Are you struggling to think of a story? Is your mind empty? Are you desperately grasping for something, anything, to get that first sentence down on your barren page or document?
You're in luck! We've combined our greatest minds (three staff members) and given them incomprehensible amounts of resources (a shared Word doc) in order to give you the best writing prompts of the century! No, of ALL TIME!
And if they suspiciously line up with our theme of "meltdown" or seem cool enough to submit to a literary magazine such as ourself? Well... that's just a happy accident.
1) Describe a time you crashed out.
Life is stressful and school sucks. There are too many valid reasons to count for crashing out on a random Wednesday. Be dramatic, exaggerate, and pull your heart out and onto your paper (or computer). Spill your stress!
2) What are your thoughts on global warming?
The world is slowly but surely coming apart right at our feet. Whether you live on this planet or a different one, describe how the sun is trying to kill us all. Or aliens. Who knows. The world is your oyster--write about it.
3) Write about the aftermath of a natural disaster.
Storms are a part of life at this point. How does this affect you, the people around you, and the environment you live in? Are you having a meltdown, or is the dirt under you starting to give up its vibrance?
4) What's worse: having a meltdown in public, or holding it all in?
Everyone knows what it's like to try to hold in tears. It hurts, its uncomfortable, and you can't really control the snot that's slowly dripping out of your nose. Would you rather suffer through the pain, or let out all your emotions at your local grocery store? Why are you holding it all in anyways?
5) Write about a snowman suffering the consequences of the sun.
Olaf is a kind soul, but what would happen if Elsa wasn’t there to make him immortal? Frosty the Snowman is a jolly person, but the Sun's radiation doesn't quite care about personalities. That snowman you built when you were five? Well, they probably melted too. Slowly and excruciatingly.
6) Write about the changing seasons.
Every year, the temperature around the world changes; the leaves shift in color and eventually fall to the ground. how does this affect your emotions? What if you're living somewhere where it's winter, but your best friend is living in the summer? Is that hard?
7) The Great AI Meltdown
It's not uncommon knowledge that AI takes about a cup of water for every prompt it replies to. It uses this water to cool down, and the hot water is released back into the environment, thereby cooking our globe in a crockpot of our own creation. That's just the realistic side--we've all seen Portal 2 and Detroit: Become Human. Or what about HAL900 and Allied Mastercomputer? AI can go wrong in so many ways; pick one!
8) The controls aren't responding.
The ship won't change course. The reactor won't insert the control rods. Your mouse just stopped clicking on the last question of the quiz. What's happening? Are we doomed?! Save us, author! Write our way out of this!!
9) The fragility of the human body.
Our bodies are complex machines. Cells make up tissues which make up organs which make up... us. But things go wrong. They go wrong all the time. Autoimmune diseases, cancers, long-term illnesses... they all slowly rust away at our flesh mechanisms. Write about how we degrade.
10) Children's tantrums vs. Adult breakdowns
Kids pitch fits over everything. They scream, cry, fall to the ground and have a meltdown. Adults also have meltdowns, though they appear differently. There are grocery store Karens, road rage, and silent simmering with a passive aggressive email. What do you do during a meltdown? Your peers? What are the differences between young and old?
11) Power outage
It's storming. A tempest whorls outside, knocking around trees and shaking street signs. Your lights flicker once, twice, and sputter out. It's dark. You can't see a thing. What do you do?
12) The straw that broke the camel's back.
You’ve been dealing with a lot. One too many homework assignments, a chore that you forgot to do, a button that just won’t go in the hole. Maybe there was a recent tragedy or argument. Whatever the cause(s) may be, they’ve been whittling away at your patience. What’s the thing to make the band snap? What pushes the water over the dam, and what does the resulting flood like?
13) Chronic conditions
Chronic conditions aren't as uncommon as one thinks. For example, asthma is one of them. A chronic condition is an ailment that someone has for at least a year that limits daily activities and/or requires frequent medical attention. Maybe you have one, or a family member, or a character. How do you/they traverse life? How do loved ones (or strangers) react?
14) Decomposition
Everything decomposes. Food molds, bodies become bone, and isopods make homes under rotten logs. It can look and be scary; everything comes to an end, and a carcass isn't always the prettiest sight. But it can also be sort of cool; vultures, fungi, and various insects all reap the benefits. Plus, it provides nutrients to the environment. What do you think about decomposition? What if there was a world out there were it was arduously slow or racecar fast?
15) Their day will go perfect, no matter what.
Your character has a big night planned. They picked out a stylish outfit, got all dolled up, and left the house in a cheerful mood. It's the first time they've been excited in ages, and their friends can't under ANY circumstances let ANYTHING ruin this. Except the world has it out for them; one friend has to prevent the character's car from being towed while they're inside somewhere. Another has to break into a government facility and impersonate an official to prevent a war from starting. A third is bargaining with Zeus to make sure the weather is impeccable. Do they succeed? Does the character find out?