story telling creative writing

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The Art of Creative Writing: Learn Storytelling Techniques

A course by reneé bibby , writer.

Explore fundamental writing structures to create a compelling narrative roadmap through storytelling devices and character development

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A good story is defined by its ability to keep readers engaged—either turning pages or scrolling paragraphs until the last sentence. In order to do that, writer Reneé Bibby believes in creating a solid framework to allow the spark of an idea to grow into an immersive story. As the director of the Writers Studio Tucson, she guides her students to develop their narrative voice.

In this course, Reneé teaches you how to hone your writing skills and lay the foundation for a compelling story. Take that great idea you have and transform into a literary piece that captivates readers.

What will you learn in this online course?

13 lessons & 27 downloads

• 96% positive reviews ( 170 )
• 7,061 students
• 13 lessons (52m)
• 27 additional resources (5 files)
• Online and at your own pace
• Available on the app
• Audio: English
• English , Spanish , Portuguese , German , French , Italian , Polish , Dutch
• Level: Beginner
• Unlimited access forever

What is this course's project?

Create a narrative roadmap with a complete story summary and character development plan.

Projects by course students

By animatorlu

By malachinachiara

By maquiammateus

Who is this online course for?

This course is for writers, authors, or anyone with an idea they want to transform into a complete literary piece.

Requirements and materials

No previous experience is necessary.

To take this course, you simply need writing materials, whether it be pen and paper, or a word-processing software.

I bought this course to dive deep in the topic of storytelling for social media content. I think this course is great for writers who are passionate about writing but I am not. Anyway, I think the course is very prepared and the teacher really loves her job. Very detailed and concentrated. Loved it.

mixieclayart

very detailed and helpful thank you

bishalerchithi

eltallerdelajulia

Reneé es muy clara y concisa en sus explicaciones. Va directa al grano, sin florituras ni explicaciones excesivamente largas. Sin rodeos.

La interacción con los alumnos en el foro es muy buena. Resulta muy gratificante ver que el profesor se toma la molestia de ver lo que escriben los alumnos, según sus propuestas.

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enestodeltodo

Un curso que aporta herramientas útiles para la creacion de historias.

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Reneé Bibby A course by Reneé Bibby

Reneé Bibby is an American speculative fiction writer and director of the Writers Studio Tucson, where she teaches beginner and advanced creative writing workshops. Her writing is often grounded in the uniqueness of the climate and culture of the Western United States. She explores concepts like grief, loneliness, heartache but also human connection, nature and comedy.

Reneé’s work has appeared in PRISM International, Luna Station Quarterly, Third Point Press, The Worcester Review, and Wildness . Her stories have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes and Best Small Fictions. Reneé is also involved in the writing community as the coordinator of Rejection Competition and Tucson-based weekly writing meetup Write Wednesday.

Introduction

Introduction to creative writing.

• The Spectrum of Scenes
• The Movement of Time
• The Way You Speak (And Write)
• Showing Your Character

The Map of Your Story

• What Is Your Story?
• How Will You Use Scenes?
• How Will You Move through Time?
• How Will Your Narrator Sound?
• How Will You Show Your Character?

Using Your Map and More!

• Writing a Story from a Craft Map
• My Personal Routine

Final project

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Enjoy learning from home without a set schedule and with an easy-to-follow method. You set your own pace.

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Learn valuable methods and techniques explained by top experts in the creative sector.

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Share knowledge and ideas

Ask questions, request feedback, or offer solutions. Share your learning experience with other students in the community who are as passionate about creativity as you are.

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The community is home to millions of people from around the world who are curious and passionate about exploring and expressing their creativity.

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Domestika curates its teacher roster and produces every course in-house to ensure a high-quality online learning experience.

Domestika's courses are online classes that provide you with the tools and skills you need to complete a specific project. Every step of the project combines video lessons with complementary instructional material, so you can learn by doing. Domestika's courses also allow you to share your own projects with the teacher and with other students, creating a dynamic course community.

All courses are 100% online, so once they're published, courses start and finish whenever you want. You set the pace of the class. You can go back to review what interests you most and skip what you already know, ask questions, answer questions, share your projects, and more.

The courses are divided into different units. Each one includes lessons, informational text, tasks, and practice exercises to help you carry out your project step by step, with additional complementary resources and downloads. You'll also have access to an exclusive forum where you can interact with the teacher and with other students, as well as share your work and your course project, creating a community around the course.

You can redeem the course you received by accessing the redeeming page and entering your gift code.

• Creative Writing
• Fiction Writing
• Storytelling

Courses you might be interested in

The Art of Storytelling: The Ultimate Guide for Creative People

Key Takeaways:

The art of storytelling is the skill of sharing stories in a way that captures people’s imagination and emotions .

It’s a way to connect with others on a universal level through the power of a story.

Have you ever been completely engrossed in a book, movie, or even a great commercial? I love that profound sensation of immersing myself in the lives of characters , intimately sharing their joys, sorrows, successes, and setbacks.

Mastering the art of storytelling is truly powerful. It has the ability to transport you to new worlds, change your perspective, and even transform lives.

As a creative, you might be seeking ways to write these kinds of interesting stories, to breathe life into your narratives, stir emotions, and spark the imagination. If so, you’re in the right place!

We will look at the art of storytelling, from the deep roots of oral traditions to modern storytelling techniques in books, movies, web series, and even social media and marketing.

Whether you are an aspiring writer, a visual artist, a digital content creator, or simply someone who loves to share anecdotes around the campfire, understanding the art of storytelling can elevate your work and your connection with your audience.

Ready to get going? Let’s unlock the secrets of great stories!

What is Storytelling?

What is storytelling? At its core, storytelling is the act of conveying a series of events, real or imagined, that interest an audience . It’s how we share experiences, impart lessons, and evoke emotions. More than simple narration, storytelling is about connection, engagement, and impact.

For creatives, telling stories isn’t just about entertainment. They’re a medium to express ideas, share visions, and create lasting impressions.

You might be a musician telling stories through music, a painter translating stories onto canvas, a filmmaker crafting poignant moments on screen, a writer building worlds with words, or even a marketer hoping to create the next viral social media video – whatever kind of creative work you do, storytelling is at the heart of your craft.

In essence, storytelling is a powerful tool that can elevate your work, making it resonate and linger in the minds and hearts of your audience. It’s not just a skill to be learned; for creatives, it’s a necessity to be mastered.

How to Improve Your Storytelling

1. understand your audience.

Understanding your audience is the first step to effective and engaging storytelling. It’s about more than just knowing who they are. It’s about understanding their desires, fears, and motivations. By diving deeper into your audience’s psyche, you can identify their needs and align your storytelling accordingly.

For example, if you’re writing a blog post for millennials about managing finances, you might incorporate references to student loans, the gig economy, and saving for first homes. This demonstrates you understand their life stage and challenges, and they’ll be more likely to resonate with your story.

2. Focus on Structure

A well-structured narrative can make even the simplest story captivating. Stories typically have three primary parts: the beginning (which sets the stage), the middle (where the main events and conflicts happen), and the end (where conflicts are resolved and the story concludes). This structure provides a roadmap for your audience, guiding them through the narrative in an engaging and logical way.

In Star Wars , the story structure is clear. In the beginning, we’re introduced to Luke Skywalker, his life, and his world. The middle takes us through his adventures and struggles against the Empire. In the end, conflicts are resolved with a major victory for the Rebellion, providing a satisfying conclusion.

3. Create Interesting Characters

Compelling characters are the heart of any great story. They need to be more than just placeholders in your narrative; they must feel real, relatable, and complex.

Spend time developing your characters, giving them unique personalities, strengths, weaknesses, goals, and fears. A well-developed character can invoke strong emotions in your audience, making them laugh, cry, cheer, or even scream in frustration.

In the Harry Potter series , J.K. Rowling creates compelling characters by giving them distinct personalities, strengths, and weaknesses. Harry, the brave and kind-hearted hero archetype character ; Hermione, the intelligent and resourceful friend; and Ron, the loyal and humorous sidekick, are characters we come to love and empathize with.

4. Show, Don’t Tell

One of the most powerful storytelling techniques is to show, not tell. This means allowing your audience to experience the story through actions, senses, and feelings rather than through explicit narrative. Instead of telling your audience that a character is angry, show it through their actions, expressions, or dialogue. This technique pulls your audience deeper into the story.

For example, rather than directly stating what a character is feeling, show it through their actions, reactions, and dialogues. It’s much more impactful to write, “Her hands shook as she picked up the phone” than “She was nervous.”

5. Deep Character Development

Characters should not only be compelling but also well-developed and dynamic. Spending time on character development means delving into their backstory , understanding their motivations, and exploring their desires and fears.

As your engaging story progresses, your characters should also grow and change, reacting to events and learning from their experiences. This makes your characters feel real and relatable to your audience, and they can see themselves reflected in your characters’ struggles and triumphs.

In Breaking Bad , Walter White starts out as a sympathetic character – a high school chemistry teacher who turns to cooking meth after a lung cancer diagnosis. But as the series progresses, we see him transform into a ruthless drug dealer, demonstrating deep character development, albeit in a negative direction.

6. Use Conflict and Resolution

Conflict is the engine that drives your story. It challenges your characters, shapes their growth, and engages your audience. But conflict isn’t just about dramatic battles or heated arguments. It can be internal, such as a character grappling with self-doubt or moral dilemmas.

Whichever form it takes, conflict should always lead to some resolution, providing a sense of closure and satisfaction for your audience.

As an example, the Lord of the Rings series is centered around the conflict of destroying the One Ring to save Middle Earth. This conflict is finally resolved in the climax when the ring is destroyed.

7. Use Tension

Conflict and tension are the lifeblood of any good story. They create suspense, pique curiosity, and elicit emotional responses from the audience. Incorporating various types and layers of conflict – from character clashes and internal struggles to situational dilemmas and moral challenges – can add depth and complexity to your story.

Tension keeps your audience on the edge of their seats. Don’t be afraid to put your characters in difficult situations, and let your audience share their struggles!

A great example of this is in Game of Thrones . Tension and conflict are constant as different characters vie for the Iron Throne, leading to countless plot twists and intense moments.

8. Use Sensory Details

A good story is one that fully engages the reader’s senses. By using sensory details, you can paint a more vivid and realistic picture of your narrative, allowing your audience to see, hear, taste, smell, and feel the story.

This technique enhances the immersive experience of your story, making your audience feel like they’re part of the narrative rather than just passive observers. The more you can engage your audience’s senses, the more real and compelling your story becomes.

For example, instead of saying, “It was a warm day,” say, “The sun bathed the city in a golden glow, the air humming with the buzz of summer.”

9. Emotional Honesty

Emotion is the language of storytelling. You can create a strong emotional connection with your audience by allowing your characters to express their emotions authentically and honestly. But emotional honesty doesn’t just mean making your characters happy, sad, or angry.

It’s about exploring the full spectrum of human emotions, from hope and love to grief and regret. It’s about showing your characters’ vulnerabilities and strengths, their highs and lows, their victories and defeats.

Know that it’s okay to show your heroes scared, your villains vulnerable, or your sidekicks sorrowful. Real emotions resonate with readers, drawing a connection between fantasy and real life.

In the animated film Up , we see the emotional honesty of the protagonist Carl Fredricksen. In the first few heart-wrenching minutes, we experience his joys, dreams, losses, and regrets through the silent narrative of his life with Ellie. This emotional honesty sets a foundation for the rest of Carl’s journey.

10. Use Theme and Symbolism

Themes and symbols are powerful tools that add depth and meaning to your story. A theme is an underlying message or big idea that runs throughout your narrative. It’s what your story is really about, beyond the plot and characters.

Symbols, on the other hand, are objects, characters, or events that represent something else. They can help convey your theme, evoke emotions, or hint at future events.

The Harry Potter series, written by J.K. Rowling, is brimming with themes and symbols. One powerful example is the Patronus charm, a symbol of hope and positivity amidst the darkness, echoing the series’ themes of love conquering fear and light prevailing over the dark.

Pacing is the speed and rhythm of your captivating story. It’s about how quickly or slowly events unfold and how much time you spend on different parts of your story. A fast pace can create tension, excitement, or urgency, while a slow pace can evoke deep emotions, build anticipation, or provide space for character development.

Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code uses fast pacing to create a sense of suspense and urgency, keeping readers on the edge of their seats as they follow the characters unraveling a series of clues.

12. Surprise and Twists

Unexpected plot twists and surprising character revelations can add a thrill to your story. They can shake up your narrative, challenge your characters, and keep your audience guessing.

But surprises and twists should not just be for shock value; they should make sense within the context of your story and deepen the understanding of your characters or plot.

In the movie The Sixth Sense , the unexpected twist completely alters the audience’s perspective of preceding events, making it a masterstroke of plot twists.

13. Relatable Stakes

The stakes in your story are what’s at risk for your characters and what they stand to lose or gain. The higher the stakes , the more invested your audience becomes. But it’s not just about life-and-death situations; stakes can be personal or emotional, such as a character’s happiness, dignity, or relationships.

The key is to make the stakes relatable to your audience, something they can understand and care about. When your audience cares about what’s at stake, they’ll care about the story.

The stakes in the TV show Friends are often personal and highly relatable. Whether it’s Ross and Rachel’s on-again, off-again relationship, Monica’s quest for perfection in her career and personal life, or Chandler’s struggle to break away from his sarcastic persona to express his feelings for Monica, viewers become deeply invested in these relatable life situations.

RELATED: Check out my thoughts on why low stakes are killing modern Hollywood!

14. Keep Practicing

Storytelling is a craft that requires constant practice and refinement. Experiment with different genres , styles, and techniques. Write often, seek feedback, and learn from your successes and failures. The more you write, the better you’ll understand the art of storytelling, and the more effectively you’ll be able to engage and move your audience.

Remember, every master storyteller started somewhere, so don’t be discouraged by initial challenges or setbacks. Keep writing , keep learning, and keep telling your own stories. You might even want to look into taking storytelling courses to become a better storyteller.

Author Stephen King is known to write 2,000 words every day as part of his writing routine, showing that even successful writers understand the importance of continuous practice. His writing habits allow him to produce new work and continually improve his storytelling skills.

Always remember that at the heart of every great story is emotion – your goal is not just to tell an unforgettable story but to make your audience feel it.

The Benefits of Storytelling

Storytelling holds a treasure trove of benefits, especially for creatives. Here are a few key advantages that illustrate the power of a good story:

• Connection : Stories help us connect with our audience on a deep, emotional level. They enable us to show our audience that we understand their experiences, hopes, and fears.
• Memorability : People are more likely to remember a well-told story than dry facts or statistics. When we weave our message into a compelling narrative, it sticks.
• Engagement : Stories are engaging. They draw us in, make us think, and provoke emotional responses. This level of engagement can turn passive observers into active participants.
• Influence : Stories inspire, motivate, and persuade. They provide a powerful platform for us to share our perspectives and influence the thoughts and actions of others.
• Universality : Stories are universal. They transcend cultural, linguistic, and generational barriers, allowing us to reach a wider audience.

In a nutshell, storytelling is a powerful tool that can elevate our work, broaden our reach, and deepen our impact on culture. As creatives, mastering this art can truly set our work apart.

Elements of Storytelling

Storytelling is an intricate tapestry woven from various threads, each contributing to the overall narrative. To master the art of storytelling, it’s essential to understand these core elements : Character, Plot, Conflict, Theme, and Setting.

1. Character

Characters are the heart of any story. They are the individuals that your audience will relate to, empathize with, love, or even love to hate. They can be heroes , villains, mentors, or sidekicks, but they should always be relatable and engaging.

Your characters are the vehicles through which your audience experiences the story. Therefore, developing multi-dimensional, relatable characters is a fundamental aspect of the storytelling process.

The plot is the sequence of events in your story. It’s the journey that your characters undertake, the path they navigate. An engaging plot hooks your audience, keeping them on the edge of their seats, eagerly anticipating what comes next.

A well-crafted plot is like a roller-coaster ride, complete with thrilling highs, poignant lows, unexpected twists, and satisfying resolution.

A common storytelling structure is the three-act story structure , which includes the introduction , the inciting incident , the rising action , the climax , the falling action , and the resolution of the story.

3. Conflict

Conflict is the engine that drives the plot. It’s the challenge that your characters must face and overcome.

There are two main types of conflict: internal and external conflic t.

Internal comes from within the characters themselves, and external comes from their interactions with others or the circumstances in which they find themselves. This tension keeps your audience engaged, rooting for the characters to succeed against all odds.

The theme is the underlying message or central idea of your story. It’s the lens through which your narrative is viewed and the thought-provoking aspect that resonates with your audience long after they’ve finished your story.

Themes can touch upon universal human experiences, like love, friendship, courage, or redemption, making your story relatable and meaningful.

The setting is the time and place where your story unfolds. The setting of a story is an active element that influences the characters, the plot, and the mood of your story. The setting can enhance your narrative, providing context, atmosphere, and a sense of authenticity.

In essence, each element – the characters, the plot, the conflict, the theme, and the setting – all come together to form a well-crafted story. They each play a unique role and contribute to the overall storytelling experience.

When you understand these elements and use them effectively, you create not just fun stories but experiences that are engaging, immersive, and impactful to readers!

