Writers' Hour Magazine: Weekly Prompts

📝 Weekly Prompt: Buying Time

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 19 Apr 2026 20:01:21 GMT

Use this prompt as an entry point into our April contest theme: How Artists Survive.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

How does someone purchase time—with money, with sacrifice, with neglect, with compromise?

Show the transaction.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the April contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

Right after I graduated from college, I got a job at a university medical library and tried to write in my spare time—and I barely got any writing done. I blamed this, in part, on the job. My schedule was always changing, and I could never seem to get into a rhythm with the writing. Plus, it was draining to be at work all day; I didn’t know how other people had enough energy to do both things. But maybe I just needed to toughen up? I’ve always been curious not only about the literal arrangements people make but how these are a match (or a mis-match) with their temperaments and their energy levels.

This month’s contest and accompanying prompts are inspired by Mason’s latest book, Making Art and Making a Living: Adventures in Funding a Creative Life.

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🌍 Our 5th Annual 24-Hour Writing Sprint! April 24-25

Join , , , , , , , , ( / ), (), , , , and thousands of other writers for a day of writing!

Start a new project, push forward on a work in progress, or work on your contest submission. Attend 1, 2 or all 24 hours - no matter where you are.

🗓️ Kickoff: April 24 2026, 7pm BST / 2pm ET / 11am PT.
👉 RSVP to join. (Free to attend)

🪶 Announcing: The Manuscript Accelerator

Are you in the middle of a book-length project and want to finish your first (or next) draft by this Summer? Applications are now open for our 10-Week Manuscript Accelerator – Virtual Residency. Apply by April 20 for £500-off.

🔒 Enter the April Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month’s contest, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the April Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: The Invisible Infrastructure

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 12 Apr 2026 20:01:20 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Use this prompt as an entry point into our April contest theme: How Artists Survive.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

Behind every finished work is an infrastructure: someone cooking dinner, a quiet room, savings, chaos, illness.

Write about the hidden system that holds the work up.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the April contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

It’s interesting to think about the forces that shape this invisible infrastructure. What are your expectations and preferences about alone time versus socializing, about risk versus security, about a well-rounded life versus a really deep focus on one thing? You can see these dynamics play out in how people choose friends, partners, jobs, and living situations—and in the type of creative work they make, too.

This month’s contest and accompanying prompts are inspired by Mason’s latest book, Making Art and Making a Living: Adventures in Funding a Creative Life.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Work on this week’s prompt at Writers’ Hour—our daily silent writing sprints. It’s the perfect environment to focus, share space with other writers, and make progress on your writing. Craving craft insights and a creative community? Explore Membership.

Plus – paid subscribers and LWS members are invited to a live generative writing session with Mason on April 13. Read more below.

🔒 Enter the April Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the April Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: The Arrangement

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 20:01:20 GMT

Use this prompt as an entry point into our April contest theme: How Artists Survive.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

Every artist has an arrangement—a job, a benefactor, a debt, a schedule, a secret. Write about the arrangement that makes the work possible.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the April contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

I never get tired of reading about how writers and artists make the arrangements that enable their work—whether it’s how they arrange their day, how they arrange their finances, or how they adopt a certain mindset or attitude that opens up new creative possibilities. I sometimes feel that if I can just get everything in my life arranged properly, I’ll be able to get to a higher level in my writing. But maybe that’s a kind of mirage?

This month’s contest and accompanying prompts are inspired by Mason’s latest book, Making Art and Making a Living: Adventures in Funding a Creative Life.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Plus – paid subscribers and LWS members are invited to a live generative writing session with Mason on April 13. Read more below.

🔒 Enter the April Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the April Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: The Story You Tell Yourself

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 29 Mar 2026 20:01:23 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Use this prompt as an entry point into our March contest theme: What If.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

What if the story you’ve been telling about this is wrong?

Start by identifying an established story, then introduce doubt: A missing detail, a competing memory, a new piece of information, or a perspective you once dismissed.

