Have you ever sat in your windowless office, suburban tract home or hobo encampment thinking, “Gee, I sure would like to write a fictional account of a horse. But, I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”

Well now you can know where to begin thanks to the people who’ve thought of everything: wikiHow. Just use their easy-to-follow instructions, and you’ll be chomping at the bit just to get started on your very own fictional account of a horse or horses.

Here are highlights from wikiHow’s 11-step guide (thanks to my Facebook friend Diyan for drawing my attention to it in the first place). I’ve put in bold the advice that I will follow or at least keep in mind whenever I get around to writing my own fictional account of a horse:

• Learn about horses…If you can, spend some time observing real horses and interacting with them. If you can’t get to a place with live horses, watch videos with horses to get a sense of how they move and behave…

• (A horse’s name) can say something about the horse’s character. For example, a horse named “Flame” might be wild and rebellious, maybe a stallion, and likely bay or chestnut colored….Try to have horses in your story with a variety of different personalities. No one wants to read about a bunch of horses who all act the same.

• …While humans are not always essential in a story about horses, they are frequently present. They should be just as fully developed as characters as the horses are….

• Do some prewriting…List the characters, both horse and human, as well as the setting, and some specific details about them. For example: Hudson (horse): Clydesdale, bay, old, smart
. Danielle (girl): 14 years old, blond hair, owner of Hudson…You may also want to draw pictures to help you visualize the story.

• …Some possible conflicts include:
 An orphaned foal struggles to survive in the wild; A band of wild horses are brought to live on a farm; A horse is purchased by a cruel owner; An old horse and a young rider must learn to work together; A group of people acquire a wild horse and try to tame it.

• …events should relate to the main conflict in your story. For example, if we have a story about wild horses coming to live on a farm, some events that could happen are:
 A headstrong mare gets loose and runs away. The foals like the humans, but worry about losing the respect of the lead stallion. The humans try to ride one of the horses for the first time. One of the horses is ill and the humans must nurse him back to health.

• Write a rough draft…this is not the final copy. Don’t worry about spelling and punctuation yet.

• Edit the rough draft with a pen or pencil…

• Complete the final copy. You may wish to type it, or you can simply write the story on paper.