Creativity Collection: 20 Writing Prompts to Stir Up Your Story
Need an infusion of inspiration for your muse? Look no further. I have just the concoction in the form of 20 more writing prompts.
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4
Prompt 81
Folklore Prompt
Kitsune—foxes from Japanese folklore. In some stories, kitsune have magical abilities, can shapeshift, and may have as many as nine tails. In other stories, kitsune shapeshift into human women and take mortal husbands. Their children, when born human, have supernatural powers of their own.
Write a story featuring kitsune. Are they tricksters or guardians, friends or foes?
Prompt 82
Opening Line Prompt
The door had had no lock the day before.
Prompt 83
Music Prompt
The Highwayman by Loreena McKennitt.
Flesh out the story of The Highwayman through a short story or novel.
Prompt 84
Picture Prompt
Tell the story of one of the soldiers on this ship, as it bears down on Alexandria.
Prompt 85
Phrase Prompt
“Haut gout.”
Meaning: slight taint of decay.
Where might a slight taint of decay be shown? Is it the smell that comes out of an old house your character is entering? Is it the corruption at the heart of a government or corporation? Or maybe it comes from the personalities of the characters themselves?
Prompt 86
Music Prompt
The Doctor’s Wife by The Clockwork Quartet.
Prompt 87
Genre Prompt
Clockpunk. What if the world ran on clockwork? Write about an alternate history in which the technological advancements of recent history were developed during the Renaissance through the power of clockwork.
Prompt 88
Dialogue Prompt
“A couple of months back, I talked to a man who had just returned from this new world across the sea—they call it Avalon, the land of miracles—and he told me that incredible things happen there, the likes of which you and I can’t imagine. He said he’d seen beasts who could talk as well as any of us; objects spring from nothing at a single word; deadly injuries healed in the blink of an eye. White magic, Maira! He’d seen white magic!”
Prompt 89
Conflict Prompt
Write about a scene from your character’s childhood, from their adult perspective. How has time warped their memories, blurred them or distorted them?
Prompt 90
Historical Figure Prompt
Write about the life and death of Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, also known as Madame de Pompadour.
Prompt 91
Opening Line Prompt
It didn’t take a sword stroke to kill him—just the stroke of a pen.
Prompt 92
Conflict Prompt
Write a story about skiers trapped by an avalanche and their journey back to safety.
Prompt 93
Psychological Condition Prompt
Fugue amnesia—when a person is unable to recall details about themselves, such as their identity, personality or memories, for a short time. This is usually during a traumatic or stressful period, with memories returning slowly some time later.
Write about a character who suffers from this kind of amnesia. Their memories have been impaired and the novel follows their struggle to remember what happened during their period of amnesia.
Prompt 94
Magic System Prompt
Imagine a system of magic where the potency of a spell is based on the colour associated with the magic-wielder. For example, someone with ‘red’ magic may not be as powerful as someone with ‘violet’ magic.
Prompt 95
Lyrics Prompt
“Holy water cannot help you now
A thousand armies couldn’t keep me out
I don’t want your money
I don’t want your crown
See I’ve come to burn
Your kingdom down.”
— From Seven Devils by Florence and the Machine
Prompt 96
Picture Prompt
Who lives here?
Prompt 97
Conflict Prompt
What are you most afraid of? What would make this feared thing become even worse? Now unleash it on your main character.
Prompt 98
Description Prompt
Continue this with a description that uses all the senses but sight:
It was behind her; she could feel it.
Prompt 99
Dialogue Prompt
“There were ways, back when I was young, to bind the soul to the earth even after the body was gone.”
Prompt 100
Conflict Prompt
Write a story set in a city that can dismantle and rebuild itself whenever it is threatened. Who lives there? What might threaten them? What happens if they can’t get away in time?
THE CREATIVITY COLLECTION ARCHIVES
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