Source: Pixabay
Welcome to the Weekly Writing Prompt from The Ink Well
We provide one weekly writing prompt for short story writers. You may choose to use the prompt to write a fictional story (made up from your imagination) or a creative nonfiction story (based on your real-life experiences).
UPDATED NOVEMBER 2026: IMPORTANT NOTES TO BE CONSIDERED FOR CURATION If you want to be curated, you must follow these rules:
You must have an introductory post on your blog with an image of yourself. (Note that challenges to our staff's resources are constantly increasing. We need to know you're a human, and have positive intent for your involvement in the Hive platform and The Ink Well.)
You must produce original content. Use your own words, not an AI tool, to write your story. And do not use editing tools like Grammarly to revise your writing. Grammarly and ChatGPT should be used to catch spelling or grammar errors, not to rewrite what you wrote.
You must read and comment on the work of two other community members for each story you publish in The Ink Well. Remember: We look for this when we curate your story. If we don't see this engagement, we will either provide a reminder or skip curating your post.
You must include one of these tags on your post:
- Fictional stories from your imagination: #fiction
- Creative nonfiction stories from your life experiences: #creativenonfiction
It is also very helpful to the admin team when authors add Fiction or Creative Nonfiction (or CNF for short) to the story title!
Before You Post in The Ink Well
Be sure to check out our community rules before posting in this community. You can find them at the top of our home page. They also appear at the top of a new post window.
Please also check out these additional helpful resources:
- Learn more about our community and the expectations of community members in our FAQ post and our treasure trove of tips and guidelines.
- Peruse our collection of great writing resources on everything from character development to how to write dialogue in our catalog of storytelling tips.
- Learn more about creative nonfiction, how it differs from fictional stories, and tips for success in our post on creative nonfiction tips.
- Remember that we are always about quality first. Never about quantity. To achieve awards in The Ink Well, take the time to write quality stories and check them for errors. See the topic of the month, "Don't Miss This Step" in the March 2025 newsletter to learn about using tools (and using them properly) if you are not already doing this. We do notice when you don't take the time!
Last Week's Winning Story of the Week
Thank you to everyone who shared a story for the last prompt, "You weren't supposed to hear that"!
Each week we pick one of our favorite stories of the week and award the author 5 Hive.
And we have a winner! Congrats to @rinconpoetico7 for his story, A Secret from the Afterlife.
Here's what our curators had to say:
@rinconpoetico7 writes a well-paced, well-structured story that carefully leads us to a satisfying resolution. The author brings us into the worldview of a young boy who visits his grandmother. She is about to lose her house. He learns this by overhearing a conversation she has with his father. In a dream he learns of a remedy. "Dig," the man in his dream instructs. And so the boy does. He finds the family's gold jewelry under a tree and the home is saved. A lovely story that doesn't miss an opportunity to entertain.
Congratulations, @rinconpoetico7!
Short Story Writing Prompt of the Week
This week's prompt is: "Better luck next time."
As a species, human beings are earnest in their attempts to try things that may not have great "odds," and to dream about winning big — whether it's buying lottery tickets, betting on horse races, trying gimmicky games at carnival fairs, or investing in cryptocurrencies that we hope will go to the moon.
But failure is somewhat inevitable when we gamble on potential wins that are not guaranteed. That's where the expression "better luck next time" comes in.
It's a sentiment that simultaneously expresses condolences for a loss, but encourages the person who has not achieved their goal to not give up, and to try again. For some people, trying again can become an addictive cycle. For others, they realize that trying to win big was just a daydream or a one-time attempt. Their financial resources are too precious. There will be no "next time."
Tell us a fictional story or a real life creative nonfiction story about a situation where someone heard the words "better luck next time" (or something similar) and made a decision about what to do next. Did they repeat their attempts to win? Or did they decide that trying again would be a waste of their time, energy and financial resources?
Note that you do not need to write the exact words "better luck next time." That is just for inspiration.
Remember, you are welcome to use AI to generate ideas and images, but the writing must be your own! We do not accept stories that are AI-generated or heavily edited by AI. Only use tools like Grammarly to fix spelling and grammar issues.
