Domino is a game of skill and strategy that involves arranging domino pieces into long rows and then knocking them over. The word domino is also used to describe a series of events that happen one after the other, a kind of chain reaction. We’ve all seen a domino effect in action when a person hits the first domino in a line and it triggers the rest of the pieces to fall over.
Lily Hevesh has been playing with dominoes since she was 9. She remembers her grandparents having a classic 28-piece set. She liked to arrange them into straight or curved lines and then flick them over to watch the entire sequence collapse.
She’s an expert now, building dazzling displays with thousands of dominoes. Her work has even been featured on television!
Hevesh started creating domino art because it was a fun way to express her creativity. But she also learned a lot from the process, including some lessons about science and engineering.
When she’s planning a new display, Hevesh starts with small test versions. She films them so she can check that they work before putting them together for a larger installation. For example, she recently tested a rainbow spiral made with 12,000 dominoes.
Dominoes are rectangular blocks with a value of one or more dots on each side, sometimes called pips. The number of pips is a sign of the domino’s rank or weight, with higher-valued tiles having more pips. Each domino is usually twice as long as it is wide, which makes it easy to stack them on end in a long row.
A Domino is a generic gaming device, similar to dice or cards, in that a variety of games can be played with them. Some are simple, like laying out dominoes in a row and then tapping one to get it to topple. Others are very complex and have many rules.
In addition to being a fun hobby, dominoes are useful for teaching children about the principles of science and math. For example, dominoes can help teach about gravity and balance. They can also be used to introduce the concepts of sequencing and pattern recognition.
The word domino is derived from the Latin dominium, meaning “dominant, master.” It’s a figurative expression that means something has dominance over other things. Today, the term dominate is widely used to mean a position of superiority or authority. But the word has also been used to refer to a system of rules or laws, a group of people or organizations, and even an idea or theory!
Whether you write by the seat of your pants or follow a detailed outline with tools like Scrivener, plotting your novel comes down to a basic question: what happens next? Considering how the domino effect works can help you create a story with a clear and compelling plot.