Methods of Storytelling

Storytelling takes many forms. No matter the method, the heart of the story remains the same, but the way it’s delivered can paint it in an entirely different light. Let’s look at some of these storytelling methods:

1. Oral Storytelling: Picture this: our ancestors huddled around a fire, sharing stories of their exploits. Or, think of the emotional connection between the parent and child as that parent tells bedtime stories at night. That’s oral storytelling – one of the oldest forms of human connection. It’s all about your presence as a storyteller, your voice, your gestures, and your expressions.

It’s like a performance, where you capture your audience’s attention with the sheer power of your delivery. Audiobook narration is one current way that authors can continue this tradition – and it’s a fantastic way to connect with your readers!

2. Written Storytelling: Ah, the written word – from spine-chilling thrillers to creepy horror movies to heartwarming love stories. Writing lets you craft worlds , characters, and narratives with an incredible level of detail.

Your choice of words, your sentence structure, and your style of creative writing – they all come together to evoke emotions, paint pictures, and tell your own unforgettable story in the reader’s mind.

3. Visual Storytelling (Art, Film, Photography): Have you ever heard the saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words”? Visual storytelling is all about that. A painting, a film scene, a photograph, they can all tell great stories sans words. Here, the magic lies in your ability to convey narratives through images, to let your visuals do the talking.

Visual storytelling is one of the most important aspects of great storytelling in videos, films, ads, and many social media posts. It allows artists to connect with their fans and create content based on good storytelling.

4. Digital Storytelling (Social Media, Blogs, Podcasts, etc.): Welcome to the digital age, where storytelling meets technology. Blogs, social media posts, podcasts – they’re all modern platforms to share stories with the world. Here, understanding your platform and your target audience is key. It’s about blending words, visuals, sounds – even interactive elements – to tell your story in a way that clicks with audiences.

Animated videos, whiteboard videos, articles and blogs, and even YouTube videos are all ways to connect with your fans and readers all over the world!

The Role of Emotion in Storytelling

Emotion is the lifeblood of storytelling. It transforms a simple narrative into an unforgettable experience. Let’s talk about the power of emotion and why it’s so crucial for telling compelling stories and keeping your audience engaged.

Think back to the stories that have stuck with you. The ones that made you laugh, cry, or kept you on the edge of your seat. What made them memorable? More often than not, it’s the emotional journey they took you on. When a compelling story makes you feel something, it creates a deep connection based on human experience – a bond between you, the main characters, and their journey.

So, what does this mean for us as storytellers? It means that we need to do more than just recount events.

We need to make our audience feel.

We must paint vivid pictures, create compelling characters, and weave narratives that tug at the heartstrings. Our stories should provoke thought, stir up emotions, and elicit responses. This is how we captivate our audience. This is how we make our stories resonate.

Remember, storytelling is not just about informing or entertaining. It’s about touching the hearts and minds of your readers

Top 30 Techniques and Terms to Know As an Effective Storyteller

1. In Medias Res : This Latin phrase translates to “in the middle of things”, often used to start a story in the middle of the action. For example, The Odyssey by Homer starts in the middle of Odysseus’s journey home.

2. Flashback/Nonlinear Narrative : This technique jumps back in time to provide some context or background. In The Catcher in the Rye , Holden Caulfield recounts past events from a mental institution.

3. Flash Forward : This method jumps forward to future events in the story. In Slaughterhouse-Five , Billy Pilgrim frequently jumps forward in time.

4. Foreshadowing : It involves hinting at events that will occur later in the story. In Macbeth , the witches foresee Macbeth’s untimely demise, foreshadowing his tragic ending.

5. Chekhov’s Gun : It’s a principle that every element in a story should be necessary, and irrelevant elements should be removed. In Checkmate , a gun placed on a table in the first act is used in the final act.

6. Framing Device : A story told within another story. Wuthering Heights is told through the perspective of a visitor reading diary entries.

7. Red Herring : It’s a misleading clue that diverts attention from the real question or matter. In The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo , Harriet’s supposed sightings mislead detectives.

8. MacGuffin : An object, goal, or other motivator that the protagonist (and sometimes the antagonist) is willing to do and sacrifice almost anything to pursue. The briefcase in Pulp Fiction drives the plot but its contents remain unexplained.

9. Unreliable Narrator : A character who tells the story with a skewed perception of reality. The narrator in Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn conceals important details.

10. Deus Ex Machina : A plot device whereby a seemingly unsolvable problem is suddenly and abruptly resolved by an unexpected and unlikely occurrence. In War of the Worlds , otherwise unstoppable aliens are defeated by bacteria, an unexpected twist.

11. Cliffhanger : A narrative device where a story ends at a suspenseful or dramatic moment, ensuring the audience will return to find out what happens. Almost every episode of Lost ends on a suspenseful note, urging you to watch the next one.

12. Stream of Consciousness : A narrative mode that portrays an individual’s point of view by giving the written equivalent of the character’s thought process. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf closely follows the protagonist’s thoughts.

13. Montage : A technique that condenses time and information by piecing together short shots into a sequence. Rocky’s training sequences in the Rocky film series are the gold standard for this technique.

14. Parallel Plot : The writer runs two storylines side by side and switches back and forth between them. In The Godfather Part II , two timelines run side by side, showing Vito and Michael Corleone’s lives.

15. Juxtaposition : Placing two elements side by side to present a comparison or contrast. Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities begins with: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

16. Magical Realism : A genre where magical elements play a natural part in an otherwise mundane environment. Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude blends the supernatural and the every day in a small Colombian town.

17. Epistolary : A novel composed entirely of letters, diary entries, or other documents. Dracula by Bram Stoker is told through letters, diary entries, and newspaper clippings.

18. Irony : A situation in which there is a contrast between expectation and reality. In The Gift of the Magi , a couple sells what the other person wants most to buy gifts for each other.

19. Pathetic Fallacy : A type of literary device that attributes human qualities and emotions to inanimate objects of nature. In Macbeth , stormy weather often accompanies violent acts.

20. Metanarrative : A narrative about narratives or storytelling. In The Neverending Story , the main character reads a book that includes his own reading of it, thereby mixing his “real life” with the story.

21. Symbolism : The use of symbols to signify ideas and qualities by giving them symbolic meanings that are different from their literal sense. The green light in The Great Gatsby symbolizes Gatsby’s aspirations and dreams.

22. Breaking the Fourth Wall : When a character acknowledges their fictionality by either indirectly or directly addressing the audience. Characters in House of Cards regularly address the audience directly.

23. Doppelganger : A duplicate or shadow of a character representing their evil side. In The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde , Jekyll’s alter ego is his evil double.

24. Backstory : A history or background created for a character. In Harry Potter , the past of Severus Snape shapes his present actions and motives.

25. Rising Action : A series of relevant incidents that create suspense, interest, and tension in a narrative. In The Hunger Games , Katniss’s training and the lead-up to the games build tension.

26. Denouement : The resolution of the issue of a complicated plot in fiction. In Pride and Prejudice , Elizabeth and Darcy’s marriage is the resolution after the climax.

27. Personification : Attributing a personal nature or human characteristics to something nonhuman. A great example is the talking animals in Animal Farm by George Orwell.

28. Conflict : Any struggle between opposing forces. In Moby-Dick , Captain Ahab obsessively pursues the white whale.

29. Anachronism : Something or someone that is not in its correct historical or chronological time. The clock striking in Julius Caesar by Shakespeare – clocks didn’t exist during Caesar’s time.

30. Allegory : A story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one. Animal Farm is also an allegory of the Russian Revolution.

Storytelling and Your Career as a Creative

Whether you’re a graphic designer, a musician, a marketer, or a writer, I firmly believe that story telling is a crucial tool in your creative toolkit. No matter the medium, the core purpose remains the same: to communicate, engage, and evoke emotions.

In the world of graphic design, think of Aaron Draplin . His designs look amazing, and they tell stories. Each of his logos provides a snapshot of the brand’s identity, history, and values. The way he uses shapes, colors, and typography is a form of visual storytelling, creating a narrative that resonates with the audience.

In music, storytelling is often at the very heart of a song. Taylor Swift is a perfect example. Her songs aren’t just catchy – they tell compelling stories about love, heartbreak, and life’s ups and downs. Each lyric helps paint a picture that listeners can relate to personally.

For marketers, storytelling is a powerful way to connect with consumers. Steve Jobs didn’t just sell computers; he told stories. He spun positive stories about innovation, creativity, and challenging the status quo. He transformed Apple from a tech company into a symbol of individuality and forward-thinking.

Even in photography, storytelling is a fundamental component. Look at Steve McCurry, best known for his photo, “ Afghan Girl” . His work is celebrated for its ability to tell a story through a single frame, capturing the human essence and narrating a tale that transcends cultural and linguistic barriers.

So, what’s the takeaway lesson here? No matter what kind of creative work you’re involved in, storytelling can elevate your craft. By making storytelling a conscious part of your creative process, you’re not just making art – you’re connecting with your audience on a deep, emotional level. And in the end, isn’t that what being a creative is all about?

There you have it, my guide to mastering the art of storytelling. We’ve covered a lot of ground, from understanding what storytelling is and why it’s vital to the core elements of the story framework that make up a compelling narrative.

We’ve journeyed through the different forms of story telling, dissected the role of emotion, and laid out practical steps to help you master storytelling skills. Finally, we’ve explored how essential storytelling is in a creative career, with inspiring examples from successful creatives.

Remember, stories are more than just plots and characters. They’re a powerful connection medium, evoking emotions and creating an indelible impact. They have the power to illuminate, to inspire, and to transform.

As we part ways, my final advice to you is this: Keep practicing. Keep refining. Blast through any writer’s block that you experience. Experiment with your storytelling techniques and creative writing , play around with different narrative styles, and don’t be afraid to bare your heart in your written stories!

It’s when you infuse your narratives with authenticity and emotion that you truly engage with your audience and elevate your storytelling to an art form.

So go on, grab your pen, your brush, your camera—whatever tool you use to create—and start telling your own stories now. Because the world needs them. And remember, every story you tell is a reflection of you and your own life – a glimpse into your unique perspective and experience.

Tell your stories with conviction and passion because there’s no one else who can tell them like you can!

Happy storytelling!

Love the art of storytelling? Check out these other helpful articles!

Plot vs Story: What’s The Difference? [With 3 Examples]

How to Start a Story: 11+ Simple & Proven Strategies

Filmmaker, Author, Actor and Story Consultant

Neil Chase is an award-winning, produced screenwriter, independent filmmaker, professional actor, and author of the horror-western novel Iron Dogs. His latest feature film is an apocalyptic thriller called Spin The Wheel.

Neil has been featured on Celtx, No Film School, Script Revolution, Raindance, The Write Practice, Lifewire, and MSN.com, and his work has won awards from Script Summit, ScreamFest, FilmQuest and Cinequest (among others).

Neil believes that all writers have the potential to create great work. His passion is helping writers find their voice and develop their skills so that they can create stories that are entertaining and meaningful. If you’re ready to take your writing to the next level, he's here to help!

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8 Great Storytelling Exercises (For Awakening Creativity)

Whether they’re writers, painters, musicians, or business owners, creative people need to exercise their brains – just like a muscle. The more you practice coming up with fresh ideas, the better you get at it. Most artists go through hundreds of awful ideas before they reach their breakthrough. Just like lifters get better at lifting. The more they lift, you’ll get better at writing stories the more you do it. Here are a few exercises that’ll set you on the right path to creative genius !

Storytelling Exercises Worth Practicing

1. use writing prompts, race against the clock.

The best way to write with a prompt is to give yourself a time limit. There’s something quite liberating about time-bound writing – it doesn’t allow you to second-guess every little detail, you just have to keep writing to make it in time. A fun way to enjoy writing prompts is to find and post them on Reddit . There, you get to receive feedback and read the stuff other writers came up with for that particular prompt.

2. Use The Story Spine Technique

3. practice people watching, 4. critique other stories you come in contact with, 5. look for daily stories worth telling, 6. get creative on zoom, 7. play the fortunately – unfortunately game.

If you have a storytelling group, give this exercise a go! *It works best with an odd number of members.*

8. Form a Line

Awakening creativity is rarely accomplished by waiting for your muse’s gentle whisper on a rainy night when you’re slightly inebriated (although that’s a good place to start). Quite to the contrary, becoming a great storyteller is all about practice, repetition, and exposure to great prose or even cinema and TV . Please put yourself out there, take a risk of exposing your ideas to others, and put the ideas laid out in this article into action. Your artistic conscience is going to thank you for it. Next up, you may want to explore a guide on how to become more creative .

Rafal Reyzer

Hey there, welcome to my blog! I'm a full-time entrepreneur building two companies, a digital marketer, and a content creator with 10+ years of experience. I started RafalReyzer.com to provide you with great tools and strategies you can use to become a proficient digital marketer and achieve freedom through online creativity. My site is a one-stop shop for digital marketers, and content enthusiasts who want to be independent, earn more money, and create beautiful things. Explore my journey here , and don't miss out on my AI Marketing Mastery online course.

Creative Writing and Storytelling for kids-- made easy

Hi! Welcome to the best creative writing website for kids (in my humble opinion.) I’m Who. And next to me are my buddies, What and Why Not. Together we make a great story.

How do we make great stories? Come on in and we’ll show you with our super easy creative writing and storytelling formula. Then try some writing prompts and activities that help kids write creatively, right now.

Creative Writing and Storytelling Resources

How to write a fun story

Story and Writing Prompts for Kids

Language Arts / Writing Worksheets

Adjectives, Adverbs, Verbs Lists

Fill in the blank stories

Story Games, Apps, Books

Printable Lesson Plans

Creative Writing Posters

Definitions of Writing Terms

The short story is a fiction writer’s laboratory: here is where you can experiment with characters, plots, and ideas without the heavy lifting of writing a novel. Learning how to write a short story is essential to mastering the art of storytelling . With far fewer words to worry about, storytellers can make many more mistakes—and strokes of genius!—through experimentation and the fun of fiction writing.

Nonetheless, the art of writing short stories is not easy to master. How do you tell a complete story in so few words? What does a story need to have in order to be successful? Whether you’re struggling with how to write a short story outline, or how to fully develop a character in so few words, this guide is your starting point.

Famous authors like Virginia Woolf, Haruki Murakami, and Agatha Christie have used the short story form to play with ideas before turning those stories into novels. Whether you want to master the elements of fiction, experiment with novel ideas, or simply have fun with storytelling, here’s everything you need on how to write a short story step by step.

How to Write a Short Story: Contents

The Core Elements of a Short Story

How to write a short story outline, how to write a short story step by step, how to write a short story: length and setting, how to write a short story: point of view, how to write a short story: protagonist, antagonist, motivation, how to write a short story: characters, how to write a short story: prose, how to write a short story: story structure, how to write a short story: capturing reader interest, where to read and submit short stories.

There’s no secret formula to writing a short story. However, a good short story will have most or all of the following elements:

• A protagonist with a certain desire or need. It is essential for the protagonist to want something they don’t have, otherwise they will not drive the story forward.
• A clear dilemma. We don’t need much backstory to see how the dilemma started; we’re primarily concerned with how the protagonist resolves it.
• A decision. What does the protagonist do to resolve their dilemma?
• A climax. In Freytag’s Pyramid , the climax of a story is when the tension reaches its peak, and the reader discovers the outcome of the protagonist’s decision(s).
• An outcome. How does the climax change the protagonist? Are they a different person? Do they have a different philosophy or outlook on life?

Of course, short stories also utilize the elements of fiction , such as a setting , plot , and point of view . It helps to study these elements and to understand their intricacies. But, when it comes to laying down the skeleton of a short story, the above elements are what you need to get started.

Note: a short story rarely, if ever, has subplots. The focus should be entirely on a single, central storyline. Subplots will either pull focus away from the main story, or else push the story into the territory of novellas and novels.

The shorter the story is, the fewer of these elements are essentials. If you’re interested in writing short-short stories, check out our guide on how to write flash fiction .

Some writers are “pantsers”—they “write by the seat of their pants,” making things up on the go with little more than an idea for a story. Other writers are “plotters,” meaning they decide the story’s structure in advance of writing it.

You don’t need a short story outline to write a good short story. But, if you’d like to give yourself some scaffolding before putting words on the page, this article answers the question of how to write a short story outline:

https://writers.com/how-to-write-a-story-outline

There are many ways to approach the short story craft, but this method is tried-and-tested for writers of all levels. Here’s how to write a short story step-by-step.

1. Start With an Idea

Often, generating an idea is the hardest part. You want to write, but what will you write about?

What’s more, it’s easy to start coming up with ideas and then dismissing them. You want to tell an authentic, original story, but everything you come up with has already been written, it seems.

Here are a few tips:

• Originality presents itself in your storytelling, not in your ideas. For example, the premise of both Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Ostrovsky’s The Snow Maiden are very similar: two men and two women, in intertwining love triangles, sort out their feelings for each other amidst mischievous forest spirits, love potions, and friendship drama. The way each story is written makes them very distinct from one another, to the point where, unless it’s pointed out to you, you might not even notice the similarities.
• An idea is not a final draft. You will find that exploring the possibilities of your story will generate something far different than the idea you started out with. This is a good thing—it means you made the story your own!
• Experiment with genres and tropes. Even if you want to write literary fiction , pay attention to the narrative structures that drive genre stories, and practice your storytelling using those structures. Again, you will naturally make the story your own simply by playing with ideas.

