Returning string from C function

I haven't used C in over 3 years, I'm pretty rusty on a lot of things.

I know this may seem stupid but I cannot return a string from a function at the moment. Please assume that: I cannot use string.h for this.

Here is my code:

#include <ncurses.h>

char * getStr(int length) { 
    char word[length];

    for (int i = 0; i < length; i++) {
        word[i] = getch();
    }

    word[i] = '\0';
    return word;
}

int main() {
    char wordd[10];
    initscr();
    *wordd = getStr(10);
    printw("The string is:\n");
    printw("%s\n",*wordd);
    getch();
    endwin();
    return 0;
}

I can capture the string (with my getStr function) but I cannot get it to display correctly (I get garbage).

Help is appreciated.

Either allocate the string on the stack on the caller side and pass it to your function:

void getStr(char *wordd, int length) {
    ...
}

int main(void) {
    char wordd[10 + 1];
    getStr(wordd, sizeof(wordd) - 1);
    ...
}

Or make the string static in getStr:

char *getStr(void) {
    static char wordd[10 + 1];
    ...
    return wordd;
}

Or allocate the string on the heap:

char *getStr(int length) {
    char *wordd = malloc(length + 1);
    ...
    return wordd;
}