Here Comes Judge!

Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter — What if? Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers prompts —

The Exercise -

Look in your files for a story that seems stuck, a story that has a story block. Next, write at the top of a separate sheet of paper the two words. What If. Now write five ways of continuing the story, not ending the story, but continuing the story to up your thinking about the events in the story. Your what if's can be as diverse as your imagination can make them. More than likely, and this has proved true through years of teaching and writing, one of the what if's will feel right, organic to your story and that is the direction in which you should go. Sometimes you will have to do several groups of what if's per story, but that's okay as long as they keep you moving forward.

The Objective -

To illustrate that most story beginnings and situations have within them the seeds of the middle and end. You just have to allow your imagination enough range to discover what works.

Story block: The Judge was named Judge by her parents and took that as a calling to go to law school and then become a judge. She didn’t know any other women with her name, and no one in her family had the name. Her parents never told her that they thought the law was the career she should enter, either.

What If -

1) Judge is what her friends called her, it was only right that she pursued a law degree and later a judgeship! ...

2) So what if Judge is my name, that doesn't mean I have to pursue a career in the law. I think I will be a superhero...

3) Mary and Ben wanted to name their child something different. If the baby were a boy, they decided to call him Judge. Well, they hadn't chosen a girl's name, and when their girl was born, they named her Judge. People did look at them a bit strangely when they told them, after all, her name would be Judge Larson.

4) Judge was walking to school, and the neighborhood kids would ask her to solve a conflict. She soon got tired of that happening each day and told them, "You are all guilty, now get to school!"

5) "I want to take Judge Judy's place on television. They can just say, "Here comes Judge!"