As always, we are looking for the elements of story. These include:
- Great first lines
- Good settings
- Well-developed characters
- Integration of action, dialogue and narrative
- A conflict that intrigues the reader
- A "story arc" which results in the resolution of the conflict and brings the story to a satisfying conclusion
- And of course, we are looking for well-edited stories that are not littered with typos or grammatical errors — please use the free Grammarly tool for grammar and spelling checks (and not AI writing or rephrasing tools for revising)
You can find more on all of these topics in the catalog of storytelling tips.
If you don't feel inspired by this prompt or the featured image, feel free to peruse any of our past prompts or our collection of idea-generators:
Rules:
Accepted content: Remember that we only accept short stories (fiction or creative nonfiction). We do not accept advice columns, personal development articles, reviews, chapter stories, recipes, etc. We also do not accept posts about violent, gory, bloody, brutal, sexist or racist themes, NSFW (not safe for work) stories like erotica, stories with a political or religious agenda, or stories featuring abuse of any kind. (We have a complete article about The Ink Well stance on violence and brutality for more information.) And do NOT use AI tools to write or manipulate your stories. You must provide your own unique content.
Post link: Please be sure to publish your story in The Ink Well community, and post a link to your story in a comment on this post.
Hashtags: Use the #fiction tag for fictional stories and the #creativenonfiction tag for creative nonfiction stories. You can also use #writing, #inkwellprompt and #theinkwell.
Images: Please only use images from license free and creative commons sites, like Pixabay, Unsplash and Pexels. You can also generate them with AI tools. Images you find on the Internet are copyright protected and cannot be used. Be sure to provide all image source links.
Length: We request that story word counts are a maximum of 1,500 words in length and ideally 750-1000 words. This is just a guideline. Longer stories are okay too, but they tend to get fewer readers. Additionally, The Ink Well admins appreciate keeping to that maximum story length for our time management. (Note: We generally consider stories less than 750 words "too short" and they tend to be missing important character development. See the "story length" topic of our September 2025 newsletter for resources on how to improve and further develop your stories.)
Translations: If you post a story that has been translated from another language, please include the English version first, followed by content in the original language.
Community support: When you post in The Ink Well, please be sure to visit the work of at least two other community members and comment on their work.
Past Prompts
After 241 straight weeks of fiction prompts (and nearly as many creative nonfiction prompts) we have started a fresh new series! If you'd like to see the full list of previous fiction prompts, you can find them at the bottom of fiction prompt #241.
Thank you for being a part of The Ink Well! @jayna, @gracielaacevedo, @agmoore and @yaziris.
Interested in joining our community? Start by joining Hive!
Join here at Hive Onboard
Already a Hive member? Click Subscribe at the top of The Ink Well community home page.
Questions? Ask The Ink Well on Discord.
We invite lovers of creative writing to visit The Ink Well, a Hive community started by @raj808 and @stormlight24 and run by @jayna, @gracielaacevedo, @agmoore and @yaziris
You can follow our curation trail by going to our hive.vote curation trail page and clicking the follow button.
Note: The Ink Well pays out curation rewards to our delegators!
We welcome delegations! These support our community in many ways, including helping us to provide support to quality content creators through curation and contests.
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A big thank you to all of our delegators:
@jayna, @felt.buzz, @cliffagreen, @carn, @ricardo993, @itsostylish, @agmoore, @marcybetancourt, @marlyncabrera, @jasonbu, @stormcharmer, @mosin-nagant, @nathy33, @timix648, @ozd, @iamraincrystal, @preparedwombat, @gracielaacevedo, @samsmith1971, @betholoji12, @jackdeathblack, @josemalavem, @generikat, @mineopoly, @hazmat, @kingsleyy, @popurri, @nancybriti1, @rinconpoetico7, @iyimoga, @kachy2022, @monster-hunter, @whatmidesays, @raymondpeter, @gabmr, @rishagamo, @morey-lezama, @evagavilan2, @funshee, @amiegeoffrey, @rukkie, @tomiajax, @stuartcturnbull, @almadepoeta, @ubani, @wesphilbin, @amakauz, @zoe01, @estilodereba, @ellizy, @faithwellington, @patienceakpan, @artofkylin, @ricurohemi28, @benwesterham, @takeru255 and @shakavon.
