Every writer knows what it’s like to stare down a blank page, but the experience is even worse when your mind is also feeling like a featureless void. For me, writing prompts have been a great way to create that little spark that can become a full-on conflagration of a story. I am, however, extremely particular when it comes to using prompts. The usual prompt generators that produce random words, or the ones that provide a character, setting, and conflict, just don’t do it for me. I like a nice, evocative single line, something that seems like it’s been plucked from a deeper story and world: one gives you the opportunity to do that building for yourself, to imagine everything else that leads to that line.
Here I’m going to share with you a few of my favorite sources for prompts along those lines, and I’ll also throw in the method I’ve chosen to hoard my collection of prompts, and serve up a random one for when I’m ready to write.