"I give myself two hours on an egg timer"

A smattering of favorite prompts from some very accomplished authors

Greetings, writers—

Maybe because I write prompts every week and have been doing so, with a few breaks, since November 2020, I’d be hard pressed to come up with (or even remember) a favorite. But when the Gotham Writers Workshop asked a bunch of well-known authors what prompts they found especially helpful, they were far more decisive (or at least organized) than I. Here are a few good ones:

My favorite writing prompt is: “What he didn’t know was _____.” This prompt helps me unearth something that I hadn’t even thought about and can move me in an exciting new direction. Another I like for a similar reason is “Five years ago, she__________” and “Five years years from now, she probably would be _______________.” —Tayari Jones, author of Leaving Atlanta, The Untelling, Silver Sparrow, and An American Marriage, among others.