Resist the urge to simply reverse the moral. The goal is not to replace one tidy narrative with another, but to examine how stories are made and remade.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the March contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Goal Setting Workshop This Week

Join us on Wednesday, April 1st, for Make April Your Month of Writing—a 1-hour goal-setting workshop for writers. RSVP here.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the March Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

Paid subscribers and LWS members can also access the replay of an exclusive guided writing session with our March Guest Judge, Hanna Thomas Uose, linked below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the March Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: Chronology

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 22 Mar 2026 20:45:37 GMT

Use this prompt as an entry point into our March contest theme: What If.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

What if you experienced your life out of chronological order?

Instead of moving from childhood to adulthood in a straight line, imagine encountering your memories, milestones, and turning points out of sequence. You might begin with the end. You might relive a future before you understand its cause. You might meet your younger self after you’ve already become someone else.

As you experiment, consider what changes when order dissolves. How does meaning shift when an outcome is known before the choice that led to it? What happens to regret, anticipation, or suspense when cause and effect are scrambled? Does knowledge become a burden or a gift?

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the March contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Events This Week

Join us on Tuesday, March 24 at 3pm ET/7pm UK for an interview on building bestselling writing careers with literary agent Juliet Mushens. RSVP here.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the March Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the March Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: Time

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 15 Mar 2026 20:45:32 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Use this prompt as an entry point into our March contest theme: What If.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

What if time behaved differently?

This prompt asks you to imagine what happens when time changes.

Time might slow down during a difficult conversation. It might skip over many days and linger on one. It might loop. It might pause in a single room. It might move quickly for children and slowly for adults. It might be something a person can lose, save, or give away.

Let altered time show itself through action and detail rather than explanation.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the March contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the March Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the March Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: The Shift

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 08 Mar 2026 20:00:46 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Use this prompt as an entry point into our March contest theme: What If.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

What if one rule quietly shifted?

This week, disturb the architecture of a world.

The rule may be public or private. A statute. A social contract. A family code. A law of physics. The shift can be global or intimate.

Stay attentive to causality. A rule is a structure. When it moves, something else must bear the weight.

You might approach this through speculative fiction, realist narrative, lyric essay, satire, poem or even drama. The form is up to you.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the March contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Events This Week

Join us on Tuesday, March 10 at 2pm ET/6pm UK for an interview on sustaining a creative life across mediums with musician . RSVP for free.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the March Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the March Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: A Different Choice

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 21:00:46 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Use this prompt as an entry point into our March contest theme: What If.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

What if you had chosen differently?

“What if you had chosen differently?” is a deceptively simple question. It invites nostalgia, regret, fantasy. Resist the easy version.

Begin by identifying the actual decision. You might write this as alternate history poem, an intimate memoir, or a braided essay or scene that holds two timelines at once.

Ask the question seriously, then stay with the answer long enough to discover something you didn’t expect.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the March contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Events This Week

Join us on Monday, March 2 for Make March Your Month of Writing—a free, 1-hour goal-setting workshop for writers. RSVP here.
On Tuesday, March 3 join us for a conversation with Lidia Yuknavitch about breaking narrative form and her newest memoir Reading the Waves. RSVP here.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the March Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the March Contest:

Read more about this month’s contest, or submit your entry now:

📝 Weekly Prompt: When the Fence Fails

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 22 Feb 2026 21:00:19 GMT

We’ve shifted to a new rhythm at Writers’ Hour Magazine: one monthly contest theme, plus weekly companion prompts that offer different angles into that theme.

February’s contest theme is The Fence. Find the full details here.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

When the fence fails: cut, climbed, moved, opened, what moves in?

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the February contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for a note from this month’s guest judge , plus news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

Having spent more than a year enveloped by the story of Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, this brings to mind the many stories I was told of crawling through mud and brambles, wire cutters down their boots, to cut the fence and crawl through, onto the military base. The experiences of Greenham Women share so many details, not just the physical experience, but the emotional and societal changes that rushed in as they cut the fence. The freedom to disobey, and how impossible it was, once they had, to fit back into the boxes, the patriarchal command to conform, in which they’d been living. When the fence fails, liberation moves in, and I’d be tempted in this prompt to write a piece of flash fiction as a woman whose mind is opened by the cutting of a fence.

This month’s contest and companion prompts are inspired by and in conversation with Eleanor’s latest book, Fallout, (out April 21, 2026).