If you’re struggling simply to find ideas, try out this prompt generator , or pull prompts from this Twitter .

2. Outline, OR Conceive Your Characters

If you plan to outline, do so once you’ve generated an idea. You can learn about how to write a short story outline earlier in this article.

If you don’t plan to outline, you should at least start with a character or characters. Certainly, you need a protagonist, but you should also think about any characters that aid or inhibit your protagonist’s journey.

When thinking about character development, ask the following questions:

• What is my character’s background? Where do they come from, how did they get here, where do they want to be?
• What does your character desire the most? This can be both material or conceptual, like “fitting in” or “being loved.”
• What is your character’s fatal flaw? In other words, what limitation prevents the protagonist from achieving their desire? Often, this flaw is a blind spot that directly counters their desire. For example, self hatred stands in the way of a protagonist searching for love.
• How does your character think and speak? Think of examples, both fictional and in the real world, who might resemble your character.

In short stories, there are rarely more characters than a protagonist, an antagonist (if relevant), and a small group of supporting characters. The more characters you include, the longer your story will be. Focus on making only one or two characters complex: it is absolutely okay to have the rest of the cast be flat characters that move the story along.

Learn more about character development here:

https://writers.com/character-development-definition

3. Write Scenes Around Conflict

Once you have an outline or some characters, start building scenes around conflict. Every part of your story, including the opening sentence, should in some way relate to the protagonist’s conflict.

Conflict is the lifeblood of storytelling: without it, the reader doesn’t have a clear reason to keep reading. Loveable characters are not enough, as the story has to give the reader something to root for.

Take, for example, Edgar Allan Poe’s classic short story The Cask of Amontillado . We start at the conflict: the narrator has been slighted by Fortunato, and plans to exact revenge. Every scene in the story builds tension and follows the protagonist as he exacts this revenge.

In your story, start writing scenes around conflict, and make sure each paragraph and piece of dialogue relates, in some way, to your protagonist’s unmet desires.

Read more about writing effective conflict here:

What is Conflict in a Story? Definition and Examples

4. Write Your First Draft

The scenes you build around conflict will eventually be stitched into a complete story. Make sure as the story progresses that each scene heightens the story’s tension, and that this tension remains unbroken until the climax resolves whether or not your protagonist meets their desires.

Don’t stress too hard on writing a perfect story. Rather, take Anne Lamott’s advice, and “write a shitty first draft.” The goal is not to pen a complete story at first draft; rather, it’s to set ideas down on paper. You are simply, as Shannon Hale suggests, “shoveling sand into a box so that later [you] can build castles.”

5. Step Away, Breathe, Revise

Whenever Stephen King finishes a novel, he puts it in a drawer and doesn’t think about it for 6 weeks. With short stories, you probably don’t need to take as long of a break. But, the idea itself is true: when you’ve finished your first draft, set it aside for a while. Let yourself come back to the story with fresh eyes, so that you can confidently revise, revise, revise .

In revision, you want to make sure each word has an essential place in the story, that each scene ramps up tension, and that each character is clearly defined. The culmination of these elements allows a story to explore complex themes and ideas, giving the reader something to think about after the story has ended.

6. Compare Against Our Short Story Checklist

Does your story have everything it needs to succeed? Compare it against this short story checklist, as written by our instructor Rosemary Tantra Bensko.

Below is a collection of practical short story writing tips by Writers.com instructor Rosemary Tantra Bensko . Each paragraph is its own checklist item: a core element of short story writing advice to follow unless you have clear reasons to the contrary. We hope it’s a helpful resource in your own writing.

Update 9/1/2020: We’ve now made a summary of Rosemary’s short story checklist available as a PDF download . Enjoy!

Click to download

Your short story is 1000 to 7500 words in length.

The story takes place in one time period, not spread out or with gaps other than to drive someplace, sleep, etc. If there are those gaps, there is a space between the paragraphs, the new paragraph beginning flush left, to indicate a new scene.

Each scene takes place in one location, or in continual transit, such as driving a truck or flying in a plane.

Unless it’s a very lengthy Romance story, in which there may be two Point of View (POV) characters, there is one POV character. If we are told what any character secretly thinks, it will only be the POV character. The degree to which we are privy to the unexpressed thoughts, memories and hopes of the POV character remains consistent throughout the story.

You avoid head-hopping by only having one POV character per scene, even in a Romance. You avoid straying into even brief moments of telling us what other characters think other than the POV character. You use words like “apparently,” “obviously,” or “supposedly” to suggest how non-POV-characters think rather than stating it.

Your short story has one clear protagonist who is usually the character changing most.

Your story has a clear antagonist, who generally makes the protagonist change by thwarting his goals.

(Possible exception to the two short story writing tips above: In some types of Mystery and Action stories, particularly in a series, etc., the protagonist doesn’t necessarily grow personally, but instead his change relates to understanding the antagonist enough to arrest or kill him.)

The protagonist changes with an Arc arising out of how he is stuck in his Flaw at the beginning of the story, which makes the reader bond with him as a human, and feel the pain of his problems he causes himself. (Or if it’s the non-personal growth type plot: he’s presented at the beginning of the story with a high-stakes problem that requires him to prevent or punish a crime.)

The protagonist usually is shown to Want something, because that’s what people normally do, defining their personalities and behavior patterns, pushing them onward from day to day. This may be obvious from the beginning of the story, though it may not become heightened until the Inciting Incident , which happens near the beginning of Act 1. The Want is usually something the reader sort of wants the character to succeed in, while at the same time, knows the Want is not in his authentic best interests. This mixed feeling in the reader creates tension.

The protagonist is usually shown to Need something valid and beneficial, but at first, he doesn’t recognize it, admit it, honor it, integrate it with his Want, or let the Want go so he can achieve the Need instead. Ideally, the Want and Need can be combined in a satisfying way toward the end for the sake of continuity of forward momentum of victoriously achieving the goals set out from the beginning. It’s the encounters with the antagonist that forcibly teach the protagonist to prioritize his Needs correctly and overcome his Flaw so he can defeat the obstacles put in his path.

The protagonist in a personal growth plot needs to change his Flaw/Want but like most people, doesn’t automatically do that when faced with the problem. He tries the easy way, which doesn’t work. Only when the Crisis takes him to a low point does he boldly change enough to become victorious over himself and the external situation. What he learns becomes the Theme.

Each scene shows its main character’s goal at its beginning, which aligns in a significant way with the protagonist’s overall goal for the story. The scene has a “charge,” showing either progress toward the goal or regression away from the goal by the ending. Most scenes end with a negative charge, because a story is about not obtaining one’s goals easily, until the end, in which the scene/s end with a positive charge.

The protagonist’s goal of the story becomes triggered until the Inciting Incident near the beginning, when something happens to shake up his life. This is the only major thing in the story that is allowed to be a random event that occurs to him.

Your characters speak differently from one another, and their dialogue suggests subtext, what they are really thinking but not saying: subtle passive-aggressive jibes, their underlying emotions, etc.

Your characters are not illustrative of ideas and beliefs you are pushing for, but come across as real people.

Your language is succinct, fresh and exciting, specific, colorful, avoiding clichés and platitudes. Sentence structures vary. In Genre stories, the language is simple, the symbolism is direct, and words are well-known, and sentences are relatively short. In Literary stories , you are freer to use more sophisticated ideas, words, sentence structures, styles , and underlying metaphors and implied motifs.

Your plot elements occur in the proper places according to classical Three Act Structure (or Freytag’s Pyramid ) so the reader feels he has vicariously gone through a harrowing trial with the protagonist and won, raising his sense of hope and possibility. Literary short stories may be more subtle, with lower stakes, experimenting beyond classical structures like the Hero’s Journey. They can be more like vignettes sometimes, or even slice-of-life, though these types are hard to place in publications.

In Genre stories, all the questions are answered, threads are tied up, problems are solved, though the results of carnage may be spread over the landscape. In Literary short stories, you are free to explore uncertainty, ambiguity, and inchoate, realistic endings that suggest multiple interpretations, and unresolved issues.

Some Literary stories may be nonrealistic, such as with Surrealism, Absurdism, New Wave Fabulism, Weird and Magical Realism . If this is what you write, they still need their own internal logic and they should not be bewildering as to the what the reader is meant to experience, whether it’s a nuanced, unnameable mood or a trip into the subconscious.

Literary stories may also go beyond any label other than Experimental. For example, a story could be a list of To Do items on a paper held by a magnet to a refrigerator for the housemate to read. The person writing the list may grow more passive-aggressive and manipulative as the list grows, and we learn about the relationship between the housemates through the implied threats and cajoling.

Your short story is suspenseful, meaning readers hope the protagonist will achieve his best goal, his Need, by the Climax battle against the antagonist.

Your story entertains. This is especially necessary for Genre short stories.

The story captivates readers at the very beginning with a Hook, which can be a puzzling mystery to solve, an amazing character’s or narrator’s Voice, an astounding location, humor, a startling image, or a world the reader wants to become immersed in.

Expository prose (telling, like an essay) takes up very, very little space in your short story, and it does not appear near the beginning. The story is in Narrative format instead, in which one action follows the next. You’ve removed every unnecessary instance of Expository prose and replaced it with showing Narrative. Distancing words like “used to,” “he would often,” “over the years, he,” “each morning, he” indicate that you are reporting on a lengthy time period, summing it up, rather than sticking to Narrative format, in which immediacy makes the story engaging.

You’ve earned the right to include Expository Backstory by making the reader yearn for knowing what happened in the past to solve a mystery. This can’t possibly happen at the beginning, obviously. Expository Backstory does not take place in the first pages of your story.

Your reader cares what happens and there are high stakes (especially important in Genre stories). Your reader worries until the end, when the protagonist survives, succeeds in his quest to help the community, gets the girl, solves or prevents the crime, achieves new scientific developments, takes over rule of his realm, etc.

Every sentence is compelling enough to urge the reader to read the next one—because he really, really wants to—instead of doing something else he could be doing. Your story is not going to be assigned to people to analyze in school like the ones you studied, so you have found a way from the beginning to intrigue strangers to want to spend their time with your words.

Whether you’re looking for inspiration or want to publish your own stories, you’ll find great literary journals for writers of all backgrounds at this article:

https://writers.com/short-story-submissions

Learn How to Write a Short Story at Writers.com

The short story takes an hour to learn and a lifetime to master. Learn how to write a short story with Writers.com. Our upcoming fiction courses will give you the ropes to tell authentic, original short stories that captivate and entrance your readers.

Rosemary – Is there any chance you could add a little something to your checklist? I’d love to know the best places to submit our short stories for publication. Thanks so much.

Hi, Kim Hanson,

Some good places to find publications specific to your story are NewPages, Poets and Writers, Duotrope, and The Submission Grinder.

“ In Genre stories, all the questions are answered, threads are tied up, problems are solved, though the results of carnage may be spread over the landscape.”

Not just no but NO.

See for example the work of MacArthur Fellow Kelly Link.

[…] How to Write a Short Story: The Short Story Checklist […]

Thank you for these directions and tips. It’s very encouraging to someone like me, just NOW taking up writing.

[…] Writers.com. A great intro to writing. https://writers.com/how-to-write-a-short-story […]

Hello: I started to write seriously in the late 70’s. I loved to write in High School in the early 60’s but life got in the way. Around the 00’s many of the obstacles disappeared. Since then I have been writing more, and some of my work was vanilla transgender stories. Here in 2024 transgender stories have become tiresome because I really don’t have much in common with that mind set.

The glare of an editor that could potentially pay me is quite daunting, so I would like to start out unpaid to see where that goes. I am not sure if a writer’s agent would be a good fit for me. My work life was in the Trades, not as some sort of Academic. That alone causes timidity, but I did read about a fiction writer who had been a house painter.

This is my first effort to publish since the late 70’s. My pseudonym would perhaps include Ahabidah.

Gwen Boucher.

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• Writing Prompts

150+ Story Starters: Creative Sentences To Start A Story

The most important thing about writing is finding a good idea . You have to have a great idea to write a story. You have to be able to see the whole picture before you can start to write it. Sometimes, you might need help with that. Story starters are a great way to get the story rolling. You can use them to kick off a story, start a character in a story or even start a scene in a story.

When you start writing a story, you need to have a hook. A hook can be a character or a plot device. It can also be a setting, something like “A young man came into a bar with a horse.” or a setting like “It was the summer of 1969, and there were no cell phones.” The first sentence of a story is often the hook. It can also be a premise or a situation, such as, “A strange old man in a black cloak was sitting on the train platform.”

Story starters are a way to quickly get the story going. They give the reader a place to start reading your story. Some story starters are obvious, and some are not. The best story starters are the ones that give the reader a glimpse into the story. They can be a part of a story or a part of a scene. They can be a way to show the reader the mood of a story. If you want to start a story, you can use a simple sentence. You can also use a question or an inspirational quote. In this post, we have listed over 150 story starters to get your story started with a bang! A great way to use these story starters is at the start of the Finish The Story game .

If you want more story starters, check out this video on some creative story starter sentences to use in your stories:

150+ Creative Story Starters

Here is a list of good sentences to start a story with:

