Oh, Inspector Panda! To where is Mr. Wu running off? How has this happened?
I must digress, for a moment.
I have to blame it on a Payless Moment. Payless is one of our neighborhood grocery stores, and because we Islanders tend to hide out in the woods, sometimes we only run into each other at the grocery store, where we clog up the aisles, catching up with our friends whom we have not seen all summer. (That’s what we call a Payless moment. Mr. Badger hates them.)
So, there I am in Payless, when I catch sight of my good friend, Deb Lund, who is the very talented author of a pile of books (my favorites being the DinoSailors, All Aboard the Dino Train, and Dino Soaring…dinosaurs that could give the panda kindergarten a run for their cuppycakes) and she is the person most responsible for my launch into kiddie-lit and without her, Pandamorphosis most likely would not exist.
In addition to being a writer, Deb is also a teacher and creativity coach. Some years back she developed these cards, which she used in her teaching, and over the years refined them and developed them as a tool for writers. They aren’t exactly writing prompts, more like things that you can use to shake up the status quo, in your life, in your story, in your painting. She finally developed them to a point where her students and writer friends were clamoring for a set of their own, and so with the help of an extremely successful Kickstarter project, she raised enough money to publish them.
Here’s how Deb describes what her cards are all about: Fiction writers are troublemakers. We create characters and get them in trouble. We’re also magicians. We pull rabbits out of hats, heroes from certain death, and stories out of thin air. We make magic by making trouble. Fiction Magic.
As one of her happy supporters, I’ve been waiting for my very own set of Fiction Magic Cards and guidebook. So, when I ran into her at the grocery store, she told me that she had just gotten a few advance sets to send out for reviews, and did I want my set now?
As luck would have it, I was stuck in a bit of a blind alley as to what was going to happen next in The Inspector Panda Case of the Picturesque Panda. I mean, I could only throw in so many Edward Hopper references, before something else would actually have to happen in my story. Thankfully, I now have my very own supply of fiction magic. Watch out Mr. Wu! The card I pulled was Lose the Prized Possession.
Uh oh.
The panda kindergarten arrives on the scene, and…
Not the tape!!!!!!
Uh oh, indeed. The cards made me do it.
Be the Bear!
Bob T. Panda
I gotta get me a set of those cards.
You do. They aren’t available quite yet, but check Deb’s website ( http://www.deblund.com ) over the next couple of weeks, and I will let people know here too. They are already helping me with Inspector Panda’s latest saga.
BTW: I’ve seen Mehitabel scribbling secretively on her cushion of power, and I think she is cooking up something with Cody. there have been some unexplained emails in my inbox.
Yeah, Cody’s been acting especially sneaky lately, too. Little devils.
What can you do? Little darlings. :o}
I’m not sure, the car looks the same as the cubvertable used by the Panda kindy …
Oh! really? Imagine that!
Nice results! Next time you have a Payless moment, please ask Deb how to write a decent battle scene and/or kill off a character without crying. (Why? Uh, *reasons*, that’s why!)
I suppose I’m stating the obvious, but if you are creating a battle scene (for instance) or killing off a character (also for instance, it seems like if you want to make the reader cry (which in my not so humble opinion you should, when death is involved) it would be difficult, as the writer, not to feel this emotion yourself.
Art is about emotion, as much as it is about what we see or hear or read that evokes emotion. I think you should let it get “messy.” Whatever that means. (and probably getting a set of Deb’s Fiction Magic cards would be a good idea too.) (and I say that as someone who is excited by the possibilities they are already showing me, in my first dive into the cards, not as someone who is getting any kind of kickback.)
NOOOO! Not Mr Wu’s tape! Will he get it back? Will we ever know why it is so important?
yes, and yes, but not right away. Bwahahaha!