When everything falls apart, what holds us together? What keeps us going, and helps us to become whole again? Set your timer for ten minutes and write about a time when your world shattered, and how you came out the other side. Look at the characters in your novel. Is there any way the lesson you learned can help one of them? Posted by Khadijah Lacina

Ooh, a storm is threatening/My very life today/If I don't get some shelter/Ooh yeah I'm gonna fade away Clearly the Rolling Stones have not faded away, but their lyrics strike a chord within all of us. Whether the storm is within us or occurs due to a force of nature, we all face upheaval and difficulty, as do our characters. What storm your character has to face is most crucial to their development and the development of your story? How are you going to help them find the shelter they need to weather it? Posted by Khadijah Lacina

We've all had the experience of wishing we had said something to someone but did not for any of a number of reasons. Dig deeper into the relationship between two of your characters, or between your character and someone who is not directly in your novel but who influenced them at some point. Set your timer for fifteen minutes and write a letter that says what your character wishes he or she had said, but never did. Posted by Khadijah Lacina

Just like a river, each thread of our lives has a starting point. Choose one crucial decision your character has to make and trace it back to its beginning. Sometimes finding the beginning of something helps us to reach its end. Alternately, think bridges. How can your character make the transition from the point he or she is at now, to where you need him to be next? Posted by Khadijah Lacina