• I’ve read about a million stories about princesses but never thought I could ever be one.
• There was once a man who was very old, but he was wise. He lived for a very long time, and he was very happy.
• What is the difference between a man and a cat? A cat has nine lives.
• In the middle of the night, a boy is running through the woods.
• It is the end of the world.
• He knew he was not allowed to look into the eyes of the princess, but he couldn’t help himself.
• The year is 1893. A young boy was running away from home.
• What if the Forest was actually a magical portal to another dimension, the Forest was a portal to the Otherworld?
• In the Forest, you will find a vast number of magical beings of all sorts. 
• It was the middle of the night, and the forest was quiet. No bugs or animals disturbed the silence. There were no birds, no chirping. 
• If you wish to stay in the Forest, you will need to follow these rules: No one shall leave the Forest. No one shall enter. No one shall take anything from the Forest.
• “It was a terrible day,” said the old man in a raspy voice.
• A cat is flying through the air, higher and higher, when it happens, and the cat doesn’t know how it got there, how it got to be in the sky.
• I was lying in the woods, and I was daydreaming.
• The Earth is a world of wonders. 
• The fairy is the most amazing creature I have ever met.
• A young girl was sitting on a tree stump at the edge of a river when she noticed a magical tree growing in the water.
• My dancing rat is dressed in a jacket, a tie and glasses, which make him look like a person. 
• In the darkness of the night, I am alone, but I know that I am not. 
• Owls are the oldest, and most intelligent, of all birds.
• My name is Reyna, and I am a fox. 
• The woman was drowning.
• One day, he was walking in the forest.
• It was a dark and stormy night…
• There was a young girl who could not sleep…
• A boy in a black cape rode on a white horse…
• A crazy old man in a black cloak was sitting in the middle of the street…
• The sun was setting on a beautiful summer day…
• The dog was restless…”
• There was a young boy in a brown coat…
• I met a young man in the woods…
• In the middle of a dark forest…
• The young girl was at home with her family…
• There was a young man who was sitting on a …
• A young man came into a bar with a horse…
• I have had a lot of bad dreams…
• He was a man who wanted to be king…
• It was the summer of 1969, and there were no cell phones.
• I know what you’re thinking. But no, I don’t want to be a vegetarian. The worst part is I don’t like the taste.
• She looked at the boy and decided to ask him why he wasn’t eating. She didn’t want to look mean, but she was going to ask him anyway.
• The song played on the radio, as Samual wiped away his tears.
• This was the part when everything was about to go downhill. But it didn’t…
• “Why make life harder for yourself?” asked Claire, as she bit into her apple.
• She made a promise to herself that she would never do it.
• I was able to escape.
• I was reading a book when the accident happened.
• “I can’t stand up for people who lie and cheat.” I cried.
• You look at me and I feel beautiful.
• I know what I want to be when I grow up.
• We didn’t have much money. But we knew how to throw a good party.
• The wind blew on the silent streets of London.
• What do you get when you cross an angry bee and my sister?
• The flight was slow and bumpy. I was half asleep when the captain announced we were going down.
• At the far end of the city was a river that was overgrown with weeds. 
• It was a quiet night in the middle of a busy week.
• One afternoon, I was eating a sandwich in the park when I spotted a stranger.
• In the late afternoon, a few students sat on the lawn reading.
• The fireflies were dancing in the twilight as the sunset.
• In the early evening, the children played in the park.
• The sun was setting and the moon was rising.
• A crowd gathered in the square as the band played.
• The top of the water tower shone in the moonlight.
• The light in the living room was on, but the light in the kitchen was off.
•  When I was a little boy, I used to make up stories about the adventures of these amazing animals, creatures, and so on. 
• All of the sudden, I realized I was standing in the middle of an open field surrounded by nothing but wildflowers, and the only thing I remembered about it was that I’d never seen a tree before.
• It’s the kind of thing that’s only happened to me once before in my life, but it’s so cool to see it.
• They gave him a little wave as they drove away.
• The car had left the parking lot, and a few hours later we arrived home.
• They were going to play a game of bingo.
• He’d made up his mind to do it. He’d have to tell her soon, though. He was waiting for a moment when they were alone and he could say it without feeling like an idiot. But when that moment came, he couldn’t think of anything to say.
• Jamie always wanted to own a plane, but his parents were a little tight on the budget. So he’d been saving up to buy one of his own. 
• The night was getting colder, and the wind was blowing in from the west.
• The doctor stared down at the small, withered corpse.
• She’d never been in the woods before, but she wasn’t afraid.
• The kids were having a great time in the playground.
• The police caught the thieves red-handed.
• The world needs a hero more than ever.
• Mother always said, “Be good and nice things will happen…”
• There is a difference between what you see and what you think you see.
• The sun was low in the sky and the air was warm.
• “It’s time to go home,” she said, “I’m getting a headache.”
• It was a cold winter’s day, and the snow had come early.
• I found a wounded bird in my garden.
• “You should have seen the look on my face.”
• He opened the door and stepped back.
• My father used to say, “All good things come to an end.”
• The problem with fast cars is that they break so easily.
• “What do you think of this one?” asked Mindy.
• “If I asked you to do something, would you do it?” asked Jacob.
• I was surprised to see her on the bus.
• I was never the most popular one in my class.
• We had a bad fight that day.
• The coffee machine had stopped working, so I went to the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea.
• It was a muggy night, and the air-conditioning unit was so loud it hurt my ears.
• I had a sleepless night because I couldn’t get my head to turn off.
• I woke up at dawn and heard a horrible noise.
• I was so tired I didn’t know if I’d be able to sleep that night.
• I put on the light and looked at myself in the mirror.
• I decided to go in, but the door was locked.
• A man in a red sweater stood staring at a little kitten as if it was on fire.
• “It’s so beautiful,” he said, “I’m going to take a picture.”
• “I think we’re lost,” he said, “It’s all your fault.”
• It’s hard to imagine what a better life might be like
• He was a tall, lanky man, with a long face, a nose like a pin, and a thin, sandy moustache.
• He had a face like a lion’s and an eye like a hawk’s.
• The man was so broad and strong that it was as if a mountain had been folded up and carried in his belly.
• I opened the door. I didn’t see her, but I knew she was there.
• I walked down the street. I couldn’t help feeling a little guilty.
• I arrived at my parents’ home at 8:00 AM.
• The nurse had been very helpful.
• On the table was an array of desserts.
• I had just finished putting the last of my books in the trunk.
• A car horn honked, startling me.
• The kitchen was full of pots and pans.
• There are too many things to remember.
• The world was my oyster. I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth.
•  “My grandfather was a World War II veteran. He was a decorated hero who’d earned himself a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and a Purple Heart.
• Beneath the menacing, skeletal shadow of the mountain, a hermit sat on his ledge. His gnarled hands folded on his gnarled knees. His eyes stared blankly into the fog. 
• I heard a story about a dragon, who was said to be the size of a house, that lived on the top of the tallest mountain in the world.
•  I was told a story about a man who found a golden treasure, which was buried in this very park.
• He stood alone in the middle of a dark and silent room, his head cocked to one side, the brown locks of his hair, which were parted in the middle, falling down over his eyes.
•  Growing up, I was the black sheep of the family. I had my father’s eyes, but my mother’s smile.
• Once upon a time, there was a woman named Miss Muffett, and she lived in a big house with many rooms.
• When I was a child, my mother told me that the water looked so bright because the sun was shining on it. I did not understand what she meant at the time.    
•  The man in the boat took the water bottle and drank from it as he paddled away.
• The man looked at the child with a mixture of pity and contempt.
• An old man and his grandson sat in their garden. The old man told his grandson to dig a hole. 
• An old woman was taking a walk on the beach . The tide was high and she had to wade through the water to get to the other side.
• She looked up at the clock and saw that it was five minutes past seven.
• The man looked up from the map he was studying. “How’s it going, mate?”
• I was in my room on the third floor, staring out of the window.
• A dark silhouette of a woman stood in the doorway.
• The church bells began to ring.
• The moon rose above the horizon.
• A bright light shone over the road.
• The night sky began to glow.
• I could hear my mother cooking in the kitchen.
• The fog began to roll in.
• He came in late to the class and sat at the back.
• A young boy picked up a penny and put it in his pocket.
• He went to the bathroom and looked at his face in the mirror.
• It was the age of wisdom and the age of foolishness. We once had everything and now we have nothing.
• A young man died yesterday, and no one knows why.
• The boy was a little boy. He was not yet a man. He lived in a house in a big city.
• They had just returned from the theatre when the phone rang.
• I walked up to the front of the store and noticed the neon sign was out.
• I always wondered what happened to Mary.
• I stopped to say hello and then walked on.
• The boy’s mother didn’t want him to play outside…
• The lights suddenly went out…
• After 10 years in prison, he was finally out.
• The raindrops pelted the window, which was set high up on the wall, and I could see it was a clear day outside.
• My friend and I had just finished a large pizza, and we were about to open our second.
• I love the smell of the ocean, but it never smells as good as it does when the waves are crashing.
• They just stood there, staring at each other.
• A party was in full swing until the music stopped.

For more ideas on how to start your story, check out these first-line writing prompts . Did you find this list of creative story starters useful? Let us know in the comments below!

Marty the wizard is the master of Imagine Forest. When he's not reading a ton of books or writing some of his own tales, he loves to be surrounded by the magical creatures that live in Imagine Forest. While living in his tree house he has devoted his time to helping children around the world with their writing skills and creativity.

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The art of storytelling 101: techniques for creating compelling narratives.

posted by iWriter user iWriter Team

December 6, 2023

Have you ever been completely enthralled by a story, unable to put the book down or tear your eyes away from the screen? We all have. There’s something magical about narratives that captivate and transport us to different worlds.

Great storytelling can leave us spellbound. But what makes these stories so compelling? 

In this blog post, we will uncover the secrets behind creating captivating narratives and explore techniques to help you weave magic into your stories. Get ready to embark on a thrilling journey through the art of storytelling!

Elements of a Compelling Narrative

A compelling narrative is the key to captivating audiences and keeping them engaged. It draws readers in, makes them emotionally invested in the story, and leaves a lasting impact long after turning the final page. 

But what exactly makes a narrative truly compelling? As content writers , we will explore the essential elements that can turn an ordinary story into an extraordinary one.

Character Development

Character development is a crucial aspect of storytelling that can make or break a narrative. It refers to creating and evolving characters throughout a story, allowing them to grow and change as the plot unfolds. Good character development makes for more realistic and relatable characters and keeps readers engaged in the story.

Conflict and Resolution

Conflict and resolution are essential elements of any captivating story. They create tension, drive the plot forward, and keep readers engaged until the very end. Conflict is a struggle or disagreement between opposing forces. 

This can take many forms, such as person versus person, person versus self, person versus society, or person versus nature. In literature, conflict is often used to create obstacles for the protagonist and force them to make difficult choices.

Resolution, on the other hand, is the outcome of the conflict. It is the point at which all loose ends are tied up, and the story concludes. This can involve a character overcoming their struggles, finding a solution to their problems, or coming to terms with an unsolvable issue.

Setting and Atmosphere

Setting and atmosphere are crucial elements in creating a captivating narrative. They help immerse readers in the story, making it more realistic and engaging. A well-crafted setting and atmosphere can transport readers to different worlds, periods, or even just down the street of a familiar city.

Plot Structure

The plot structure is the backbone of any story, providing the framework for how events unfold and characters develop. The sequence of events drives the narrative forward and keeps readers engaged from beginning to end. 

Techniques for Creating a Captivating Story

The success of any story lies in its ability to captivate and engage the reader. A captivating story keeps the audience hooked, eagerly turning the pages to discover what happens next. But how do writers achieve this magic? 

What techniques can be employed to create a truly compelling narrative that leaves a lasting impact on the reader’s mind? This section will explore some tried and tested techniques for creating a captivating story.

Start with a Strong Opening

The first few lines of your story are crucial in grabbing the reader’s attention. A strong opening creates an immediate connection with the reader and sets the tone for the rest of the story. It could be an intriguing question, a shocking statement, or a vivid description that captures the reader’s imagination.

Develop Interesting Characters

Characters are at the heart of any good story. They drive the plot forward and evoke emotions in readers. Creating well-developed characters with distinct personalities, motivations, and flaws makes them relatable and adds depth to your story.

Show, Don’t Tell

This is a cardinal rule of storytelling – show your readers what is happening instead of telling them. Use descriptive language and sensory details to paint a vivid picture in their minds. This allows readers to experience the events as they unfold rather than being told about them.

Build Suspense

One way to keep readers engaged is by building suspense throughout your story. Tease them with hints about upcoming events or revelations that leave them wanting more. This keeps them on edge and invested in the story.

Use Dialogue Effectively

Dialogue is a powerful tool for bringing your characters to life and moving the story forward. It can reveal their personalities, relationships, and motivations naturally and engagingly. Use it strategically to add depth and interest to your story.

Create Conflict

Every great story needs conflict – it creates tension, pushes the plot forward, and keeps readers engaged. Introduce obstacles, challenges, and dilemmas for your characters to overcome, making their journey more compelling.

Use Foreshadowing

Foreshadowing is a literary technique where an author hints at future events in the story. This creates anticipation and adds an element of mystery that keeps readers engaged as they try to piece together what will happen next.

Pace Your Story

The pace of your story has a significant impact on its ability to captivate readers. Vary the pace by slowing down during important moments or building up tension during action scenes. This allows readers to catch their breath while keeping them hooked.

Create a Strong Plot

A well-crafted plot with unexpected twists and turns will keep readers wanting more. Plan out your story carefully, ensuring each event leads naturally into the next and keeps the story moving toward a satisfying conclusion.

Unleash the Art of Storytelling

In conclusion, narrative techniques play a crucial role in the art of storytelling. This creates captivating stories that keep readers engaged and invested. By utilizing vivid descriptions, relatable characters, and well-paced plotlines, writers can transport their audience to new worlds and evoke powerful emotions. 

Are you looking for video scripts or content that weaves a compelling narrative? At iWriter, we can connect you with writers who can help create your content. Schedule a free call with one of our account managers today. 

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20 Inspiring TED Talks on Storytelling, Writing, Filmmaking and Creativity.

Every aspiring screenwriter should watch right now..

20 inspiring TED talks on storytelling, writing, filmmaking and creativity.

Welcome to our curated list of the top TED talks on storytelling. Originally founded in 1984,  the TED media organization has grown exponentially in recent years. Their free online database of talks has become something of a wormhole of inspiring talks on a wide variety of topics.

Luckily for you, we’ve dived into that wormhole and emerged with the top TED talks on storytelling from filmmakers such as JJ Abrams , novelists such as JK Rowling and screenwriters such as Shonda Rhimes . As well as a whole host of film industry professionals, motivational speakers, professors and entrepreneurs.

So, without further ado, it’s time to grab that coffee, dim the lights, and get inspired…

Best TED talks on storytelling. 

1. how to write a story:  john dufresne..

Author, screenwriter and professor of creative writing, John Dufresne, talks about how it doesn’t matter how luminous your prose is, or fascinating your central character, you need a plot.

If your central character isn’t striving to accomplish something meaningful, the reader will put down your story.

2. The mystery of storytelling:  Julian Friedmann.

Highlights of this talk by veteran agent, Julian Friedmann, include how you need to make an audience feel pity for your protagonist, usually by making them go through some kind of undeserved misfortune.

This enables the audience to connect emotionally with the character and when this happens you, the writer, begin to have control over the audience. One of the very best TED talks on storytelling online.

3. Rewriting collective instincts:  Phil Lord.

Hollywood screenwriter Phil Lord, who co-wrote the Lego Movie , talks about the process of rewriting—a vital process, however much it stresses writers out.

An interesting fact he gives is that the Writers’ Guild of America consumes more mental health visits than any other healthcare collective in America.

4. The clues to a great story:  Andrew Stanton.

This is one of the best TED talks on storytelling you’ll find. Andrew Stanton, part of the Pixar writing dream team behind Toy Story , Finding Nemo , WALL-E , etc. talks about writing with emotion .

He implores us to make him care about our stories and characters—emotionally, intellectually, aesthetically. Because we all know what it’s like to not care…

5. Screenwriting and the fear of being found out:  Tim Sullivan.

Tim Sullivan is a British screenwriter whose most recent movie was Letters to Juliet , starring Amanda Seyfried. In this TED talk, he describes how screenwriting is always about selling.

When you have an idea for a film, the first person you have to convince it’s any good is yourself. If you don’t, somewhere down the road, someone’s going to find you out…

Best TED talks on storytelling and filmmaking.

6. making your first film whatever it takes:  nicolas forzy..

Nicolas Forzy is an independent filmmaker who explains that if you want to shoot a feature film, you usually start with what you have access to: a car, an apartment, a friend’s restaurant, and build a story around that.

Forzy did the opposite, filming a feature with gunfights, sword fights and extravagant locations, and yet somehow managed to get it produced and up on the big screen.

7. What it’s like to be a woman in Hollywood:  Naomi Jones.

What can really help your screenwriting is to see what you put on the page from the point of view of an actor. As actor Naomi McDougall Jones highlights, a typical female character description in a script reads like this: “Brian’s love interest. Attractive, cute, and flirty, she is the ideal girl and Brian’s prize throughout the entire film.”

Very useful talk on how to write more interesting female characters.

8. The film industry today:  Frank Smith.

Having a general idea about the industry you want to work in can always be beneficial, and in this talk, Frank Smith gives a great overview of Hollywood today. He discusses how a lot of people make their fortunes in Hollywood and a lot of people spend their fortunes in Hollywood. But why?

The reason is that they’re entrepreneurs, and entrepreneurs thrive on constant change. Which of course describes Hollywood perfectly.

9. How I made an impossible film:  Martin Villeneuve.

Filmmaker Martin Villeneuve (younger brother of Denis Villeneuve, the director behind Enemy, Sicario, Blade Runner 2049 , etc.) talks here about his experience making Mars et Avril , the sci-fi spectacular based on his own graphic novel.

Getting his unique vision of the future on the big screen was a challenge primarily because he had virtually no money. Listen to how he managed to achieve it against all the odds.

Best TED talks on storytelling and creativity.

10. try something new for 30 days:  matt cutts..

Former Google engineer Matt Cutts tells us in under four minutes how you should think about something you’ve always wanted to add to your life and try it. Every day for the next thirty days.

This is just about the right amount of time to add a new habit or subtract a habit. When it comes to screenwriting this could mean, for example, adding something positive like one hour’s solid writing a day, and subtracting something negative, like Facebook.

11. The mystery box:  JJ Abrams.

JJ Abrams needs no introduction and in this amusing talk, he delves deep into one of the most fundamental aspects of imagination: mystery. Every scene should be a teaser that draws the reader into the next, using question after question after question.

He gives the example of Star Wars , in which the droids meet a mysterious woman we don’t know: mystery. Then we meet Luke Skywalker who sees the droids’ holographic message that she wants to find Obi Wan Kenobi, but who the hell’s Obi Wan Kenobi: mystery. And on and on.

12. Before Avatar … A curious boy: James Cameron.

James Cameron reveals how the genesis of his movies like Aliens, The Terminator and Avatar lie in a childhood fascination with the fantastic—from reading science fiction on his way to high school, to man going to the moon in the late 60s, to Jacques Cousteau’s deep-sea diving.

An interesting and personal account of the creative process from one of today’s major forces in film.

13. Success, failure and the drive to keep creating: Elizabeth Gilbert.

Author of the novel that went on to become the movie Eat Pray Love , Elizabeth Gilbert describes how she failed continuously for six years while trying to get published.

She talks about how every rejection letter was devastating, but how eventually she was able to keep going and keep writing because she loved writing more than she hated failing at writing. Inspiring stuff.

14. A writer’s secret to catching creative ideas: Brad Herzog.

Author Brad Herzog bases his talk on the fact that there are different aspects to creating an idea: there’s conceiving the idea, developing the idea and conveying the idea. The trick is to put them all together in order to come up with something really special.

He advises you do this by countering conventional wisdom, surprising people and making them expect the unexpected.

15. How to build your creative confidence: David Kelley.

Legendary designer David Kelley urges us to realize that we’re all naturally creative and tells us how to let our ideas fly and do what we set out to do.

In this inspiring talk, he stresses that we can all reach a place of creative confidence if we put our mind to it.

16. My year of saying yes to everything:  Shonda Rhimes.

Shonda Rhimes has written over 300 episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and is one of the hardest working people in TV. In this eloquent and passionate speech, she describes how much she loves her work and the process of writing, which she calls “the hum.”

But what do you do when you lose “the hum”?—that sense of joy you once had for something you love? Watch the talk to find out.

17. How to stop screwing yourself over: Mel Robbins.

An award-winning life coach and motivational speaker, Mel Robbins, tells us how to get motivated to do what we really want to do in life. She notes, for example, that scientists have calculated the odds of each of us being born: 1 in 400 trillion.

Yet despite the fact that it’s amazing we’re here in the first place, we take it for granted and continue to be ruled by our “inner snooze alarm.”

