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Best Short Story Writing Prompts

Join our ongoing contests and win up to $1,500. Flex those creative muscles with these writing prompts.

Showing 266 prompts reset

This week's contest:
Win $250

Better in Color

159 contest entries /
105 stories

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Closes at 23:59 - May 01 EST

Write a story that includes the line "Can you keep a secret?" or “My lips are sealed."

– 50 stories

Include the word “hero,” “mask,” or “truth" in your story’s title.

– 61 stories

Write about a second chance or a fresh start.

– 63 stories

Set your story before dawn or after midnight. Your character is awake for a specific reason.

– 70 stories

Write a story with an age or date in the title.

– 35 stories

Your character meets someone who changes their life forever.

– 46 stories

Write a story that includes the word “birthday,” “birth,” or “party.”

– 66 stories

Write a story that includes the line “I can’t sleep.”

– 86 stories

Center your story around one of the following: stargazing, lethargy, or a myth/legend.

– 53 stories

Write a story from the point of view of a canine character or a mythological creature.

– 99 stories

Begin your story with “It was the hottest day of the year...”

– 65 stories

Write a story set during a heatwave.

– 66 stories

Begin your story with someone saying, “Are you there, God? It’s me...”

– 67 stories

Write a story where two characters talk around an important subject without ever mentioning it directly.

– 56 stories

Start your story with a non-visual sense. Use a certain scent, texture, sound, or taste to ground the beginning before continuing the narrative.

– 64 stories

Write a story that includes the line “Are you real?” or “Who are you?”

– 106 stories

One character is an artificial intelligence. The other is a human being. Your reader must struggle to tell which is which.

– 61 stories

Using only dialogue, depict a conversation between a non-human entity and a human being about what it means to tell a story, or to be alive.

– 63 stories

Write a story where the only character with a name is an artificial being.

– 45 stories

Center your story around someone who uses technology (AI, hardware, etc.) to write their next work and slowly descends into madness.

– 45 stories

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