“What if” posts are not simple writing prompts but supercharged explorations into the many directions a simple prompt can take you. Here you will find conventional questions and “what if” questions surrounding a prompt to help get the creative juices flowing.
Prompt is inspired by the latest book I read.
What if a small town in rural America experiences a murder a week, or month, or year? All on the same day at the same time. These are the only murders that have ever happened in the town. A week seems pretty quick and may limit the explanation of the cause or the availability of plot twists to occur, but it can be done.
Let’s start with the yearly murder on the same day at the same time. Obviously, this is some type of anniversary of an event. These events can range from a divorce, a birthday, the death of a loved one, to tax time, a rejection, or any number of holidays during the year.
These yearly murders have to have some deep meaning to the killer. That would have to be true for weekly or monthly occurrences unless the killer you have in mind has no feelings. But what meaning would the killing have?
Some of these “what if” directions can border on cliché if not taken care of twisting the plot in new ways. For example, what if the killer was rejected and now is the reason he kills. For simplicity, a man is rejected by a woman he loves. His revenge is killing someone who looks just like the woman on the day and time he was rejected. This is cliché. This can be changed up a little by mixing and matching the genders of either party. This will help complicate the solving of the case by your main character. But what if your main character fits the “type” the killer is looking for, but your MC somehow gets away and as he looks into his/her close call it is then realized that other victims have not been as lucky and no one knew or suspected.
Let’s go in another direction. What if the killings whether, yearly, monthly, or daily stem from childhood trauma? What if the killer, as a kid, was bullied by a much older group of kids? The killer’s life has not turned out as his childhood dreams and he blames those that bullied him. The killer snaps and wants revenge. The older group of kids are now scattered across the country. What if some of the now adults he seeks revenge against turned out just as he thought they would, no job, maybe trailer thrash, still bullying the little guy? What if he doesn’t just simply murder them but wants to seek an act of revenge that would really hurt them based on how their life has turned out? What if some of these now adults turned out to be successful, pillars of the community, married and with kids, coaches Little League? What revenge then? What if the killer comes across one now adult that he is reluctant to kill?
What if the killer was just not bullied but sexually assaulted? This could add more depth to your story especially if the reason you write is to convey a message.
A lot more directions can be explored here and I hope this has inspired your muse.
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