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Event This Week

Join us on Tuesday, February 24 at 2pm ET/7pm UK for an interview with Jennifer Breheny Wallace on writing and the need to matter. RSVP here.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the February Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the February Contest:

📝 Weekly Prompt: Behind the Fence

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 15 Feb 2026 21:00:14 GMT

We’ve shifted to a new rhythm at Writers’ Hour Magazine: one monthly contest theme, plus weekly companion prompts that offer different angles into that theme.

February’s contest theme is The Fence. Find the full details here.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

Write about what is kept behind the fence: an object, truth, name, or relationship it protects (and traps).

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the February contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for a note from this month’s guest judge , plus news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

This feels more physical to me; I see barbed wire, the farm where my father lived. I see sheep and tractors but also the barbed wire to him, that surrounded him. He protected himself; he was impossible to get near to. I see the barbs ripping our corduroys and catching our woollens as we climbed through fences, holding strands open with our boots and hands, I see the pain he protected by being sharp with us. I would approach this by moving in and out of the metaphysical.

This month’s contest and companion prompts are inspired by and in conversation with Eleanor’s latest book, Fallout, (out April 21, 2026).

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Event This Week

Join us on Tuesday, February 17 at 2pm ET/ 7pm GMT for a live chat on Substack with . Add to calendar.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the February Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the February Contest:

📝 Weekly Prompt: Crossing the Line

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 08 Feb 2026 21:00:18 GMT

We’ve shifted to a new rhythm at Writers’ Hour Magazine: one monthly contest theme, plus weekly companion prompts that offer different angles into that theme.

February’s contest theme is The Fence. Find the full details here.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

Write about the quiet crossing of a line, small or huge, shown through action and consequence.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the February contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for a note from February’s guest judge , plus news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

A Note from

This makes me think of my family, the unspoken rules and the quiet crossing of one of those lines - “thou shalt not speak” - when I published my debut; a line I didn’t know existed until I stumbled over it. It feels urgent, silent, and imperative, and I would approach this prompt with those sensations leading the way, informing the action and building an arc to the consequences, which in my case were a breakdown of relationship with my sister and, equally powerful, a reclamation of my sovereignty.

This month’s contest and companion prompts are inspired by and in conversation with Eleanor’s latest book, Fallout, (out April 21, 2026).

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Event This Week

Join us on Tuesday, February 10 at 2pm ET/7pm UK for an interview on a look Inside the Creative Brain with Neuroscientist David Eagleman. RSVP for free.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the February Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

How to Enter the February Contest:

📝 Weekly Prompt: The First Boundary

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 22:37:17 GMT

We’ve shifted to a new rhythm at Writers’ Hour Magazine: one monthly contest theme, plus weekly companion prompts that offer different angles into that theme.

February’s contest theme is The Fence. Find the full details here.

📝 WEEKLY PROMPT

Someone encounters a boundary for the first time.

This week’s prompt asks you to stay close to the first moment a boundary becomes real. Think expansively about what that boundary could be—a security rope in a museum, a “staff only” door, a family code, a paywall, a dress code.

As you write, choose one boundary and build the scene around the approach. Who is doing the approaching, and what are they carrying into that moment: entitlement, fear, hunger, naïveté, grief, impatience. What do they expect will happen?

Let the boundary announce itself through the senses. Show us the sign, the texture, the sound, the pause. Show us who is watching, even if it is only the narrator watching themselves.

This weekly companion prompt is free and open to everyone. No submission required.

If you’re writing toward the February contest, consider this prompt one entry point into the theme.

Keep reading for news and announcements.

Happy writing!
The Writers’ Hour Magazine Team

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Events This Week

Join us on Monday, February 2 for Make February Your Month of Writing—a free, 1-hour goal-setting workshop for writers.
On Thursday, February 5 joins us for a Q&A Exploring The Ethics of AI in Writing.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

🔒 Enter the February Contest:

Paid subscribers and LWS members: Ready to submit your contest entry? Read more below.

If you’d like to enter this month, upgrade now—you’ll unlock the submission link instantly.

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | The Relic

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 25 Jan 2026 21:00:30 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to turn the mundane into something charged.

✨ Plus! We’ve got two free live events this week. Details below.

