘Sorry,’ Gwen said. ‘We've had fly issues today,’ and then inexplicably added, ‘It wasn't one of yours, was it?’
 
Lord B.L. Zeebub looked at Gwen with sadness. ‘Not anymore.’”
 
Now this is proper creepy, and humorous as well. Interesting combination of person and creature, I guess, in the form of a demon or the devil with flies making up his actual body. This makes a kind of intuitive sense in its grossness. Thank you, Paul Monteith.
 
Right, well it is now time for us to dip once more into the endless story possibilities that await us in… the Socks of Destiny.
 
*SOCKS OF DESTINY ORGAN JINGLE*

This part of the show is un-transpose-able! There's much giggling and rustling of paper as I pull words at random from the Socks of Destiny to create three unique sentences according to the rules of Exquisite Corpse, going: “Describing word—noun—action—describing word—noun.” Today’s resulting sentences are:
 
1. The wondrous midnight squee’d into the microphone to attract the attention of the illuminated tree trunk.
2. The murderous blood moon eagerly awaited the trial of the inner bubble wrap.
3. The forgetful elevator flipped a coin with the cursed red panda.
 
After some initial brainstorming, I use the "pause button" (at length!) to draft a scene or short story, using one of these as my chosen writing prompt. Here goes (fingers crossed)…
 
******
 
OK, so before I start reading out my draft, this story has got a little bit out of control and is turning into, hm, about three and a half thousand words. Which is way too long to read out on this show. But if I start from the very beginning, then stop about a thousand words in, you will miss the juicy part. So I’m going quickly summarise what happens in the beginning so I can skip ahead a little bit.
 
My protagonist is Sian who has a new job in a publishing house of literary works, but hankers for something more, book-wise. In her lunch hour she stumbles into a shop her colleagues would all sneer at: a comic book shop called Under the Blood Moon Comics. (Because I have gone with “The murderous blood moon eagerly awaited the trial of the inner bubble wrap.”) As she buys a graphic novel, the shopkeeper has an unusual way of explaining ‘urban fantasy’, and that’s where I’ll dive in:
 
As if sensing her interest, the shop keeper turned his dusky eyes upon her with fresh intensity. His tone was deep, yet easy, conversational.
 
“The terrors of the forest have retreated as we’ve moved away from it, and built ourselves new spaces to live. But we bring our hauntings with us, don’t you think? We carry the folklore of the forest within us, wherever we may go. This,” he raised his eyebrows at the street outside the window; “This is our self-made forest. We build our dreams, our aspirations, ever outwards, but our nightmares are never far behind. They lurk in every shadow, in the very brickwork that surrounds us; the history that breathes in every chimney pot.”
 
“I love the way you put that. So beautiful,” Sian blustered, her cheeks warm. “You must be an author, too?” She gestured at the shop’s interior, to make it clear she meant ‘like these other authors’, not ‘like me’. The idea that this poetic stranger might guess she was an aspiring author made her stomach shrivel to a pea.
 
He thanked her and they exchanged a few more pleasantries as he tapped numbers into the card terminal.
 
Sian was just murmuring her goodbye when the man reached under the counter and produced a small package. “A free gift. For my one-hundredth customer this month.”
 
“Oh. Wow. Really? Thank you.” She turned it over, tracing the string that criss-crossed the brown paper package. It was light and roughly oblong; through the slight squish of bubble wrap beneath the paper, the flatness of a small book poked through. A notebook, probably?
 
A folded note was tucked under the string which, for some reason, Sian could only train her eyes to read properly after she’d left the shop, stumbling out her thanks. It read:
 
“Inspiration costs nothing. It is a flame we artists pass between each other, knowing full well that to read is to drink from the well, and to write is to drink from the same well while pouring new water into it.
 
“The wrapping is your unravelling. Use the bubble wrap with care.”
 
Her eyes darted over that last line again, unable to match it with the poetic tone of the rest.
 
The bubble wrap?
 
She slipped the package into her bag and didn’t touch it again until evening.
*
 
On the train home from work, Sian imagined tugging on that string and peeling away the brown paper while snuggled on her sofa, rapt with anticipation. (Dinner was a microwave meal, so that could wait.) But when she got home and stomped up the stairs to her flat, she found she couldn’t sit down. She switched on her desk lamp—the desk that was officially her writing desk, but had gradually become stacked up with newspapers and books—and tore the package open over the desk, shoving the string down the length of it until it dropped free. Inside was a black velveteen notebook, with Under the Blood Moon Comics printed on the front inside its logo, a maroon, fuzzy-edged circle. Very smart. Sian raised her eyebrows at the thick, creamy pages. No expense had been spared on this freebie.
 
But the bubble wrap.
 
At first, she thought there was something wrong with her eyes. A rusty-red haze seemed to hover around the sheet of bubble wrap, which proved to be roughly A4 size once shaken out. She held it under her nose, narrowing her eyes. Inside each air pocket drifted a tiny smudge of dark amber-red. A sort of scorched colour. She peered closer at one of them. It wasn’t a stain, but a bead of rust-red gas swelling under each tiny plastic dome.
 
Her heart fluttered. Her gaze flew back to the note, which had scattered onto the table in her haste: “The wrapping is your unravelling. Use the bubble wrap with care.” This gas—it couldn’t be some kind of drug, could it? But surely the amounts were too miniscule. And who would do that, anyway? If this could be some illicit substance, how tricky it would be to seal a single puff of gas into each and every bubble on this sheet. It was too bizarre. She ran her nail along the edge of a see-through dome. For free, as well?
 
Sian creased over in a spasm of giggles. It was just so ridiculous. Presumably, she was meant to believe this was magical. She was meant to be like a little kid in a magic shop, believing in the power of colourful toys and boxes of tricks. For all his poetic ramblings and philosophising, did the shopkeeper really see her this way?
 
