would like you to write what I call a slow motion moment. Write 300-700 words describing an action that takes ten seconds of real time. You may write it from either the first person (I) or the third person (he/she/it/they). No interior monologue is allowed. That means we dont get to hear what a character is thinking (if a character is indeed present). We can only see what he or she is doing or seeing. Its important that you stick to only about ten seconds of real time. Jump right into the description with your first line. Do not provide context or describe other events that happened before or after these ten seconds. Remember, you may not allow the character to remember past events, to wonder what is happening elsewhere, or to ruminate in any way. Basically, you are describing only the concrete, material details of the event.

Heres a snippet of a slow motion moment, from Ian McEwans A Child in Time. This is a description of an awful encounter on the road with a truck:

He was preparing to overtake when something happened he did not quite see what in the region of the lorrys wheels, a hiatus, a cloud of dust, and then something black and long snaked through a hundred feet toward him. It slapped the windscreen, clung there a moment and was whisked away before he had time to understand what it was. And then the rear of the lorry made a complicated set of movements, a bouncing and swaying, and slewed in a wide spray of spark, bright even in sunshine. So far Stephen had had time to move his foot towards the brake, time to notice a padlock swinging on a loose flange, and Wash Me Please scrawled in grime.

Some events like car accidents do seem to occur in slow motion. Often they are momentous. But they do not have to be as dramatic as a car crash take for example, the first glimpse of the person you would someday marry. Here are some examples of other interesting events that take less than 10 seconds, which you could describe. Feel free to steal one of these, or make up your own!

• Getting slapped
• Hitting a deer with a car
• Going downhill on a rollercoaster
• A kiss
• Pulling a trigger