c/creative-writing-prompts

22

scott.olivia•6h ago

That writing prompt about the multiverse took me 6 hours to figure out

I saw this prompt about parallel universes where every choice spawns a new timeline. Thought I'd write a short story about a guy who can see all his other selves. Simple right? Then I spent like 4 hours just trying to decide if the main character remembers the other timelines or not. Then another 2 hours on whether the other selves can interact with each other. Ended up with 3 pages of notes and zero actual story. Has anyone else gotten stuck on a seemingly simple prompt for way too long?

24

david_reed22•16h ago

Can we talk about that old bookshop in Portland that banned genre labels?

I walked into Powell's Books last month and noticed they don't sort fiction into mystery, romance, or sci-fi racks. The owner told me they think labels limit what people pick up. Half of me thinks it forces readers to try new things but the other half says I just want to find my next crime novel fast. Does this approach help creativity or just make browsing a headache?

15

brooket43•3d ago

Dialogue-first vs plot-first writing? Dialogue wins every time.

I tried writing a short story last month with a tight plot outline. Three pages in, I got bored. Characters sounded like robots. Switched to writing just the dialogue first, no plan. Built the whole scene around what they said to each other. Came out 10x more natural. Plot can be fixed later. Dead characters kill everything faster. Anyone else find dialogue drives your best scenes?

21

blair_chen81•3d ago

Messed up a brisket trim so bad I turned it into chili instead

So last Sunday I was getting ready for a family cookout and grabbed a 12 lb brisket from Costco. I've trimmed maybe 10 briskets before, no big deal. But I got distracted by my dog barking at the mailman and accidentally cut a huge hole right through the flat. Like, 4 inches long. Fat cap was all wonky too. Looked terrible. Instead of trying to salvage it for smoking, I cubed the whole thing up, seasoned it heavy, and slow cooked it in a pot with beans and tomatoes for like 3 hours. Family actually said it was the best chili I've made. Has anyone else turned a butchering mistake into something edible?

2

the_robin•4d ago

Tried a writing prompt generator and it broke my story completely

I used one of those AI writing prompt apps last Tuesday just to get some fresh ideas for a fantasy short I've been stuck on. The thing gave me a prompt about a knight finding a magical spoon that turns water into wine, which seemed silly but I went with it. After writing 3 pages, I realized the whole plot had no tension because the spoon solved every problem right away. I learned those generators don't understand story structure at all, they just throw random words together. My whole Sunday got eaten up fixing the mess and I ended up throwing out 80% of what I wrote. Has anyone else had a prompt tool actually make your writing worse instead of better?

13

phoenix_singh25•5d ago

Warning: The 'show don't tell' rule was ruining my stories until I tried this

I kept getting feedback that my writing felt flat even though I was following all the usual advice. Last week I tried writing a scene where the character never describes an emotion at all, just lists what they physically do for one page. Has anyone else found a specific trick that actually made that rule click for you?

9

quinnm77•8d ago

Spent 3 hours trying to make a character sound natural in dialogue

I was working on a scene where two old friends catch up at a diner, and the dialogue kept coming out stiff like they were reading from a script. I rewrote it four times over two days, stepping away and coming back, before I realized the problem was I was making them talk too much about the plot. Once I let them interrupt each other and talk over mundane stuff like the bad coffee, it clicked in about 20 minutes. Has anyone else hit a wall like that and found a weird simple fix that shouldn't have taken so long?

6

emery10•22d ago

That week I tried writing a novel in 7 days was a complete disaster

I sat down last June convinced I could crank out 50,000 words for a week long challenge. By day three I had 2,000 words and a migraine from staring at a blank screen too long. Has anyone else fallen for those fast writing challenges and ended up worse off than when you started?

9

zara_sanchez•22d ago

Got stuck in a laundromat in Austin for 3 hours because of a poetry slam

I went to this laundromat off East 6th last Tuesday, just trying to do my weekly wash in peace. Turns out they host this monthly poetry slam right in the middle of the place, like between the dryers and the folding tables. Some guy read a 20 minute poem about his cat's existential dread while my clothes sat in the rinse cycle. I couldn't leave because my wet stuff was stuck in a machine that kept glitching. By the time I got out, the poetry had actually gotten good, which was the weirdest part. Has anyone else stumbled into a random event at a totally boring place?

21

nina_taylor•24d ago

Just wasted $40 on a writing prompt generator app that's basically useless

I thought I'd try that app called PromptForge that keeps showing up in ads. It was supposed to give me unique story starters but it just recycles the same basic ideas like 'a character finds a mysterious door.' Three prompts in and I got the same premise twice. I feel dumb for not just sticking with the free prompts on this community. Has anyone else tried one of those paid tools and regretted it?

20

williamhenderson•25d ago

That character prompt from 3 years ago still haunts me

I found a writing prompt last week from a 2022 thread about a ghost who only appears in reflections, and I spent 6 hours crafting a story about a guy who slowly realizes his mirror self is living a completely different life. The thing is, nobody replied to it and the thread got archived before I could post. Has anyone else poured time into a dead prompt and felt like you wasted your best idea?

9

robert_ross95•26d ago

Three years ago I tried writing a novel in 30 days and ended up with 50,000 words of pure nonsense

It was November 2021 and I thought hey, NaNoWriMo sounds fun. I had this grand idea about a detective who solves crimes in a futuristic city where everyone lives underwater. By day 15 I had written like 20 chapters of the guy just walking through underwater hallways and describing the lighting. I never even introduced a crime. The whole thing was just worldbuilding with no plot. I got the word count but it's the worst thing I've ever read. Has anyone else finished a big writing challenge and ended up with something totally unusable?