Still sniggering, she slouched forwards, steadying herself against the desk, but at the gentle pop of a bubble, she snatched her hand away and stared.
 
A tiny cloud of red exploded silently from where her nail had caught it, a volcanic eruption in miniature. Forgetting her laughter instantly, she ducked to sniff the evaporating puff before it dispersed.
 
An odd smell of burning coal, mixed with rust, hit her nostrils. The rust scent lingered—a bit like blood? Sian’s eyelids drooped. She staggered back, gripping the arm of her chair. Stumbling sideways, she managed to lever herself into the seat as her legs turned to sponge. The moment her body slumped against the back of the chair, she sank into wild dreams.
 
Her dream-body swooped from under her, up through the chimney, realising a second too late that she had somehow squeezed, paper-thin, through a crack in the brickwork. A blackened tunnel rushed past her and she inhaled the night air.
 
A landscape of rooftops spread out before her, a jumbled patchwork brushed with moonlight. Chimneys punctuated the slopes, their stubs like blunt pencils poking the sky. No longer smoking, but blackened by history, by memory. Sian sat like a cat in wonder, observing it all, but sensing, more than seeing. Under her feet crowded layers of history, Victorian times and beyond, all crushed together. Closing her dream-eyes, she could sense images, echoes of the past, shuffling over each other like negatives from an old-fashioned camera. It was just as the bookseller said. The stones, they whispered to her. Bricks creaked, the pressure of years gathered tight, wincing through the mortar. Haunted by the lives they’d kept.
 
Sian roved the rooftops, a darkened whisper. She crept over the tiles, marvelling at their solidity against her shadow-like feet and hands. The tiles weren’t quite cold to the touch. It was as if they held the memory of coldness in their hard, smooth slate.
 
But she—she was as light as the air itself, and free to roam the night.
 
It was on the roof of the museum that they gathered. Chalk-white as a full moon, the figures were too solid to be ghosts. A concrete angel with sharp hollows for eyes tested her thick wings against the night. A cherub, unclenching its chubby fingers; a gargoyle with its tongue dangling, stretched a clawed paw onto the slate. A round-faced gremlin with a chipped nose turned its weathered features upon Sian. Pale, smudged around the edges, with limbs stiff from decades, if not centuries, of waiting.
********* 
And that is how—or is the beginning of how—“The murderous blood moon eagerly awaited the trial of the inner bubble wrap.”
 
Not so much ‘murderous’, unless there really is some dried blood in those mysterious puffs of gas. And no, it won’t be ‘just’ a dream. If a dream impacts on the character’s objective reality, then what you have is a dreampunk story. Look up Cliff Jones Jr or whatisdreampunk.com for more information on that.
 
So, yes, I got properly stuck into this story, although I haven’t quite finished it and there will be plenty of editing to do, I’m sure. I’m hoping I can make it good enough to include it in my next book-length collection on Weird Creatures, so you will have a chance to find out the ending in time, when it’s written. But in spite of this story growing legs and scampering over rooftops, I have to tell you, this writing exercise was on very dodgy ground to start with. After reading out those three Exquisite Corpses, this was very much one of those times when I truly did not know which one I was going to pick, and what I was going to write.
 
After some faffing around, I picked this Exquisite Corpse, and gave myself twenty minutes, as a starter—to basically give myself permission to drop this prompt if it didn’t work after that period, in which case I would just try out the next one. I initially started writing about someone opening up a compact disc, printed with the red logo of Under the Blood Moon as an album title or the name of a band, and it was the idea of music, or strange sounds, maybe a strange message recorded on that CD, which transported my character when she listened to it, though I wasn’t sure where. I was sort of forcing myself to just write whatever came into my head without worrying too much about it (as is my way), but all the time fishing for something that snagged my attention. Something that got me even slightly excited. The CD or music idea fizzled out after a couple of paragraphs, but what it gave me was a hint that I was in the mood for some kind of portal, so even as I abandoned the CD idea and turned my attention to the bubble wrap instead, I realised that this was the flavour of what I was after. Some kind of elevation, transportation to another way of being. And that’s where the early images of this story began to emerge.
 
So: from absolutely nothing to something, and certainly a story I never would have written were it not for this particular Exquisite Corpse. And, I don’t know about you, but bubble wrap will never quite seem the same…
 
I just want to emphasise as well, for those who might be thinking, oh, I’m not sure if I could do that: this is the whole point of these writing prompts. They take you to places you would never otherwise go; would never dream of on your own. And the way to get there is in the writing itself. I could have stared out the window for who-knows how long, twiddling my pen; I could have paced until I wore a hole in the carpet: nothing would have revealed the story idea I ended up writing, except the act of writing itself. I put pen to paper, I pushed myself to keep going, keep searching through the writing, and after many minutes of stumbling around, that’s what caused me to discover the idea… that then grew.
 
So what about a writing prompt for you, my talented listeners, to try? Because this magical journey-stuff is free for anyone to try. The ‘wondrous midnight’ might be a little bit, hm, safe. The ‘murderous blood moon’ –well, that’s maybe the opposite. You could have a go at that. There’s always the ‘forgetful elevator’, if the ‘murderous blood moon’ might be a bit too dark for you, although we are approaching Halloween.
 
Whatever you choose, you know what to do: hit the ‘contact’ button on any page footer, write about a paragraph or so, either a scene or a description of a story idea or character, and make sure you get it to me by the Friday after this show’s release, so I have time to include it in the recording. If you have an author website or social media handle you’d like me to quote, make sure you include that as well so I can give you a proper shout-out.
 
Until next time, go forth and be inspired!