📝 PROMPT

Write about an ordinary object that someone treats as sacred. Let the reader understand why only at the end.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) next week.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

One way into this prompt is to treat the object with real seriousness on the page, especially if it’s something small and unglamorous.

You don’t need to explain why it matters at the start. Let the reader feel the devotion first, then start to wonder.

When you reveal the “why,” aim for specificity. A single concrete detail can reframe everything that came before.

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Live Events This Week

Author joins us for Three Prompts, our new live generative writing series, sharing prompts inspired by his flash novel something out there in the distance. RSVP (exclusive for LWS Silver & Gold Members).
Join us on Tuesday, January 27 for a conversation with musician, painter, and novelist on his approach to making art across disciplines. RSVP.
On Thursday, January 29, join us for a Q&A with Madeleine White of Libraro. We’ll demystify what publishing can look like beyond traditional routes. RSVP.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Work on this week’s prompt at Writers’ Hour—our daily silent writing sprints—where writers around the world gather together to write. It’s the perfect environment to focus, share space with other writers, and make progress on your writing.

Craving more craft insights and a creative community? Learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | What I Believed

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 18 Jan 2026 21:00:44 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to remember a strange or specific truth your younger self lived by.

✨ Plus! We’ve got two free live events this week. Details below.

📝 PROMPT

Write about a belief you once held with complete conviction—strange, specific, and utterly true to you at the time (about bodies, love, death, God, grown-ups, money, animals, school). Write from inside that belief. No hindsight.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in February.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

One way into this prompt is to choose a belief with a clear shape—something you once knew was true—and then write from inside it as if it’s still governing the world. Try anchoring yourself in sensory detail: where were you when you held this belief, what did you do because of it, what rules did it create, what did it protect you from? You can write it as scene, confession, fable, list, prayer, dialogue, or poem. The key is commitment: let the belief steer the language and the logic, without stepping outside to explain it.

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🎟️ Free Live Events This Week

Join us on Tuesday, January 20 for a conversation with writer-director Morgan Cooper (creator of Bel-Air) on film, storytelling, and creative audacity. RSVP.
Bring a creative block, fear, or dilemma to Agony Art: Dear Amie, a live coaching hour with (We Need Your Art) on Thursday, January 22. RSVP.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Craving more craft insights and a creative community? Learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | How to Make It Through

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 11 Jan 2026 21:06:04 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to write a set of instructions for an ordinary task—while quietly showing what it takes to make it through a specific season of life.

📝 PROMPT

Write in second person (“you”). Give the reader instructions for doing something mundane (folding laundry, washing hair, packing a lunch). Under the surface, you’re actually teaching them how to survive a specific emotional season. Never name the emotion directly. Let the instructions carry it.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) soon.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

Start by choosing a task with a clear physical sequence, something you can break into steps (e.g., make tea, fold laundry, wash hair, pack a bag). Then commit to specificity. Name what the hands do. Name the textures, temperatures, and sounds. The more concrete the instructions, the more room you create for subtext. Stay within the task until the end. The last line should feel earned because every step has carried its weight. If you do this right, the reader understands what kind of season it is without you ever naming it.

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

🏔️ Dreaming Big in 2026 — Free Workshop Replay

Want a clear, ambitious writing plan for 2026? We’re sharing the free replay of our annual guided goal-setting workshop to help you start the year with clarity, momentum, and creative intention. 🎥 Watch Dreaming Big in 2026.

🪶 The Manuscript Accelerator: 10-Week Virtual Residency

Early Bird applications for our next Manuscript Accelerator: A Virtual Residency at the London Writers’ Salon end today, January 11th.

This is a 10-week immersion for writers who want to finish the first (or next) draft of a book-length project by Spring 2026. You’ll get paired with a personal coach for weekly accountability and craft support, plus a small group of peers working on similar projects – all designed to help you make meaningful progress on a draft.

Apply by January 11th for £500-off and a first look. Details & Apply.

✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Craving more craft insights and a creative community? Learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | Four Things I’m Carrying

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 04 Jan 2026 21:00:55 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to name what you’re carrying into the new year.

