1,000 Creative Writing Prompts: Ideas for Blogs, Scripts, Stories and More

About the Author

My name is Bryan Cohen and I want to help you write. I’m the author of a Web site called Build Creative Writing Ideas and I’m also the author of this book.

I’ve found that one of the toughest things for a writer is to come up with ideas and so I’ve created 1,000 Creative Writing Prompts: Ideas for Blogs, Scripts, Stories and More to help writers avoid the dreaded writer’s block that I keep hearing about. These prompts have over 50 different subjects including holidays, race, romantic comedy, childhood, prom and even the American Dream.

A prompt is a jumping off point that helps you to get your brain and pen moving. Some of these prompts are questions, some are scenarios and many of them deal with your own life and memories. When you use a memory or an emotion to write from, it helps you to feel like you aren’t starting from scratch. There are thousands of stories already in your brain and many of these prompts are attempts to jog your memory and to use your brain for all it’s worth.

I also feel that when you use your memories and your heart for these prompts, the writing ends up coming from a place of great truth. Even if you are writing a fantastical story about a boy and his dog, if it comes from a foundation of honesty, the story will strike a chord with your readers. Successful franchises like Harry Potter work for a number of reasons, but I believe the main reason is that we relate to those characters. Creating from truth is the first step to successful writing.

I’m proud to say that these prompts are original and that I’ve put many, many hours into coming up with them. I’ve gotten some extremely positive feedback from users of my website and so the creation of this book was the next logical step.

I’ve written a few short essays to help get you started, but you can start writing from the prompts right away if you wish. So…hop to it!

How to Be a Writer

A lot of people feel like they need some kind of permission to be called a writer. Like once they’ve taken enough classes or once they’ve published something there is some tribunal that will decree that they are now in fact writers. Others feel as though they’re writers even though they’ve never even made an effort to write more than a short story here and a poem there.

We live in a tough world full of put-downs and negative talk. If someone does not have the will or the ability to achieve his dreams he may feel the desire to kick around the aspirations of other people. We may hear this kind of unproductive negativity from our parents, friends, loved ones and those we mistakenly see as our enemies.

A writer is a person who can see through all this negativity and still feel passionate about writing. A writer wants to write and wants to figure out ways to make writing more a part of his life. There are some writers that are financially successful and others who haven’t made a dime, but they are all still writers.

If you say over and over again that you aren’t qualified enough to be a writer…you will fulfill your own (kind of boring) prophecy. If you tell yourself that you are a writer and you tell other people this over and over again, the opposite will be true. But how do you know if you’re a writer?

If you aren’t sure if you qualify as a writer, there is only one thing you need to do.