A World You Don't Understand preptober 2026

Week One
The Elevator Pitch Three Things I Know The Promise CHALLENGE. Steal This Prompt

Elevator Pitch: Describe your story in 50 words or fewer. Then try again in one sentence
Attempt one:

A 27 year old woman is stuck with a child she never planned on having. No matter how hard she tries, she seems to not give a good life to the young girl. Stressed from this, she continues to attempt to give her a nice life and reflects on her own mother who neglected her throughout her childhood.

Attempt two:

A young mother attempts to give her own daughter a good life while remember her own terrible childhood.

Three Things I Know: Provide three things you absolutely know about your story and three things you haven't figured out yet.
Three Things I know

1. protagonist is a young mom, age 27
   
2. story follows the mothers backstory and her raising her daughter
3. she will basically feel like she fails her daughter

Three Things I Dont Know

1. Age of Daughter
   
2. Where it's going to be set
3. Names of character

The Promise: Complete the following phrase: "I want this story to make the reader feel ______." Then explain why.
I want this story to make the reader feel

empathy and sadness. I want them to feel the same hurt and sadness the mother feels trying to raise her own daughter.

CHALLENGE. Steal This Prompt: Pick one of these 10 elements and incorporate it somehow into your concept.
Prompts

- A locked door
- An unwanted inheritance
- A lie told at dinner
- Something buried beneath a tree
- An embarrassing lie
- A secret
- Something very very pink
- A monster
- A sport game
- A story within a story

Picked Prompts

- A lie told at dinner
- Something very very pink
- A story within a story