📝 PROMPT

Name four things you’re carrying into January: one object, one obligation, one secret, one desire. Write a piece that includes each of them.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in mid-January.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

This prompt invites you to take stock in a way that doesn’t flatten you into resolutions.

A helpful way in is to choose things that feel specific enough to touch. Let the object be literal. A key, a receipt, a child’s mitten, a chipped mug, a book with a bent spine. Let the obligation be something that repeats and has weight, even if it looks ordinary from the outside. Let the desire be honest. And with the secret, trying writing a truth you circle with imagery.

A quick permission slip, as always: you can write this as nonfiction, fiction, poetry, or something in between.

✨ Dreaming Big in 2026 — A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop

What are your writing plans for 2026? Join us for a free, guided workshop to help you begin 2026 with clarity, ambition, and creative intention.

Dreaming Big in 2026: A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop for Writers
🗓️ Tuesday, January 6, 2026
🕑 2:00–3:00pm ET (7pm GMT)
📍 Live on Zoom
👉 Register here (FREE)

(Silver & Gold LWS Members: RSVP Here)

Come with something to write with and a willingness to imagine generously.

PS: ✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

Come work on this week’s prompt at Writers’ Hour—our daily silent writing sprints—where writers around the world gather together to write. It’s the perfect environment to focus, share space with other writers, and make progress on your writing.

If you’re craving more creative community or a steadier writing rhythm, learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | Inventory at the Threshold

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 28 Dec 2025 21:00:50 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to gather the loose threads of a year.

📝 PROMPT

On the last night of the year, someone takes inventory—but not of achievements. Write an inventory of what remains unfinished, unsaid, or is still vibrating. Structure the piece as a ledger, list, or catalog.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in mid-January.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

For this prompt, lean into inventory as form. Lists have a strange power when they’re allowed to accumulate without commentary. Trust the order in which things arrive. You don’t need to account for the whole year, but stay with the prompt long enough for a pattern to emerge. Wishing you a very happy new year!

Congratulations to the winners of The Pathless Path!

We are thrilled to share the contest results for the week of November 16th. Writers were invited to write about stepping into the unknown. Special thanks once again to our guest judge, .

First Place: Over That Hill by Tawnya Gibson
Second Place: From Picasso To Puccini by Rebecca Pappa
Third Place: KOM GOED THUIS by Margot Tancred

Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to everyone who participated. It’s a pleasure to share these pieces with you.

✨ Dreaming Big in 2026 — A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop

What are your writing plans for 2026? Join us for a free, guided workshop to help you begin 2026 with clarity, ambition, and creative intention.

Dreaming Big in 2026: A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop for Writers
🗓️ Tuesday, January 6, 2026
🕑 2:00–3:00pm ET (7pm GMT)
📍 Live on Zoom

👉 Register here (FREE)

(Silver & Gold LWS Members: RSVP Here)

Come with something to write with and a willingness to imagine generously.

PS: ✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

If you’re craving more creative community or a steadier writing rhythm, learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | December 21: The Longest Night

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 21 Dec 2025 21:00:34 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s prompt invites you to stay with a long night and notice how darkness subtly reshapes attention.

📝 PROMPT

Write about a night that felt unending. Let the darkness alter the sense of time, choice, or self. Notice what stretches, what contracts, what becomes possible only because the night is long.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in mid-January.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

There’s no need to begin with a full story or a dramatic event. Choose a way into the night that feels manageable—a physical setting, a moment of waiting, a sensory element—and stay with it. Let time move at its own pace on the page, even if that means lingering on small details or letting hours pass in a sentence.

Resist the urge to explain or resolve too quickly, and pay attention to what the darkness alters. This prompt welcomes memory or invention, realism or dream. Follow the writing until something small changes, and allow that shift to be enough.

✨ Dreaming Big in 2026 — A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop

What are your writing plans for 2026? Join us for a free, guided workshop to help you begin 2026 with clarity, ambition, and creative intention.

Dreaming Big in 2026: A Creative Goal-Setting Workshop for Writers
🗓️ Tuesday, January 6, 2026
🕑 2:00–3:00pm ET (7pm GMT)
📍 Live on Zoom

👉 Register here (FREE)

(Silver & Gold LWS Members: RSVP Here)

Come with something to write with and a willingness to imagine generously.