18. The magical science of storytelling:  David JP Phillips.

Absolutely brilliant talk on stories and chemicals in the brain. When we write a story we’re actually trying to induce a hormonal, chemical response in the reader’s mind. One that will engage them with the story you’re telling.

Phillips suggests all your stories should be sorted by type, according to which make people laugh (via endorphins) which make people feel empathy (via oxytocin) and so on. Unmissable.

19. Why you will fail to have a great career: Larry Smith.

Larry Smith, a professor of economics, has a blunt challenge to all of us who are putting off the pursuit of our dreams: “Everyone tells you to pursue your passion and follow your dreams. You hear it again and again and then you decide not to do it. You’re afraid that if you look for your passion but don’t find it, you’ll look like an idiot. So then you look for excuses as to why you’re not going to follow your passion.”

20. Inside the mind of a master procrastinator:  Tim Urban.

Still struggling to finish (or start) that screenplay? Want to shoot your own short but can’t find the time? Entrepreneur Tim Urban urges us to think about why we’re really procrastinating because everyone is procrastinating on something in life.

In this funny talk, he says how we need to stay aware of the power of the “instant gratification monkey” and make sure we start today. Well, maybe not today.

Let us know in the comments below what you think of our selection and if we’ve missed out your favorite TED talk on creativity, storytelling or filmmaking.

Enjoyed these TED talks on storytelling? Get even more inspired by these posts…

How to Become a Screenwriter: A Pro’s Guide to Unlocking Your Career

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Competitions

1000 story prompts to spark your creativity.

By Ken Miyamoto from ScreenCraft · September 20, 2023

When you’re trying to figure out what you are going to write next, you need to choose wisely. Concept is everything — at least at first glance. It’s what sells the book, short story, movie or TV series. As soon as you have a compelling and engaging concept, you can build equally compelling and engaging stories and characters around them. Read more about The Secret to Understanding What High Concept Means in Hollywood . With that in mind, here we present the ultimate list of 1000 story prompts to get your creative juices flowing. So get ready to go down a wild rabbit tunnel of story prompts. Be sure to bookmark this post so you can read all one thousand of them!

Note: These prompts were purposefully developed on the fly. However, because we live in the same world and are influenced by the same things, some may same familiar. Some may have even already been developed. But the point is to get your creative energy moving as you consider any and all possibilities.

