Collaborative Stories for the Collective Imagination

Story Prompts

April 2025

Every month, we release new creative writing prompts to help you launch your next collaborative fiction journey.

This month’s theme: STAIN

1

Gas leaked out of abandoned wells, staining the topsoil for miles, and then the lightning storm arrived.

• Contributed by Switch-Lit
Select
2

Reach out to a dining companion and write a story about a surreal restaurant whose multi-course meal stains the tongues of diners with colors of their true mood.

• Contributed by Switch-Lit
Select
3

With the arrival of spring, it was a stain that I no longer wanted to hide.

• Contributed by Switch-Lit
Select
4

With a sibling or old friend, write the origin story behind a lingering stain from childhood.

• Contributed by Switch-Lit
Select
5

Write a vivid story set underneath a microscope where a slide of spore cells stained by malachite green mutate into a new human remedy.

• Contributed by Switch-Lit
Select

You can also continue without a prompt and start a story on your own.

Start without a prompt