Idea generator

18 Last Line Prompts Prompts

These prompts create a starting constraint, question, or situation. Use one as written, combine two, or change the audience, setting, objective, or limitation to make a new exercise.

Choose a random prompt from the bank.
Prompt 1

This time, when the phone rang, she let it ring.

Prompt 2

Only then did he understand why the key had never fit any door.

Prompt 3

At sunrise, the border was gone from every map except hers.

Prompt 4

We left the porch light on for someone who was finally not coming home.

Prompt 5

The signature at the bottom was mine, dated thirty years before I was born.

Prompt 6

For the first time all winter, the station clock was correct.

Prompt 7

He returned the borrowed coat with one extra button sewn inside.

Prompt 8

The town kept the statue but changed the name on the plaque.

Prompt 9

She closed the file without deleting it.

Prompt 10

By noon, everyone had forgotten the storm except the people who had caused it.

Prompt 11

The final page of the diary was blank, which was the answer I needed.

Prompt 12

We took the long road home because there was no longer anyone waiting to punish us for being late.

Prompt 13

The restaurant opened the next morning under both their names.

Prompt 14

I mailed the confession to the person it would hurt least: myself.

Prompt 15

When the elevator doors opened, the missing floor was there.

Prompt 16

He won the argument and lost the reason he had started it.

Prompt 17

I put the photograph back in the box, face down this time.

Prompt 18

The last thing we heard from the old radio station was our own sign-off.