1000 Story Prompts

• Families from an alternative universe live upside down underneath our houses.
• A character dies and is told they can choose to be reincarnated — only to be reborn as a dog.
• A stay-at-home father lives a secret life as a superhero.
• A female superhero lives a secret life as a supermom.
• The world we know is discovered to be a dream of a superior being.
• Earth is actually a zoo watched by visiting guests (UAPs) from around the universe.
• A man’s toy collection from the 1980s comes to life.
• An introverted character realizes that they actually died years prior and are a ghost.
• Titanic in space.
• A world where superheroes are hunted down and killed.
• An alien invasion story through the eyes of the aliens. (Read this Script Lab Script Collection: Out of This World Sci-fi Screenplays ).
• Kids playing their parents’ Dungeons & Dragons game open a portal to the 1980s.
• A family awakens to the appearance of a strange door in their family room that wasn’t there before.
• A stranger appears at a family’s house claiming to be a future resident.
• Someone finds out how to rig the biggest lottery drawing in history.
• Angels come to live on Earth.
• Demons begin to overtake society as they try to take over Earth.
• A romantic comedy told through the eyes of two dogs that fall in love.
• Two football coaches from opposing schools fall in love — but are both still living in the closet.
• An egotistical manly man suddenly fears everything.
• A world where humans are the pets.
• A world where women don’t need men to procreate.
• An egotistical scholar is suddenly stripped of his intelligence for 24 hours.
• A being falls from the stars to the Earth.
• A man falls from the stars to the Earth.
• A woman falls from the stars to the Earth.
• A woman claims to be the daughter of God.
• God is nothing more than a cosmic child playing games with their toys.
• God is actually a writer that has conjured us all as stories.
• Characters discover a fountain of youth.
• A family is offered a vacation into the stars by visiting aliens.
• A family mistakenly books tickets to Paris, Texas, instead of Paris, France.
• An American woman inherits a castle in Scotland.
• Characters play, “What dead celebrities or historical figures would you like to have dinner with?”, only to see their selections come knocking at the door.
• What if Dorothy replaced somebody in Oz — and someone replaced her in Kansas?
• Scientists discover time travel and must keep it secret from the government.
• An animated movie demystifying the great white shark — a surprisingly peaceful species.
• Beings live in every single closet in the world.
• There really are monsters living under our beds.
• Suburban dads take part in the world lawn-mowing championships.
• A new law where criminals must face their greatest fears.
• A man afraid of snakes washes up on an island full of them.
• Vampires that can survive during the daylight.
• A world where vampires rule the Earth.
• The end of the world is near, and families must live with that knowledge.
• A world where space travel never happened.
• A world where war has never been waged.
•  A world where real old-world magic is slowly beginning to resurface.
• A young boy tries to convince everyone in his town that he actually IS a wizard.
• A young girl discovers that she is a descendant of witches.
• A collector’s collection of old lunch boxes from the 1980s allows him to send and receive notes from the past.
• Present day times where the internet and social media were never created.
• There are cities in the clouds.
• There are cities in the deepest parts of the ocean.
• A character discovers that they are living in a computer simulation — and they are the last human alive.
• A new and dangerous species is discovered living in the highest treetops of the world.
• A disgraced baseball manager manages a Little League team to the big championship.
• A retired football player goes back to coach his son’s Pee Wee league.
• The first female football player accepted into the NFL draft.
• Astronauts volunteer to undergo the first flight to Mars.
• The Earth is found destroyed by Nuclear War when astronauts from a Mars mission return.
• Star high school football players go out for soccer when their football team is barred from playing.
• The world’s biggest action movie star wakes up in the world of his hit movies.
• UFOS and UAPs are actually evolved humans from the future.
• Bigfoot exists — and it’s time for him and his kind to meet the world.
• A grumpy old man takes on a dare to become a comedian.
• Mosquitos are actually tiny fighter planes for a species trying to take over this world of giants.
• A character discovers that they are actually a robot.
• A character discovers that they are actually a clone.
• A character discovers that they are actually God who has suffered brain damage while walking the Earth as a human.
• A character discovers that they are the offspring of the Devil.
• A character discovers that they can hear the voices of the dead.
• A character discovers that they can see into the past.
• A character discovers that they can see into the future.
• Earth is actually Purgatory.
• Earth is actually Heaven.
• Earth is actually Hell.
• Earth is actually a video game for aliens.
• A suburban mother discovers that the whole neighborhood of mothers and wives are the “perfect” clones generated by the men.
• A suburban dad discovers that the whole neighborhood of dads and husbands are the “perfect” clones generated by the women.
• The children of a suburban family discover that the other children in the neighborhood are “perfect” clones.
• A man’s dog starts talking to him suddenly.
• A family’s dog starts talking to them one day.
• A character goes back in time to meet their younger self.
• A suburban family moves to the big city.
• A big city family is forced to move to the suburbs.
• Real-life dragons are released from a deep cavern.
• Rock climbers witness a cartel murder and are chased through the mountains.
• A skydiver falls onto an invisible alien ship.
• An astronaut crashlands on a planet and is taken in by an alien family.
• An alcoholic must deal with the demons of their past.
• A character is told they have twenty-four hours to right the wrongs they’ve done to others before they die.
• A bullied character wills themself to have super strength.
• An abused character wills themself to be able to fly.
• A racist is forced to live in the body of a minority.
• A male figure skater is placed into an Olympic hockey team.
• A character attempts to escape an underwater prison.
• An escaped convict hides in the suburbs.
• A police officer is sent to a prison where he has put away most of the prisoners within.
• Conflicts between countries are now decided by epic battles between one soldier versus another.
• A character falls in love with their best friend from high school.
• A high school jock is forced to live in the body of a nerd he bullies.
• A high school nerd is forced to live in the body of the jock who bullies him.
• A character tries to emulate the fictional Batman — fighting crime from the shadows.
• A character makes a wish to be smart and suddenly wakes up as the smartest and wealthiest businessperson in the world.
• A state championship-winning high school football coach is forced to coach a first-of-its-kind female football team.
• An unpopular high school kid mistakes strange coincidences for superpowers.
• Peter Pan is actually a monster that steals children.
• Billy the Kid awakens in the twenty-first century.
• Wyatt Earp is brought into the future by future townfolk in need of a sheriff.
• International spies must face the world of retirement.
• A submarine crew discovers a new world.
• A submarine crew falls into the deepest depths of the ocean and is frozen in cryosleep, only to awaken one hundred years later.
• Families are tasked with colonizing the moon.
• Humans now live on the moon, with what happened to Earth in their ancestors’ time left a mystery.
• A doctor finds the cure for cancer, only to be threatened by a secret society of government officials and soldiers.
• A doctor finds the cure for cancer, only to face the bureaucracy of giving it to the public for free.
• A doctor finds the cure for cancer, only to refuse to share it for millions of dollars for each dosage.
• The world’s first cyborg deals with not being entirely human.
• The world’s first human clone deals with their supposed lack of humanity.
• The world’s first superhero deals with the alienation of their abilities.
• A champion race car driver undergoes a worldwide race around the world by land, sea and air.
• A young character discovers they have healing powers — but every time they heal someone, they get more and more sick themselves.
• A writer discovers that every character they conjure comes to life.
• A mother and her teenage son switch bodies.
• A father and his teenage daughter switch bodies.
• A feuding brother and sister switch bodies.
• A wealthy boss and their underling employee switch bodies.
• A group of role-playing game players discovers that the rolls of their dice can determine things around them in their world.
• The parents are kidnapped by aliens, leaving the kids to save them.
• A major city is destroyed by a nuclear attack and the surrounding communities struggle to pick up the pieces.
• A young boy with an advanced aging disorder plays Pee Wee football against players a third of his size.
• A girl decides to play football on the guys’ team and becomes the star player.
• A shamed tennis pro competes in the highly competitive local pickleball tournament.
• The world of professional beach volleyball players.
• The world of major league eating.
• The world of professional cornhole players.
• The world of professional badminton players.
• A character suffers from a disorder that only allows them to communicate through song.
• A soccer player who is now a professional only because their father has coached them since youth soccer.
• A football player who is now a professional only because their father has coached them since youth football.
• A baseball player who is now a professional only because their father has coached them since youth baseball.
• A character finds a job site that can place them in any job in any time period.
• A smart and popular high school student finds a legal loophole that allows them to run for president.
• Angels are aliens.
• Demons are aliens.
• God was an alien.
• A faith-based story about a wise child that claims to be the son of God.
• A faith-based story about a child that can speak to those who have passed away.
• A faith-based story about a homeless man that some think is the second coming of Jesus Christ.
• George Lucas actually visited a world that inspired Star Wars after his near-death experience in a car crash.
• A farmer discovers an alien craft in his fields.
• A farmer discovers a strange wooden door in his fields.
• A character goes into an MRI and is somehow transported back in time.
• An F-35 fighter jet and its pilot are transported to the 1942 bombing of Pearl Harbor.
• A character afraid of water decides to overcome their fear by visiting the world’s biggest water park.
• A popular comedian decides to run for president as a joke, only to discover that they win.
• A young girl who loves the Little House on a Prairie books makes a wish to live during those times, only to discover the realities of those difficult times and environments.
• An online shark expert turns out to know nothing about sharks when he’s invited to a Shark Week show. (Read the Script Lab Script Collection: Killer Shark Movies That Audiences Eat Up )
• A sitting president wanting to get more votes decides to go to space.
• A poor single mother wins the biggest lottery in history.
• A character who wins the biggest lottery in history vows to give it all away — only to discover how hard it is to do that.
• A bank robber is a modern-day Robin Hood.
• A luxury cruise ship is overtaken by present-day pirates.
• A luxury cruise ship is overtaken by pirates from the past.
• A luxury cruise spaceship is overrun by space pirates.
• A family of the future must escape Earth from its tyrannical rule.
• A family of settlers in the 1800s face off against alien invaders.
• A family of settlers in the 1800s begin to experience UFO phenomenon.
• Cowboys from the Wild West face off against alien invaders.
• Parents travel to the future to see what their children grow up to be like — and the results are not great.
• The boogeyman is real.
• Santa Claus is real — but not how most would expect.
• A scientist clones his family that died in an accident.
• A character wakes up tied to an electric chair.
• A character wakes up in a gas chamber.
• Frankenstein’s Monster was real.
• A historian discovers that Dracula is real.
• A contemporary retelling of the Dr. Jekyll vs. Mr. Hyde story.
• A historian proves that King Arthur and Excalibur legends were real.
• A character wakes up and decides to do the opposite of what they would normally do.
• A character decides to sell everything they own to live on a sailboat.
• A character decides to quit their successful-yet-unfulfilling job to return to the job they loved in high school.
• A stay-at-home dad decides to start an Olympic curling team.
• Empty-nesters decide to sell everything and travel the country in an RV.
• A high school kid in 1969 decides they are going to hitchhike across the country to attend Woodstock.
• A rock star on the verge of superstardom stumbles upon a desert bar inhabited by members of the 27-Club — rock stars like Jim Morrisson, Janice Joplin, Jimmy Hendrix, Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse.
• An aging rocket scientist decides to make his own rocket to take him into space before he dies.
• The first baby born in space.
• The first family to go on a space journey.
• The satellites we see in the sky are actually UFOs/UAPs being covered up by SpaceX and NASA.
• People are invited to a haunted mansion where the eccentric owner wants to market it as a Disneyland-like attraction.
• A group of young friends go on an amusement park ride only to be catapulted into another world.
• The story of the creation of the first roller coaster.
• The story of the creation of a waterpark.
• A young teen wishes they could fly, only to wake up with angel-like wings.
• Kids discover a hidden doorway.
• Characters discover a hidden staircase leading to a strange world.
• Kids discover that their gaming system can control actual sports games and players.
• A high school football team scrimmages a professional NFL team — and beats them.
• A college football team scrimmages a professional NFL team — and beats them.
• A sandlot baseball team comprised of neighbor kids challenges the high school team.
• Old friends reunite over a suburban fire pit.
• A high school reunion leads to murder.
• An old grudge leads to a character being stalked.
• Someone is following a character on their cross-country drive.
• Someone picks up a hitchhiker, only to realize that they are a long-dead historical figure.
• A character travels back to their old hometown, only to realize that they’ve time-traveled to their childhood era.
• A thrill seeker commits a crime to be sent to prison so he can see if he can escape it.
• A YouTuber influencer pranks the wrong person.
• Dracula immigrated to the United States and is a crime boss.
• High school students on an abroad trip find Excalibur.
• Robin Hood is the villain of the story.
• Sherlock Holmes’s dog as he solves pet-life mysteries.
• Dorothy’s granddaughter is kidnapped by the daughter of the Wicked Witch of the West in Oz.
• The story of  The Wizard of Oz  set on another planet.
• A modern-day retelling of Tarzan .
• A woman is stranded on an island and must survive.
• The contestants of a  Survivor -like show learn that the civilized world back home has been destroyed.
• It’s revealed that an Olympic swimmer is actually a mermaid or merman.
• A father and son or mother and daughter go on a safari to bond.
• Parents of a college freshman decide to attend their child’s university to be near them.
• A father is tasked with coaching his son’s soccer team even though he’s never played or watched the sport.
• A mother is tasked with coaching her son’s football team.
• A father is tasked with coaching his daughter’s cheer team.
• Parents of spoiled rich kids decide to move their family to a third-world country.
• A soldier goes AWOL.
• While doing research in the jungles of Vietnam, a team of scientists is visited by a Vietnam War-era soldier.
• A poker player needs to earn money to pay off a debt.
• A contemporary retelling of the  Alice in Wonderland story.
• An aging mother with apparent dementia claims to be Alice from  Alice in Wonderland.
• The children of two families are abducted by aliens.
• An 1800s-era family travels to the frontier to start a new life.
• A brother and sister learn that their parents are Russian sleeper agents.
• A character discovers that their father is a wanted criminal.
• A character suspects that their father is a serial killer.
• A writer stalks random people to learn what it is like for serial killers to stalk their victims.
• When a character feels like their life has no meaning, they decide to get the high score on every old Galaga arcade machine they can find.
• A character discovers an old 1980s arcade.
• A character decides to quit their boring day job and open an old 1980s arcade.
• A former drug addict decides to find the child she was forced to give up.
• A grown-up orphan decides to find their birth parents.
• An orphan learns that their parents are aliens from another world.
• A stranded astronaut is taken in by an alien race.
• The first family to venture to another planet loses their son, only for him to be raised by aliens.
• A family struggles to keep up with the Joneses.
• Siblings struggle to survive the angst of being the new kids in school.
• A character creates a new kind of internet.
• A character mourns the death of their parent.
• A family decides to move away from the city and buy their own island.
• A family is shipwrecked.
• An astronaut living on the moon watches Earth be destroyed by an alien invasion.
• An astronaut living on the moon watches Earth be destroyed by nuclear war.
• A journalist is offered the chance to interview an assassin.
• A journalist is offered the chance to interview an alien living among us.
• A journalist is offered the chance to go back in time to interview a historical figure of their choice.
• A time-traveling assassin struggles to kill a child who would grow up to become Adolph Hitler.
• Children discover an old mine shaft and become trapped within it.
• Children discover a cave that leads into another world.
• Present-day children are grounded from their screens as their parents show them what they did growing up.
• The first trip down the Mississippi River.
• Present-day adventurers decide to travel the full length of the Mississippi River in a canoe.
• A pilot has an encounter with a UFO/UAP.
• A local sheriff tries to uncover a conspiracy.
• An FBI agent suspects a local sheriff of covering up a murder.
• An FBI agent and local sheriff team up to uncover a murder mystery.
• A high school student investigates the murder of a local teen.
• High school students are transported forward in time to their 30-year high school reunion.
• High school students are transported into the bodies of their middle-aged selves.
• Young children are transported into the bodies of their high school selves.
• A funeral reunites a group of high school friends.
• Friends take their terminally ill friend on an adventure.
• A character is mistakenly told they are going to die.
• A character visits a psychic who tells them they are going to die soon.
• A psychic foresees a murder.
• A fake psychic sets up clients to make them believe their predictions are coming true.
• A man pays a psychic to tell a woman he has a crush on that she’s going to meet someone just like him.
• A computer program becomes self-aware.
• A videogame character becomes self-aware.
• A character’s newly AI-automated house becomes a death trap.
• An AI fighter jet defies orders.
• The first human-looking military drone.
• The first cyborg soldier.
• A character’s memories are downloaded into a clone.
• A martial artist is invited to fight in an intergalactic tournament.
• A soldier is invited to fight in an intergalactic war.
• A single soldier represents Earth in a one-on-one match to the death.
• A family inherits an old castle with a ghost living in it.
• While visiting old castles on vacation, a family is transported back in time.
• A passenger on an airliner wakes up to discover they are the only person on the plane.
• The first civilian passenger flight to the moon goes awry.
• A family decides to sail around the world together.
• A character mourning the death of their parent decides to walk across the country.
• A character mourning the death of their sibling decides to bike around the country.
• A character mourning the death of their spouse decides to travel the world.
• Two characters fall in love during a layover at an airport.
• A sailor rescues another and they fall in love.
• A sailor decides to brave the Bermuda Triangle.
• All of the ships and planes that have disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle suddenly reappear.
• The Bermuda Triangle of space travel.
• Cats and Dogs rule the Earth.
• A small farming family fights off invaders during World War III.
• A small farming family avoids the nearby alien invasion.
• A talented Asian-American character struggles to become a country singer in Nashville.
• A musical prodigy goes to Julliard as a teenager.
• A musical prodigy goes to Julliard as a pre-teen.
• A Broadway stage actor portraying a historical figure is visited by their ghost.
• A young girl comes of age.
• A young boy comes of age.
• A young non-binary character comes of age.
• A writer has the power to write someone’s death.
• A writer has the power to change people’s minds.
• A writer has the power to build things in the real world through their writing.
• A small-town chef is hired to be the president’s chef after a campaign visit.
• A small-town sheriff decides to become an FBI agent.
• An FBI agent decides to retire and later becomes a small-town sheriff.
• An 18-year-old decides to run for sheriff.
• An 18-year-old decides to run for mayor of a small town.
• Children in a small town rally to convince the town board into financing a water park.
• Teens hide in an amusement park after hours only to see the characters of the rides come to life.
• After a terrorist attack, a college-bound student decides to join the military.
• A college-bound student decides to join the military after the death of their veteran father.
• A group of teens discovers that they are actually clones.
• Former prison cellmates are reunited after thirty years.
• Two puppy siblings separated at birth decide to find each other.
• A police officer who accidentally killed a teenager tries to reconcile with the family.
• A high school graduation goes awry when the “graduating” student reveals that they didn’t graduate.
• A college-bound student uses his tuition money to party.
• A bank robber hides in plain sight in a small town.
• A character escapes a mental institution.
• A character decides to commit a crime bad enough to go to prison so they can kill the murderer of a loved one.
• Two rival coaches make each other’s lives miserable in the off-season.
• An unlikely sports athlete becomes the best to ever play the game.
• A student that lost a limb in an accident wants to letter in every single high school sport.
• Friends recreate their favorite classic movie.
• An engineer is tasked with creating Leonardo Da Vinci’s various designs.
• Albert Einstein is reincarnated.
• Albert Einstein is brought back from the past to solve a dangerous problem.
• Alfred Einstein, Albert’s little-known idiot brother, tries to make a name for himself.
• Marie S. Curie, the mother of modern physics, rivals Albert Einstein.
• Children find a magic carpet in their grandparents’ attic.
• A contemporary retelling of the forty thieves as bank robbers the FBI is trying to track down.
• Siblings discover that they are the descendants of Adolf Hitler.
• A character learns that they are the bastard child of the president.
• A character learns that they are the bastard child of a king.
• A character learns that they are actually a missing child reported missing thirty years prior.
• A character finds buried treasure.
• Friends find a bag of money in the woods.
• Friends find a wishing tree that grants wishes a little too literally.
• Soldiers fighting in World War II realize that they are actually toy soldiers.
• A character who lost their spouse in the 9/11 attacks joins the military to hunt down Osama Bin Laden.
• A character dreams of an impending terrorist attack and does all they can to prevent it from happening.
• A mother deals with empty-nest syndrome.
• A father deals with empty-nest syndrome.
• A character decides to leave everything behind to live and work at a remote lighthouse.
• A man who claims to be a great hunter is anything but.
• A character obsessed with cartoons is thrust into their worlds.
• A comic collector searches for the ultimate find.
• A toy collector searches for the ultimate find.
• A character suffers from Sinistrophobia — the fear of objects to your left.
• A character does their best to become a criminal mastermind — with lackluster results.
• A character becomes a vigilante.
• A suburban American town bands together as an invading army approaches.
• An alien ship crash lands in the suburbs.
• A returning astronaut finds Earth destroyed.
• A returning astronaut finds Earth taken over by an alien race.
• A returning astronaut is actually an alien doing recon for an invasion.
• The real story behind the creation of Coca-Cola.
• The real story behind the creation of the hula hoop.
• The real story behind the creation of Pong.
• A teen who can’t detach from technology is transported back to the 1980s.
• A teen who can’t detach from technology is transported back to the 1950s.
• A teen who can’t detach from technology is transported back to the 1800s.
• Parents try to become influencers on social media — with hilarious results.
• Worldwide rule is decided by the Olympic Games.
• Characters struggle to survive a destructive meteor shower.
• Characters are sucked into their favorite TV shows.
• A hunter is transported into the lives of his prey.
• A skilled hunter is forced to hunt down and kill a man.
• An average Joe is forced to assassinate the president.
• An Amish man turns away from his Amish roots and goes to Vegas.
• Teens who leave their Amish community face a world of technology, drugs, and sex.
• A character decides to dig the deepest hole known to man.
• A ghost hunter falls in love with a ghost.
• A ghost falls in love with the owner of the house they are haunting.
• A ghost struggles to help the family of the house they haunt.
• A bowling league gets a little too competitive.
• A sand volleyball league gets a little too competitive.
• A small-town softball tournament gets a little too competitive.
• A bar owner keeps his patrons safe amidst a vampire attack.
• A bar owner keeps his patrons safe amidst a zombie attack.
• A bar owner serves drinks to ghosts who frequented the bar in the past.
• A man is suddenly approached by dozens upon dozens of offspring that were born of his donated sperm.
• An old band reunites after thirty years.
• Old former iconic band members reunite one last time after fifty years.
• A garage band is discovered and thrust into stardom.
• The story of a rookie MLB baseball player pitching a no-hitter.
• The story of a Little League pitcher pitching a no-hitter.
• A lifeguard is suddenly afraid of water.
• The world of professional minigolfers.
• A young man goes off to college and meets the girl of his dreams.
• A young woman goes off to college and meets the guy of her dreams.
• An LGBTQIA+ character goes off to college and finds the partner of their dreams.
• A young high school freshman comes of age.
• A stay-at-home parent deals with empty nest syndrome.
• A tubing adventure turns dangerous amidst a storm that causes flooding.
• A small plane crashes in the mountains and the passengers must survive and escape.
• An earthquake causes havoc in a big city.
• An earthquake unleashes beasts from deep within the Earth.
• A meteor shower is actually the end of the world — and the government knew it.
• A character struggles to deal with the death of their significant other.
• A pool hustler is released from prison.
• A gambler decides to beat the house against all odds.
• A gambler banned from all Vegas casinos decides to beat them all in disguise.
• A haunted amusement park.
• A haunted theme ride.
• A haunted mansion that is now a bed and breakfast.
• A ghost travels to various places as an afterlife vacation while haunting wherever they stay.
• A haunted spaceship is found by explorers.
• Astronauts on their way to Mars come across curious alien lifeforms.
• Astronauts on the first mission to Mars come across what looks to be a human-made ship.
• Astronauts on the first mission to Mars come across a ship identical to theirs.
• A dog travels on a cross-country adventure to find his person who moved off to college.
• A near-catatonic man is found wandering the streets in the rain, covered in blood.
• A serial killer raises a serial-killing family.
• A serial killer tries to quit but can’t.
• A portal to a strange alternate universe opens in somebody’s house.
• A family that has been underground since Y2K arises to a very different world.
• A pilot continually travels to different time periods after flying into a storm.
• A character discovers that they can’t die.
• A character discovers that when they die, they keep coming back to the day before their previous death.
• As a teen goes through puberty they develop superpowers.
• An old couple is given a chance to be reborn again so they can find each other and fall in love once more.
• Two married couples decide to swap mates.
• Swingers from 1970s suburbia are transported to the 2020s suburbia.
• People can transport themselves to their favorite movies and TV shows.
• People can transport themselves into the stories of their favorite books.
• Two brothers are all that is left of the human race.
• Two brothers face off against each other in the Super Bowl.
• Two sisters face off against each other in the U.S. Open.
• A brilliant but nerdy high school student conjures the perfect football scheme to win it all.
• Two volleyball players decide to quit college and become professional beach volleyball players.
• A shamed tennis pro decides to team up with a suburban mother and wife to win the pickleball championships.
• A new sport in created — arena golf.
• A competition where the person who stays up the longest wins ten million dollars.
• A social experiment gone wrong.
• Prisoners escape from a prison for the criminally insane amidst a terrible storm.
• A teacher saves a school from a school shooting but suffers from PTSD.
• Soldiers fall in love but are separated by war.
• The first encounter with an alien race leads to a representative swap so humans and aliens can learn about each other.
• A character somehow begins to exchange emails with their past self.
• An undelivered letter sent from a soldier to his family is finally delivered a generation later.
• NASA receives a message from space.
• NASA receives a message from space from a futuristic space crew claiming to be from the 1960s.
• NASA receives a message from space from a futuristic space crew claiming to be from the 2060s.
• A stargazer begins to communicate with something in the sky with a flashlight.
• Two children appear from deep within a mountain cave.
• Lost siblings are raised by forest animals.
• A youth soccer team competes for the national championship.
• A JV football player becomes the star quarterback when two varsity players go down.
• A track and field star breaks both legs in a car accident and struggles to return to competition.
• A middle school-aged character breaks both legs in an accident but heals in a way that makes them the fastest human being.
• A character wishes they could be fast only to see their wish granted by literally only being able to do everything fast.
• A character gets a call from a stranger claiming to be locked in a van somewhere.
• A 911 operator gets a call from a serial killer threatening to kill again.
• A 911 operator gets a call from someone claiming to be a vampire.
• A legal loophole allows a child to run for president.
• A treasure hunter finds a treasure that causes government agents to hunt them down for it.
• A time traveler goes back in time to find out who really killed JFK.
• A time traveler goes back in time to stop the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
• A time traveler goes back in time to see if Jesus Christ was real.
• A time traveler goes back in time for the sole purpose of documenting historical moments on film.
• A time traveler goes back in time to bet on games of the past.
• NASA decides to use a passing asteroid as a fuel saver to travel to Mars.
• A mother must hunt down her serial killing son.
• A father must hunt down his serial killing son before he kills again.
• Parents deal with the horror of their child being exposed as a serial killer.
• A detective goes to extreme measures to get into the mind of a serial killer.
• A detective uses new technology to inject their consciousness into the mind of a serial killer.
• A parent who is a detective uses their skills to find out who toilet-papered their house.
• An inner-city youth runs away to the suburbs to see what life is like in such a safe place.
• An inner-city family moves to the suburbs to escape violence only to see it manifested in what they felt would have been a safe place.
• A suburban family moves to the city and struggles to adapt.
• A family finds a wolf pup and raises it.
• A family finds a lost Bigfoot child and raises it as their own.
• An alternate universe where humans have colonized the moon.
• A future where humans have colonized Mars.
• An autistic child struggling to adjust to society begins to display superhuman powers.
• An autistic child struggling to adjust to society begins to display gifted musical talents.
• A genius child helps their father win at the casino.
• A genius child being raised in an abusive home runs away and begins to sit in during college classes.
• A youth bowling tournament gets a little out of hand.
• A planet from millions of light years away from Earth tries to find a way to venture there.
• A lone gunslinger travels across the country searching for their arch-nemesis.
• A village of Samurai warriors deals with an alien trying to kill them.
• Immortal people walk the Earth unseen.
• A news reporter is contacted by someone claiming to be immortal and wanting their story told.
• A news reporter is contacted by someone claiming to be from the future.
• Authorities arrest a stock market trader for inside trading and are shocked when he claims to be from the future.
• The military fights vampires.
• The military uses vampires as supersoldiers.
• The military uses zombies as a first-wave assault.
• An aging martial arts teacher decides to become an MMA fighter to make ends meet.
• An inventor creates a new form of fuel.
• An inventor creates a new form of energy and is chased by the government that wishes to stop it from going public.
• Someone creates a website with outlandish conspiracy theories and the public begins to believe them.
• A pizza delivery driver is forced to transport a hitman to his next hit.
• The Universal monsters (Dracula, The Wolf Man, etc.) are transported into the real world.
• An unhinged Dungeons & Dragons player circa the 1980s believes the game’s world is real.
• An escaped convict tries to start a new life in a quiet town.
• A lonely housewife falls for an escaped convict she picked up on the highway.
• A train is loose and only character can stop it.
• An AI program enacts revenge on a user who treated them poorly.
• Die Hard in a school.
• Die Hard on a cruise ship.
• Die Hard in a spaceship.
• Die Hard on an island.
• A character goes on a run and is taken by someone.
• A father enacts revenge on his child’s killer.
• A new teacher inspires the school.
• A church school student believes their pastor is an angel.
• A child discovers that their parent is a fallen angel.
• A character dies and comes back to life as their family’s new pet.
• A trivia night turns bloody as players are told if they get an answer wrong one of their team members will die.
• A heat wave of the century puts lives in danger.
• A flood of the century puts lives in danger.
• A lonely comic book-loving character decides that they want to become a real-life supervillain — and they fail drastically and hilariously at every turn.
• A vampire that is afraid of the dark.
• A consciously-aware zombie.
• A werewolf that is allergic to fur.
• A character terrified of water and desperate for a job applies for a lifeguard position.
• A chef loses their taste.
• A motivational speaker loses everything and struggles to follow their own device.
• A psychic becomes a detective.
• A detective enlists the help of a psychic — and they fall in love.
• A hypochondriac goes to medical school.
• A self-help author is exposed as a fraud.
• A character takes a vow of silence.
• A character will win a million dollars if they don’t speak for a year.
• A character that is a vegetarian and desperate for a job can only find one at a butcher shop.
• A comic who was attacked on stage must overcome their newly developed stage fright.
• A popular musician who was attacked on stage must overcome their newly developed stage fright.
•  An atheist is mistaken as a prophet.
• A librarian becomes trapped in the story of their favorite book.
• A child escapes bullies in an abandoned city library.
• A rich child is given a robot companion for their birthday.
• An adoption service that allows aliens to adopt human children in need.
• Cloaked alien ships have been watching the world for centuries.
• A pilot discovers a strange city in the clouds.
• A submarine crew discovers a strange city at the bottom of the ocean.
• JFK is cloned.
• Abraham Lincoln is cloned.
• Nazi fanatics attempt to clone Hitler.
• A detective in the 1960s discovers who he thinks is Adolf Hitler.
• New technology allows people guilty of environmental crimes to be transformed into trees and plants.
• A man is transported into the body of a woman.
• A meat industry executive is transported into the body of an animal.
• A motivational speaker loses all of their motivation.
• A heralded divorce counselor is actually on their fifth marriage.
• A successful wedding planner struggles to plan their own wedding.
• A life coach has a mid-life crisis.
• A haunted antique store.
• A haunted museum.
• Museum historical exhibits are actually portals into the time period they represent.
• Someone has the power to use photographs as portals into the captured time period.
• Angels and demons walk among us.
• Aliens walk among us.
• Vampires walk among us.
• Hunters stumble upon Bigfoot.
• Hunters become the hunted.
• Someone is living in the walls of someone else’s house.
• A character decides to hitchhike around the world via automobiles, planes and boats.
• A teenager steals their parent’s car for a day.
• A teenager steals their parent’s boat for a day.
• A teenager steals a sailboat to sail around the world.
• A city family decides to live on a farm.
• Farmies decide to sell their valuable land to go live in the city.
• A family discovers a tiny civilization of people that are one-centimeter tall living in their backyard.
• A race car driver tries to get back on the track after a dangerous crash.
• A race car driver is hired to be a driver for a bank heist.
• A race car driver becomes an eSports star.
• A zookeeper who hates animals.
• A fireman becomes a pyrotechnician.
• A fireman becomes a pyromaniac.
• A doctor is haunted by the patients who died under their care.
• A teacher is caught drunk at school.
• An engineer accidentally creates a time machine.
• A nurse is killing their patients.
• An architect is tasked with building the first moon colony structure.
• A lawyer learns that the client they are defending is guilty of murder.
• An accountant discovers that their company is working with the mob.
• An artist can’t stop painting a particular face.
• A writer is pulled into the world of their bestselling novel.
• A scientist discovers the cure for cancer and now they’ve lost it.
• A police officer struggles to survive after being attacked in the streets.
• A dentist becomes a sadistic serial killer.
• A psychologist believes their patient is a serial killer.
• A social worker goes against protocol and takes in a family in need.
• An actor with multiple personality disorder becomes the most heralded actor of their time.
• An athlete tries to make a comeback during a mid-life crisis.
• A photographer begins to capture ghosts in their pictures.
• A journalist stumbles upon a conspiracy that leads all the way up to the White House.
• A mermaid washes up on the beach after a hurricane.
• An underground city flourishes.
• A haunted forest.
• A lakehouse family reunion leads to hijinks and bonding.
• An ancient buried alien city is found in a desert.
• A mysterious cavern is found behind a waterfall.
• A carpenter begins to display the biblical powers of Christ.
• An ancient temple awakens from within.
• Ancient Egyptians begin to come out of the pyramids.
• An electrician is electrocuted and develops strange powers.
• A plumber working in an old building discovers a civilization of monsters in the sewers below.
• A towering palace appears out of nowhere.
• A volcano under Yellowstone erupts.
• A veterinarian claims to be able to hear the thoughts of animals.
• A haunted skyscraper.
• A skier falls deep into glacier caverns and struggles to escape.
• A mountain climber falls deep into glacier caverns and sees that others decades before him did the same and struggled to survive.
• An economist predicts a massive economic collapse — but no one will listen.
• A computer programmer escapes into their own virtual world they’ve created.
• A pharmacist uncovers a pharmaceutical conspiracy.
• A financial advisor is corrupt.
• A diver shrinks to the size of a fish and explores the coral reefs of Hawaii.
• Ghosts haunt a sunken shipwreck.
• A character who doesn’t know they are a ghost — while everyone else does.
• A hairstylist and fashion designer mock the fashion industry by creating ridiculous designs only to see them become worldwide trends.
• Empty nest parents decide to sell their house and buy a vineyard.
• Rocky Mountain Hot Springs suddenly become fountains of youth.
• Rocky Mountain Hot Springs can heal all sickness and disease.
• A wildlife reserve is actually the home of Bigfoot.
• An observatory has the power to transport visitors to other planets.
• A haunted movie theater.
• A Hollywood makeup artist is hired by the government to help spies assume different identities.
• A paramedic is taken hostage by a mortally wounded bank robber on the loose.
• A paramedic is taken hostage by an escaped and wounded convict.
• A football stadium haunted by NFL legends.
• A baseball stadium haunted by baseball legends.
• The true story of the first surveyor to lay out plans for the first highway.
• A haunted library.
• A government translator is the only survivor of a terrorist attack and is taken hostage.
• An art gallery’s paintings come to life.
• A London bridge is inhabited by trolls.
• A haunted lighthouse.
• A real estate agent specializes in haunted houses.
• A haunted and abandoned ski resort.
• An old abandoned ship from the 1700s appears in a harbor after a hurricane.
• A geologist discovers a type of rock not of this earth.
• An old Civil War-era fort suddenly comes to life with a full brigade of soldiers.
• An astronomer discovers a new planet.
• A new planet suddenly appears close to Earth.
• Earth is suddenly transported to another Solar System.
• A historian is approached by government officials to use their time travel machine to investigate historical mysteries.
• Tomb robbers are haunted by ghosts.
• A geyser erupts, leaving behind strange creatures nobody has ever seen.
• A mathematician becomes obsessed with solving a seemingly unsolvable equation.
• A used car salesman has to sell one hundred cars over one weekend to save his business.
• A fitness trainer is hired by an obese character to get them into shape — and they become fast friends while doing so.
• The story of employees spending a summer working at a water park.
• A rock climber struggles to climb the mountain their father never could.
• A news anchor freezes on live television and loses his job.
• The life and career of a saint-like pastor.
• A character is tasked with inventorying an old government warehouse full of wooden and unmarked boxes.
• A robot factory becomes self-aware.
• A haunted abandoned 1980s-era shopping mall.
• A day in the life of 1980s-era teenagers hanging out at a shopping mall.
• The lives of retail store employees.
• Students believe that their school is haunted.
• A haunted hospital.
• A highway motel is actually a time portal where visitors from all decades and generations visit.
• An actor goes back in time to meet the historical figure they are portraying.
• A cartoon animator’s creations come to life.
• A cartoon animator is whisked away into the world he has animated.
• The lives of those who work at a spaceport.
• After the civilized world has been destroyed by Nuclear War, survivors discover an old radio station and try to find other survivors through the radio waves.
• A character is stuck on a fire tower as a forest fire rages around them.
• A cemetery security guard begins to see ghosts.
• A cemetery security guard deals with the rising dead.
• A claustrophobic character is buried alive.
• A marine biologist befriends a real-life mermaid.
• A marine biologist befriends an alien hiding in the ocean waters.
• A music teacher going through a mid-life crisis decides to start a rock band.
• A music teacher going through a mid-life crisis decides to get his old band back together.
• A physical education teacher going through a mid-life crisis decides to try out for the Olympics.
• A hunter bored with hunting animals decides to start hunting people.
• A cop teams with a vampire to take out a mob boss who is actually a werewolf.
• A travel blogger is kidnapped.
• Siblings who think their parents are boring wake up in the 1980s and see what adventures they had.
• A world where everyone prefers to live in virtual reality.
• A character realizes that the world they live in is actually a virtual reality world they created 100 years ago.
• The world of a cult overtakes society.
• A cult leader is actually an alien.
• A cult leader is actually a bored character who was dared to create a successful cult.
• A pacifist has a twin who is an assassin and must assume their identity.
• A parent seeks revenge for the death of their child.
• A hero must save the world one last time after already having done it dozens of times before.
• Forbidden love between GMs of rival sports teams.
• An archeologist searches for Excalibur.
• A middle-aged character who has lived with their parents their whole life must live on their own after their parents pass away.
• A lowly servant rises up against a dystopian overlord.
• A detective trying to solve a single murder case discovers that it links to murders from around the world.
• The first international serial killer is discovered.
• A father seeks forgiveness from the children he abandoned.
• A mother seeks forgiveness from the children she abandoned.
• A character seeks forgiveness from the parents they abandoned.
• A group of thrill seekers decide to break as many extreme records as possible.
• A teacher tasks his students with trying to find a world record they can break.
• An empty nest mother stalks her college son.
• An empty nest parent uses the internet and social media to find the perfect mate for their kid.
• A family decides to be the first family to fly around the world in a hot air balloon rig.
• A world where there is no land.
• A future where society is forced to live in underground cities after Nuclear War.
• A future where society is forced to live in floating skies.
• A future where society is forced to live in underwater cities.
• Three days in the lives of characters that attended Woodstock.
• A father hunts down and kills everyone that had anything to do with his son’s drug addiction.
• A drug addict gets clean and travels the country atoning for his past wrongdoings.
• A character goes back in time to see who killed their loved one.
• A character befriends the person they know who killed their loved one.
• A character unknowingly befriends the murderer of their loved one.
• The most unlikely pair fall in love only to discover they are related.
• A character is tasked with marrying someone before their upcoming birthday or risk losing their inheritance.
• A character is tasked with marrying someone before their upcoming birthday or risk having to marry a childhood friend who they signed a contract with before going to college.
• A lawyer is tasked with defending a known mass murderer.
• A doctor is tasked with saving the life of the person who killed their loved one.
• The world succumbs to mass flooding as characters struggle to survive.
• A character’s wish to spend one more day with their lost loved one comes true in an unexpected way.
• An American high school football star moves to Australia where their new school only has rugby.
• A thrill-seeking parachuter travels through a storm and lands in another time.
• The Wild West in space.
• The true story of Billy the Kid.
• A character can build things with their mind.
• A character wakes up invisible.
• A character can teleport from one place to another.
• A shape-shifting serial killer.
• A character wakes up with the ability to read people’s minds but can’t stop the new power.
• A hiker stumbles upon a civilization of tiny people that capture him.
• A world where cities are forced to live under force field domes to protect them from nuclear fallout.
• A therapist has the ability to feel others’ true emotions.
• A therapist can read their patient’s minds.
• A serial killer with the power to manifest everyone’s greatest fears.
• A character with the power to start earthquakes.
• A character that feels no physical pain.
• A character has a seizure and suddenly develops powers that are slowly killing them every time they use them.
• A new rock star copes with their newfound stardom.
• An actor copes with their newfound stardom.
• A movie star goes back to their hometown after the death of their parent.
• A movie star goes back to their hometown for their 30-year high school reunion.
• A character suffers from amnesia and slowly begins to remember who they are.
• A human and an alien fall in love.
• A human and alien couple raise a family in the suburbs.
• Children discover that their parents are alien imposters.
• Children discover that their parents are robots.
• Siblings discover that they are actually from another planet.
• A soldier deals with losing limbs in battle.
• A soldier comes home after the war.
• An intergalactic soldier returns home after a decade of fighting in an intergalactic war.
• A grandma with a legendary cookbook within her family decides to open a restaurant.
• A family fights over grandma’s secret recipe.
• When a character wins the lottery their family fights for their share.
• When a character wins the lottery they are stalked by people wanting their share.
• A character wins the lottery and uses it all to find the cure for cancer.
• A group of high school friends have a pool party only to be transported back in time to their grade school selves.
• A group of high school students meet up the night before they all head off to different colleges.
• A group of old-timers all wish that they could go back to their high school years — and their wish comes true.
• A college student wanting to lose his virginity before he turns twenty-one meets his soulmate who has vowed to not have sex until she’s married.
• A character meets their perfect match only to discover that their parents have decided to get married.
• A wild high school party leads to unexpected and inspiring mixtures of cliques.
• High school students in the future go off to college on different planets and spaceships.
• Despite universal hate of clowns, a clown troupe decides to open a clown school.
• A videogame designer is actually a military recruiter who uses their games to recruit soldiers.
• Soldiers are now drone pilots who control drone robot soldiers.
• A princess wants to be a warrior.
• A warrior wants to be a princess.
• Paleontologists discover proof that dragons did exist.
• A cowboy visits the big city.
• A wizard teleports to present-day New York.
• A scientist time travels to the Middle Ages and is treated like a wizard.
• A caveman is found preserved in a glacier and comes back to life.
• The scary story of a traveling circus in the late 1800s.
• Aliens visit the World Fair in the 1960s.
• Babe Ruth is transported from the past to the future and manages to still dominate baseball.
• Fictional detective characters from 1970s crime shows come to the real world and try to tackle cases as they did in the show.
• A fictional action hero becomes self-aware within his movies.
• A submarine crew falls asleep and wakes up to realize they’ve been transported to space.
• A submarine crew realizes they have traveled back in time and face a fleet of WWII German submarines.
• The story of a character and their dog.
• A ninja faces off against an Old West gunslinger.
• A samurai faces off against a medieval knight.
• A character’s mirror image starts to talk to them.
• The reflection in our mirrors is a window into a mirror universe.
• A probe sent lightyears into space sends back images of a planet identical to Earth.
• Astronauts discover an alien probe.
• A wife realizes that her husband has been cheating on her for years and goes out on a wild night out with her single friends.
• A husband realizes that his wife has been cheating on him for years and goes out on a wild night out with his single friends.
• A character with a low IQ undergoes an experimental surgery and becomes a genius overnight.
• An egotistical character with a high IQ hits their head and loses all of their smarts.
• Back in the 1980s, a snowboarder invades the ski slopes.
• A previously famous fitness instructor tries to get back on the fitness scene but is clueless about how out of shape they are now.
• A rabbi, priest and monk walk into a bar.
• Young friends who find a boat decide to travel down the Mississippi River.
• A group of young friends decide to climb a mountain.
• A child decides to live exclusively in their backyard tree house.
• Young friends decide to make the biggest tree house they’ve ever seen.
• A rich character lives life like a child.
• A child enters a poker tournament via a loophole in the rules — and wins.
• Three brothers reunite after being kept apart for decades.
• Three sisters reunite after being kept apart for decades.
• Best friends discover that they are actually siblings.
• A couple who have just met discover that they are actually siblings.
• A middle schooler has a crush on their new teacher.
• A puppy brings a family together.
• A dog declares war on the new cat adopted by the family.
• A dog and cat become best friends.
• A puppy raised by cats tries to make friends with other dogs.
• Vampires live on the dark side of the moon.
• Aliens live on the dark side of the moon.
• A superhero loses their powers.
• A dying superhero must give their powers to a worthy person.
• A mother must deal with her alcoholism while trying to remain the perfect mom.
• High schoolers create an underground fight club.
• High schoolers become drug dealers to pay off their parents’ debt.
• College students become high-stakes poker players to pay off their student loans.
• A high schooler offers to protect bullied students — for a price.
• A military sniper is recruited to become an international assassin.
• A high school student is mistaken as an international assassin.
• An IT tech discovers a secret file.
• Filmmaking students decide to recreate their favorite movie.
• An aging man’s dream to be young again comes true as he ages backward each day.
• A character is given the chance to revisit the pivotal moments in their lives.
• A character is given the chance to go back to their high school days.
• An old website from the 1990s allows characters to email God.
• An old website from the 1990s unlocks a sinister being.
• A charismatic character proves a point about society by making people believe the world is flat.
• Characters travel back to the era of dinosaurs.
• A brilliant high school student decides to clone themselves.
• Twin characters are mortal enemies.
• Twins meet each other and discover that they’ve fallen in love with the same woman.
• A man lives two lives after he marries twins that were separated at birth.
• A character must decide which twin they want to date.
• A successful screenwriter is forced to work a regular job for a living.
• A successful athlete is forced to join the workforce.
• College students discover that the dean is a Russian sleeper agent.
• High school students suspect that their principal is a Russian sleeper agent.
• High school students suspect that their teacher is a mobster in the Witness Protection program.
• A man travels the world looking to taste the perfect beer.
• A dying character wants to find their soul mate before they die.
• An angel wants to walk the Earth as a human.
• A character is afraid of everything.
• A man and his dog switch bodies.
• A storm opens a strange portal.
• A character has a meal with the devil.
• An upstanding citizen decides to rob a bank.
• A fraud investigator uses their knowledge to cheat their company out of millions.
• An insurance investigator uses their knowledge to cheat a company out of millions.
• A professional athlete comes out as gay.
• A character deals with the realization that they have done nothing spontaneous in life.
• A construction worker falls in love with a demolition worker.
• A soldier comes back from war and discovers that their spouse has disappeared.
• A soldier comes back from war and discovers that their spouse has another family.
• A character mourning the loss of their family decides to build a cabin in the woods.
• Friends decide to dig the deepest hole they can in their backyard.
• Friends discover buried treasure in their backyard.
• High schoolers decide to plan the most epic party of all time.
• A smooth-talking character loses their voice.
• A deaf person uses their special talent to become a musician.
• A town bands around a dying kid’s dream to become a superhero.
• A child discovers that their parents are vampires.
• A child discovers that their parents are aliens.
• A child discovers that they are adopted.
• A veteran decides to find his old buddy from Vietnam.
• Two war veterans dealing with PTSD fall in love.
• A police officer must break the law to save their family.
• An average character discovers they have a unique talent.
• A Dungeons & Dragons player wants to learn to become a blacksmith to make their own sword.
• A character finds a magical sword embedded in a tree.
• A small lake town discovers that something strange is in the lake waters.
• A character raises a bear as a pet.
• A brilliant high schooler discovers a new energy source.
• A brilliant child solves the most difficult math problem.
• A talented musician struggles to become a star.
• A talented writer struggles to be published.
• A bow hunter with a compound bow travels back in time.
• A child breaks into prison to see their father.
• A father breaks out of prison to see his child on their birthday.
• A character discovers a strange microchip under their skin.
• A character discovers that they are actually an angel that fell to Earth.
• A football player strives to be taken seriously by their coach.
• A football player strives to get a college scholarship to play football.
• A football player strives to get drafted into the NFL.
• A character buys an old desk that has special powers.
• A character’s split personalities suddenly appear as real people in their house.
• A tennis player has an opportunity to make it as a ping pong player in the Olympics.
• Teenagers make their own Quija board.
• Tarzan on another planet.
• Sherlock Holmes in high school.
• People’s shadows come to life when they are asleep.
• Old reality stars try to make a comeback.
• Old child actor stars try to make a comeback.
• A pilot mourning the death of his family takes one last flight around the world.
• A soccer or rugby coach is hired to coach an American football team.
• Two swordsmen meet in the forest, ready to duel.
• A character wanders the streets of a deserted Los Angeles.
• A young man from the dangerous inner city streets attends open tryouts for the NFL.
• A former NFL player goes back to his hometown to coach his high school football team.
• A young woman who always wanted to be a princess gets the chance to make that dream come true.
• An American discovers that he is the heir to the British throne.
• A forty-something man goes back to college and walks onto the football team to realize his football dreams.
• What really happened to the Roanoke Colony?
• The “real” reason the Terracotta Army was created.
• The “real” reason the Great Pyramids were created.
• Chornobyl has more secrets than we previously knew.
• What happened to the Lost Colony of Japan?
• What “really” happened to Flight 19?
• A minimalist and a hoarder move in together.
• A Vegan Animal Rights Activist moves is forced to move in with a Butcher.
• A mercenary is partnered with a pacifist.
• A risky and destructive detective is partnered with a pacifist.
• A risk assessment analyst is partnered with a risky and destructive detective.
• A wilderness survival expert is forced to relax at a luxury resort complex.
• A hardworking executive is tasked with leaving their phone behind for an off-the-grid adventure.
• Teenagers are forced to go on an off-the-grid adventure in the wilderness.
• A health nut is forced to live with a junk food addict.
• A tech-savvy teen is tasked with teaching an old person about technology.
• A collector of rare books finds a copy of the first Christian bible.
• A collector of rare books stumbles upon one that unlocks evil into the world.
• An antique collector finds a genie in a bottle.
• A genie in a bottle plans a daring escape.
• A scientist searching for UFOs and a UFO skeptic partner together.
• A failed comedian is forced to work at a funeral parlor.
• The life of a stuntperson.
• The life of a presidential chef.
• A Midwesterner comes to Hawaii for college and learns how to surf.
• A famous sharpshooter time travels to the Old West.
• An uber-Jimmy Buffet fan struggles to get over the death of their idol.
• A bartender decides to move to the Bahamas to open a bar in paradise.
• When a former work-from-home dog owner gets an office job, their dog breaks out of the house to find them.
• A fantasy football GM is given the chance to run an NFL team and fails miserably.
• The first cyborg.
• The first female NFL player.
• A person’s dreams are actually glimpses into the lives of strangers.
• Nightmares are a glimpse into hell.
• A little boy goes missing in a small town.
• A little girl goes missing in a small town.
• A restaurant owner must do something spectacular to stay open.
• The training of a real ninja.
• A modern-day Samurai lives life off the grid.
• A spy discovers their parents were Russian sleeper agents.
• A space explorer discovers a planet called Earth.
• A werewolf tries their best to live a regular life.
• A modern-day witch struggles to follow their beliefs.
• A knight and a samurai duel.
• A hacker stumbles upon a disturbing secret.
• An assassin is tasked with going back in time to kill his younger self.
• A bounty hunter chases their most difficult bounty.
• A mercenary struggles with following through with their assignment.
• An archeologist makes a shocking discovery about humanity.
• A gunslinger from the Old West grows old.
• A pirate captain defies his crew.
• A historian discovers that what they believed was fact is actually fiction.
• An inventor creates the ultimate undetectable weapon.
• An inventor creates the ultimate new energy source and is chased down by government officials.
• A ghost hunter begins to fall in love with the ghost they are chasing.
• A cyborg detective.
• A shapeshifting serial killer.
• An AI becomes self-aware.
• An ancient warrior is reawakened.
• A time-traveling historian quietly records the truth behind all major historical events.
• A VR gamer can’t escape his VR game.
• A genetic experiment gone wrong.
• A puppeteer’s puppets come to life.
• A little person struggles to live in a big world.
• The unexpected truth about Area 51.
• The unexpected truth about Stonehenge.
• What really happened on the Mary Celeste ship found floating and abandoned?
• The Mothman legend.
• A serial killing clown.
• A clumsy superhero.
• An inept spy.
• The heartfelt story of a local cat lady.
• A character addicted to social media.
• An old character decides they want to be a social media influencer.
• A couch potato witnesses a murder.
• A ghost bunter who is scared to death of ghosts but good at hunting them.
• A barista falls in love with a customer.
• A Dungeons & Dragons dungeon master is thrust into their own campaign.
• A compulsive liar struggles to be taken seriously when they witness something outrageous.
• A hopeless romantic has the worst luck in love.
• A museum of oddities comes to life.
• A germophobe struggles during the pandemic.
• A soap opera actor gets their big feature break.
• A soap opera actor is stalked by a fan.
• Santa Claus decides to retire.
• An eccentric crossword puzzle solver discovers a secret code within the daily puzzles.
• A UFO abducts an annoying human that doesn’t want to leave the ship.
• A bartender realizes that their patrons are vampires.
• A UPS driver delivers to a haunted property.
• A country town bands together to survive a flood.
• A character gets a call from their long-missing spouse.
• A lowly story prompt content creator sees his prompts come to life on the big screen.

How to Use Story Prompts

What can often get your creativity flowing is reading story prompts — brief and often intriguing or thought-provoking sentences or ideas that serve as a starting point for creative writing, providing a concept, scenario, world, or theme that can be expanded into a full-fledged story.

You can use story prompts as a foundation to develop characters, plotlines, conflicts, and resolutions, ultimately crafting your own unique stories around the initial idea provided by the prompt.

Want to Come Up With Your Own Story Prompts?

The secret sauce of storytelling is learning how to come up with those grand ideas and concepts. It may seem daunting to most. How do you come up with something fresh and new when everything seems to have been done? Creativity is the key.

• Give people what they’ve seen before, but a different version of it.
• Merge two clever ideas into one.
• Introduce a concept into a whole different world and genre.
• Subvert expectations from otherwise familiar stories and characters.

Do that and, boom…you’ve just come up with your very own story prompt!

Read More: 50 Gold Screenwriting Quotes to Jump Start Your Creativity

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WEEKLY WRITING PROMPTS

Join (probably?) the world's largest writing contest. Flex those creative muscles with weekly writing prompts.

Showing 2239 prompts

The perfect recipe, write a story about someone searching for a missing ingredient, literally or metaphorically..

LIVE – Dramatic

Set your story in a kitchen, either early in the day or late at night.

LIVE – Short Story

Write a story inspired by the saying “Revenge is a dish best served cold.”

LIVE – Angst

Start or end your story with two people discussing an important matter over a meal.

Write a story in the form of a recipe..

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🏆 Featuring 12 prize-winning stories from our community. Download it now for FREE .

Show how an object’s meaning can change as a character changes.

Write a story about an ordinary object that becomes magical (either literally or figuratively)., center your story around a character who is obsessed with an object., send your characters on an unforgettable quest to find an essential object., write a story about an object that changed everything for a character., subscribe to our prompts newsletter.

Never miss a prompt! Get curated writing inspiration delivered to your inbox each week.

Center your story around a character’s attempt to escape a bad situation that inadvertently leads them back to the source of their problems.

Start a story with someone receiving a message from their past self, warning them of the consequences of their actions., a character’s life of deceit unravels as their past catches up with their present. what are the consequences, write a story about someone seeking forgiveness for their past actions., your character gets everything they ever wanted — only to realize the true cost., your character wants something very badly — will they get it, write a story set against the backdrop of a storm., there’s been an accident — what happens next, your character overhears something that changes their path., write a story with two characters who meet for the first time — and one of them has a secret., win $250 in our short story competition 🏆.

We'll send you 5 prompts each week. Respond with your short story and you could win $250!

Contest #270 LIVE

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Creative Writing Prompts

When the idea to start a weekly newsletter with writing inspiration first came to us, we decided that we wanted to do more than provide people with topics to write about. We wanted to try and help authors form a regular writing habit and also give them a place to proudly display their work. So we started the weekly Creative Writing Prompts newsletter. Since then, Prompts has grown to a community of more than 450,000 authors, complete with its own literary magazine, Prompted .  

Here's how our contest works: every Friday, we send out a newsletter containing five creative writing prompts. Each week, the story ideas center around a different theme. Authors then have one week — until the following Friday — to submit a short story based on one of our prompts. A winner is picked each week to win $250 and is highlighted on our Reedsy Prompts page.

Interested in participating in our short story contest? Sign up here for more information! Or you can check out our full Terms of Use and our FAQ page .

Why we love creative writing prompts

If you've ever sat in front of a computer or notebook and felt the urge to start creating worlds, characters, and storylines — all the while finding yourself unable to do so — then you've met the author's age-old foe: writer's block. There's nothing more frustrating than finding the time but not the words to be creative. Enter our directory! If you're ready to kick writer's block to the curb and finally get started on your short story or novel, these unique story ideas might just be your ticket.

This list of 1800+ creative writing prompts has been created by the Reedsy team to help you develop a rock-solid writing routine. As all aspiring authors know, this is the #1 challenge — and solution! — for reaching your literary goals. Feel free to filter through different genres, which include...

Dramatic — If you want to make people laugh and cry within the same story, this might be your genre.

Funny — Whether satire or slapstick, this is an opportunity to write with your funny bone.

Romance — One of the most popular commercial genres out there. Check out these story ideas out if you love writing about love.

Fantasy — The beauty of this genre is that the possibilities are as endless as your imagination.

Dystopian – Explore the shadowy side of human nature and contemporary technology in dark speculative fiction.

Mystery — From whodunnits to cozy mysteries, it's time to bring out your inner detective.

Thriller and Suspense — There's nothing like a page-turner that elicits a gasp of surprise at the end.

High School — Encourage teens to let their imaginations run free.

Want to submit your own story ideas to help inspire fellow writers? Send them to us here.

After you find the perfect story idea

Finding inspiration is just one piece of the puzzle. Next, you need to refine your craft skills — and then display them to the world. We've worked hard to create resources that help you do just that! Check them out:

• How to Write a Short Story That Gets Published — a free, ten-day course by Laura Mae Isaacman, a full-time editor who runs a book editing company in Brooklyn.
• Best Literary Magazines of 2023 — a directory of 100+ reputable magazines that accept unsolicited submissions.
• Writing Contests in 2023 — the finest contests of 2021 for fiction and non-fiction authors of short stories, poetry, essays, and more.

Beyond creative writing prompts: how to build a writing routine

While writing prompts are a great tactic to spark your creative sessions, a writer generally needs a couple more tools in their toolbelt when it comes to developing a rock-solid writing routine . To that end, here are a few more additional tips for incorporating your craft into your everyday life.

• NNWT. Or, as book coach Kevin Johns calls it , “Non-Negotiable Writing Time.” This time should be scheduled into your routine, whether that’s once a day or once a week. Treat it as a serious commitment, and don’t schedule anything else during your NNWT unless it’s absolutely necessary.
• Set word count goals. And make them realistic! Don’t start out with lofty goals you’re unlikely to achieve. Give some thought to how many words you think you can write a week, and start there. If you find you’re hitting your weekly or daily goals easily, keep upping the stakes as your craft time becomes more ingrained in your routine.
• Talk to friends and family about the project you’re working on. Doing so means that those close to you are likely to check in about the status of your piece — which in turn keeps you more accountable.

Arm yourself against writer’s block. Writer’s block will inevitably come, no matter how much story ideas initially inspire you. So it’s best to be prepared with tips and tricks you can use to keep yourself on track before the block hits. You can find 20 solid tips here — including how to establish a relationship with your inner critic and apps that can help you defeat procrastination or lack of motivation.

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Storytelling

In these TED Talks, masters of storytelling share their creative secrets and explore new approaches to their age-old craft.

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Tips for Using AI to Enhance Your Storytelling

Everyone is looking for creative ways to stand out. Whether you’re an aspiring writer , a content creator, or someone who simply enjoys weaving tales, you’ve probably wondered how to make your storytelling more engaging.

Here’s the good news: you don’t need to do it all alone. AI is here to help, and if you’re ready to enhance your storytelling in exciting ways, you’re in the right place. We’ll walk you through how to use AI tools, like an AI story generator, to breathe life into your stories, spark fresh ideas , and streamline your creative process.

With the right tips and guidance, AI can be your new writing companion, helping you unlock potential you might not even know you had. Ready to learn how?

Let’s dive in!

1. Use AI for Idea Generation

2. collaborate with ai, don’t let it take over, 3. enhance world-building with ai, 4. use ai for character development, 5. refine your plot with ai’s help, 6. speed up the editing process, 7. embrace ai for dialogue suggestions, 8. overcome creative blocks with ai prompts, conclusion: partner with ai to boost your creativity.

Writer’s block is real, and it can be frustrating when you’re staring at a blank page with no idea where to start. This is where AI comes in handy. AI-powered tools, such as an AI story generator , are designed to provide you with endless inspiration.

These tools analyze countless stories, themes, and plots to offer suggestions tailored to your genre or preferred writing style . If you’re struggling to come up with a gripping plot or unique character dynamics, simply input a few details and let the AI generate potential ideas for you. This doesn’t mean the AI does all the work – think of it as a brainstorming buddy that sparks new thoughts.

A common misconception is that AI will replace creativity. However, AI is not a replacement for the human touch but a tool to amplify it. Think of AI as a co-writer or creative assistant. It can help you outline your plot, draft character arcs, or even come up with twists you hadn’t considered. But remember, the heart of the story should still be your own.

To make the best use of AI, feed it your ideas first. For example, provide a rough plot or describe the type of story you want to write. Then, use the AI’s suggestions to refine your story, ensuring your personal voice and vision shine through.

Creating believable, immersive worlds is one of the hallmarks of great storytelling . But world-building can also be time-consuming and mentally exhausting. This is where an AI story generator can help build out your universe. From generating detailed descriptions of imaginary cities to offering cultural backstories for fictional civilizations, AI can assist in fleshing out the world where your characters live.

You can input prompts about the setting and let the AI suggest environmental details, historical context, or even specific social dynamics that enrich the backdrop of your story. This speeds up the process while ensuring you have a well-developed world to support your narrative.

Characters are the soul of any story. Well-developed characters can captivate readers and make them care about your plot. However, creating multifaceted, relatable characters can be tricky. AI can help by giving you a variety of character archetypes, personality traits, and background stories that you can adapt or build upon.

For example, you can use an AI story generator to experiment with different character personalities or conflicts. AI tools often suggest how a character might evolve, what challenges they could face, and how they may interact with other characters. By working with AI, you’ll be able to create characters with depth, flaws, and motivations that feel real to your readers.

Plotting is an essential part of storytelling, but it’s not always easy to keep track of everything as the story progresses. Whether you’re outlining a short story or working on a complex novel, AI can help you streamline your plot development.

You can use AI to ensure that your story’s pacing feels right and that there are no gaping plot holes. Input your story’s main plot points into an AI tool and let it provide feedback on how to tighten up your narrative, add twists, or foreshadow events effectively. The AI can even suggest alternative directions your story could take, allowing you to experiment with different plotlines without losing sight of the original idea.

Editing can be one of the most time-consuming parts of storytelling, but AI can assist here, too. AI-powered editing tools can spot grammatical errors, suggest better sentence structures, and even provide style recommendations based on the tone and voice of your story.

While it’s always good to have a human editor review your work, AI can help you get your manuscript to a much more polished state before you hand it over. This not only saves time but also helps you learn about your own writing habits, giving you insights into common mistakes and areas for improvement.

Writing natural-sounding dialogue is a challenge, even for experienced writers. AI can help you generate dialogue that feels authentic and reflects your characters’ personalities. By analyzing speech patterns, tone, and context, AI tools can suggest how different characters might interact in certain situations.

With the assistance of an AI story generator, you can input the setting of a conversation or the type of relationship between characters, and the AI will suggest dialogue snippets. Of course, you can modify and tweak these suggestions to ensure they align with the nuances of your characters, but this can save time and provide inspiration when you’re feeling stuck.

Sometimes, the hardest part of writing is just getting started. If you’re facing a creative block, AI writing prompts can be a great way to kickstart your imagination. AI tools can generate unique and specific prompts based on your preferred genre or writing style. These prompts can be anything from “Write about a character who wakes up in a completely unfamiliar world” to “Describe a conversation between two old friends who haven’t seen each other in years.”

These prompts are designed to get your creative juices flowing, offering fresh perspectives that can spark a new scene, character interaction, or plot twist.

AI won’t replace the human elements that make stories magical – the emotion, the heart, the unique perspective you bring. However, AI can certainly be a powerful tool to enhance your storytelling, giving you the support and inspiration you need to craft compelling narratives. By using tools like an AI story generator, you can get fresh ideas, develop your characters, build immersive worlds, and refine your plots more efficiently.

The key is to collaborate with AI, allowing it to assist while keeping the core of the story firmly in your hands. Whether you’re looking to speed up the writing process or overcome a creative block, AI can help you tell your best story yet.

 Victoria is a writer who loves telling stories and helping others bring their ideas to life. She enjoys finding creative ways to make storytelling fun and engaging, often using tools like AI to spark new ideas. When she’s not writing, she’s sharing tips to inspire others and make the writing process easier.

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