PS: ✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

If you’re craving more creative community or a steadier writing rhythm, learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | December 14: After the Applause

Lindsey Trout Hughes — Sun, 14 Dec 2025 21:00:37 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s challenge invites you to step into the quiet that follows a public moment, and write what’s revealed when there’s no one left to impress.

📝 PROMPT

Begin just after something ends: a performance, an argument, a ceremony, or any public moment. In the genre of your choosing, write what happens when the noise drops away.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in mid-January.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

This prompt is less about the event itself than what follows it. You don’t need to dramatize the applause—trust your reader to imagine it. Instead, place us in the seconds or minutes after, when the public moment has ended.

You might approach this literally (a stage, a courtroom, a dinner table) or metaphorically (the end of a relationship, a role, a belief). We’re especially interested in pieces that resist summary and stay with sensation, consequence, or choice. What shifts when the audience leaves? What truth arrives when the noise drops away?

As always, surprise us. Let the ending open something rather than resolve it.

PS: 💭 End-of-Year Reflection Workshop

We’re hosting a live, guided reflection workshop to help you close out 2025 with intention and care, and make space for the year of writing ahead.

Writing Your Final Chapter of 2025: An End-of-Year Reflection Workshop
🗓️ Tuesday, December 16
🕑 2:00–3:00pm ET (7–8pm GMT)
📍 Live on Zoom, Recording provided for those who can’t attend live

Come with a blank page and your favourite pen. We’ll do the rest together.
👉 Get tickets here

(Complimentary Access for Silver & Gold LWS Members: RSVP Here)

PPS: ✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

If you’re craving more creative community or a steadier writing rhythm, learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery:

⏳ Weekly Writing Prompt | December 7: Borrowed Time

London Writers' Salon — Sun, 07 Dec 2025 21:01:36 GMT

Artwork by Emma Winterschladen

Welcome to the Weekly Writers’ Hour Prompt!

This week’s challenge invites you to write into the possibilities that open when time briefly bends in your favor.

📝 PROMPT

You (or your character) are given one extra hour. What do you do with it? Write in the genre of your choosing.

There is no contest submission window for this prompt. We’ll resume the full contest (prizes, publication, and editorial selection) in mid-January.

A Note from Our Editorial Team

This week, as always, take the prompt in any direction that pulls at you.

Maybe a character wakes to find the world paused, a single unclaimed hour humming just for them. Maybe you slip into memoir and write the hour you wish you could return to—or the one you wish you’d had. Maybe the extra time becomes an opportunity, a temptation, a portal, a mistake.

You don’t need to explain where the hour came from. You don’t even need to use all sixty minutes. What matters is what shifts: a choice, a revelation, a detail that only becomes clear when the usual rules of time fall away.

Congratulations to the winners of Lights, Camera, Action!

We are thrilled to share the contest results for the week of November 9th. Writers were invited to write something that feels cinematic. Special thanks once again to our guest judge, .

First Place: The Crossing by Alice Dawson
Second Place: Run, Peanut, Run by Jonathan Josephson
Third Place: The Swarmers by Toni Burns

Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to everyone who participated. It’s a pleasure to share these pieces with you.

PS: 🗳️ Vote for Writers’ Hour Magazine

Our friends at are hosting their 3rd Annual Chill Subs Community Favorites Best Lit Mag Awards. Show your love and nominate Writers’ Hour Magazine (type ‘Hour’ to find us) 👉 Vote for Writers’ Hour Magazine. Deadline is today, December 7th.

We’re also hosting a special Q&A with Chill Subs cofounder :

🎙️Finding Your Place in the Literary World w/ Chill Subs
🗓️ Date: Monday, December 8, 9am ET (2pm GMT)
📍 Location: Virtual, over Zoom
🎟️ Free & open to all 👉 Register Here

PPS: ✍️ Write with us daily at Writers’ Hour

If you’re craving more creative community or a steadier writing rhythm, check out our December events, or learn about Membership.

🔒 Paid Subscriber Perk: Editorial Feedback Lottery

This week, three paid subscribers will be chosen at random to receive personalized feedback on up to 500 words written in response to this prompt.

How to enter the feedback lottery: