Aug 8, 2026 · 1 min · 1 segments
Plot Lab takes pop culture headlines, trending topics, and viral moments and turns them into original fiction ideas, with a guest author. Hosts Kristi Leonard and Beth Uznis Johnson bring the prompts…
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What if the strangest thing you read in the news today became your next favorite novel? Whatever we come up with is going to be so different and better than whatever the original intent was
anyway.
Oh, absolutely.
Everything in life is a writing prompt.
Every episode, we host a guest author and give them three headlines.
We start with this one idea and then you take that idea and it just tends to explode.
They pick the one that grabs them.
Yeah, that last one I'm not doing because I will end up crying.
And
together, we brainstorm a brand new story.
And then
you think, well, why did that bastard come back, right? How come, you know, nice Aunt Franny can't come back from the dead and we got this jerk.
It's
part writer's room,
part game show.
A faulty light that goes ballistic on the internet and, you know, the interwebs just go crazy and there are TikToks about it and conspiracy theories everywhere.
and everybody puts on their tinfoil hats.
I mean, that's one way to go with it.
Okay, can I steal that idea? If you're a writer, a reader, or just someone who loves watching an idea reach a boiling point, pull up a chair.
I really see it as kind of a dark black comic novel.
Sorry.
There's just so many directions.
Now you know why it takes you so long to write a book.
What if the strangest thing you read in the news today became your next favorite novel? Whatever we come up with is going to be so different and better than whatever the original intent was
anyway.
Oh, absolutely.
Everything in life is a writing prompt.
Every episode, we host a guest author and give them three headlines.
We start with this one idea and then you take that idea and it just tends to explode.
They pick the one that grabs them.
Yeah, that last one I'm not doing because I will end up crying.
And
together, we brainstorm a brand new story.
And then
you think, well, why did that bastard come back, right? How come, you know, nice Aunt Franny can't come back from the dead and we got this jerk.
It's
part writer's room,
part game show.
A faulty light that goes ballistic on the internet and, you know, the interwebs just go crazy and there are TikToks about it and conspiracy theories everywhere.
and everybody puts on their tinfoil hats.
I mean, that's one way to go with it.
Okay, can I steal that idea? If you're a writer, a reader, or just someone who loves watching an idea reach a boiling point, pull up a chair.
I really see it as kind of a dark black comic novel.
Sorry.
There's just so many directions.
Now you know why it takes you so long to write a book.
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