32

miasanchez•27d ago

Hit 50,000 words on my novel draft and honestly didn't think I'd get past 10k

I've been working on this fantasy story set in Portland for like 8 months now, and I finally crossed the 50k mark last night. It felt huge because I usually bail on projects around chapter 3 when I run out of steam. My writer friend Jen kept telling me to just write garbage and fix it later, which I finally tried. Anyone else have a writing milestone that surprised them way more than they expected?

22

amyh12•27d ago

Heard a writing professor at a bar say 'kill your darlings' is the worst advice ever given

I was eavesdropping at a coffee shop in Portland last week and this guy who apparently teaches at PSU was telling his friend that the whole 'kill your darlings' thing makes people delete their best, most original ideas. He said he's seen students cut the one weird character or strange plot twist that made their story stand out, just because someone told them it was self-indulgent. Kinda made me rethink how I edit my own prompts and short stories. Has anyone else run into advice that ended up hurting more than helping?

17

colescott•29d ago

My neighbor's kid asked me why I write sad endings and I didn't have a good answer

I was at a backyard barbecue last Saturday and this 14 year old girl who lives next door asked why every story I share online ends with someone losing something. She said 'don't you ever just want things to work out?' and I honestly froze. I've been writing prompts for years and I always default to tragedy or bittersweet stuff. It made me wonder if I'm just scared of writing something happy or if I think conflict equals quality. Has anyone else noticed they lean too hard into dark endings?

19

williamhenderson•1mo ago

The moment I realized my protagonist had no real goal

Last week I was staring at chapter 7 of my novel for the third night in a row. Nothing was happening, just scenes of my main character walking around and thinking. Then it hit me around 2 AM in my kitchen while making coffee. She had no actual want, no driving need that pushed her forward. I deleted three chapters and started over with her wanting something simple, a specific blue notebook her grandmother left behind.

3

emma_wells83•1mo ago

Can we talk about when a writing prompt totally backfires

I tried one of those 'write a story from your biggest regret' prompts last week and it wrecked my whole day. Instead of a fun creative exercise, I ended up spiraling into bad memories from 2019. On the flip side, my friend used the same prompt and wrote her best short story ever. So is the issue the prompt itself or how we handle the emotional weight behind it? Have you ever had a prompt go sideways on you like that, or do you think prompts should steer clear of heavy topics altogether?

24

elliot_roberts•1mo ago

That 'show don't tell' writing rule felt like gatekeeping until my critique group ripped apart my first 30 pages

Had three people point out I wrote 'he felt angry' eight times in one chapter and after forcing myself to rewrite each scene with only actions the whole thing actually read like a real story, anyone else have a writing rule they fought against that ended up fixing their work?

3

blair_chen81•1mo ago

My fantasy novel's magic system broke itself on page 47

I spent like 3 months building this whole rule set for how magic works in my story. Last Tuesday I was writing a scene where my main character casts a protection spell and realized the rules I made would actually let her do something way more powerful. It totally broke the conflict I had planned for the next 5 chapters. I had to go back and rewrite the magic system with a hard limit on how much energy a person can pull at once. Has anyone else had a plot hole or rule in their world building just collapse on them mid story?

14

karen_carter•1mo ago

That poetry slam in Austin last month changed my whole approach

Guy got up and read this raw, unfinished piece about his dog dying. Crowd went silent. Made me realize my polished drafts are killing my voice. Anyone else find more truth in the messy first versions?

13

hannahcraig•1mo ago

Swapped from plotting every scene to just writing and it's night and day

I spent like 3 years planning a novel with color coded index cards and a whole timeline in Google Sheets. Finally got sick of it and just started typing whatever came to mind for a short story about a bakery in Portland. That story got accepted by a lit mag in under 2 weeks. Anyone else find that overplanning kills the fun of writing?

14

wade_kelly77•1mo ago

That writing mentor told me to kill my favorite paragraph and I'm glad I did

I had this writing teacher in a workshop last year, an older guy named Tom who wrote for magazines. He read my short story and said "that paragraph where the character describes the sunset, cut it, it's slowing everything down." I was so mad at first because I thought that paragraph was beautiful. But I tried it, took it out, and the story moved way faster and got picked up by a small lit journal 3 months later. Has anyone else had a piece of advice that hurt to hear but turned out to be right?

2

barbara_jenkins66•1mo ago

Just realized writing prompts work better when I set a timer

I spent last Saturday trying to write a story from a prompt about a haunted vending machine and got nowhere for 45 minutes. Then I set a 15 minute timer and forced myself to just type garbage until it went off, ended up with 400 words that actually had a plot. Has anyone else found a weird timing trick that unlocks their writing?

9

colescott•1mo ago

I finally found a trick that kills writer's block fast

I was stuck on a scene for 3 days straight, just staring at a blinking cursor in my local coffee shop. Then I tried typing the worst possible version of that scene on purpose, and somehow the garbage version unlocked the real one. Has anyone else used the "write it badly" method to break through a block?

19

olivia670•1mo ago

That writing advice about 'show don't tell' I always rolled my eyes at...

My critique partner pointed out in a scene where I wrote 'she was sad' that I could just describe her staring at the rain for 3 pages. Tried it on a story last week and got my first acceptance from a lit mag. Has anyone else found a specific writing rule that actually clicked after you ignored it for years?