101 Creative Writing Prompts to Break Writer's Block

The blank page is intimidating. Sometimes all you need is a single spark to ignite a fire. Here are 101 creative writing prompts designed to get you writing immediately.

Sci-Fi & Speculative Prompts

• You buy a vintage mirror at a garage sale, but it reflects the room as it was 50 years ago.
• The first message from extraterrestrial life is just a playlist of 80s pop music.
• Gravity slowly stops working for 10 minutes every day at noon.
• You wake up in a world where everyone has a number floating above their head, but you don't know what it counts.
• A time traveler appears in your living room but refuses to tell you if they are from the past or future.
• The internet gains sentience and immediately deletes all cat videos. Why?
• You discover a door in your apartment that wasn't there yesterday. It leads to a train station on Mars.
• Every time you fall asleep, you wake up in a different person's body for exactly one hour.
• The stars begin to blink out, one by one, forming a countdown.
• You find a smartphone on the sidewalk. It has photos of you from next week.

Fantasy & Magic Prompts

• A dragon wakes up from a thousand-year slumber and demands a lawyer, not a knight.
• You are a minor NPC in an RPG who suddenly gains free will.
• Magic exists, but it costs memories to use. You just cast a spell to save your life, but you forgot who you saved.
• A sword in a stone. Everyone pulls it out easily. The problem is putting it back.
• The local tavern is a front for a secret society of retired villains.
• You find a map where the land changes every time you look away.
• A potion shop owner accidentally mixes a love potion with a truth serum. Chaos ensues.
• The villain isn't trying to destroy the world; they're trying to save it from something much worse.
• You have the power to speak with animals, but they only gossip about mundane things.
• A ghost hires you to solve their own murder because they can't remember how they died.

Contemporary & Emotional Prompts

• You find an old letter in a library book that was written by you, but you have no memory of writing it.
• Two strangers get stuck in an elevator. One is on their way to a wedding, the other to a funeral.
• Write a story that takes place entirely in a queue at the DMV.
• A character tries to recreate their grandmother's secret recipe, missing one key ingredient.
• You meet your soulmate, but they speak a language that doesn't exist.
• A famous musician plays anonymously in a subway station. Only one person recognizes them.
• Write about a breakup from the perspective of the shared pet dog.
• A character finds a roll of film in a thrift store camera and develops it.
• Two people promise to meet at the top of the Empire State Building in 10 years. Only one shows up.
• You receive a package addressed to your childhood imaginary friend.

Thriller & Mystery Prompts

• You enter your apartment and find a stranger cooking dinner. They insist they live there and have photos to prove it.
• A detective realizes the serial killer follows the plot of a book the detective hasn't finished writing yet.
• You find a diary in a hotel room. The last entry is dated tomorrow.
• Every clock in the world stops at exactly 3:33 PM. When they start again, one person is missing from every city.
• You receive a text from a number you deleted years ago: "I know you're watching me."

How to Use These Prompts

Don't overthink it. Pick the one that jumps out at you and start typing. The goal isn't perfection; it's momentum.

Hearth is built for this kind of rapid drafting. With our distraction-free interface and AI tab-complete, you can turn a simple sentence into a full scene in minutes.