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119 Best Creative Writing Exercises for Authors in 2025

Showing 119 writing exercises curated by Reedsy.

Wanderlust

Character Development

Transplant your character into an entirely new location. It could be a new country, city, or continent. How do they react to the new surroundings?

A Whole Week

Character Development

Describe each day of the week as if it were a person. Give each one personality traits, a job, and a goal. Write a short story about them.

The Next Great Author

Character Development

Develop a character that's an author. Write a short story from the point of view of that author.

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The Name Game

Character Development

Here is your challenge: for the next week, collect fun names. I've collected them for years in a little notebook - from obituaries, news stories, random lists, and spam. Spam is great for funny names.Then go through your notebook, choose a name, and write a short character sketch based off that name. It's amazing how the names make the characters come to life and start moving the story in fun directions you never expected.

Reputations

Character Development

Have each primary character free-write what they think about the other characters in the story. This will also deepen the secondary characters.

The Hammer and the Hatchet

Writer's Block

A stranger walks into the general store and buys a hammer, a hatchet, some rope, and an apple. What does he do with them?

Pick-Up Line

Writer's Block

Cheesy pick-up lines are the worst...but sometimes (when they work), they're the best conversation starters out there. Pick one of the pick-up lines from below and write down a conversation that you can imagine following afterward.

  • "Your smile is like Expelliarmus. Simple but disarming."
  • "Did it hurt? When you fell from heaven?"
  • "Are you a parking ticket? You've got fine written all over you."
  • "Are you from Tennessee? Because you're the only ten I see."
  • "If I could rearrange the alphabet, I'd put U and I together."

Picket Fence

Writer's Block

Describe your house - or the dream house you hope to get some day.

Break The Ice

Character Development

Further chip away at your character and establish how they present themselves to others by imagining how they would briefly describe themselves in the following situations:

  1. In a job interview
  2. On a first date
  3. Catching up with an old friend
  4. Flirting with someone at a party
  5. In their twitter bio
  6. At the border between the US and Mexico

The Word Salad

Writer's Block

Our subconscious minds combine items in unexpected, sometimes whimsical ways. Set a timer for twenty minutes and use at least three of these words in your draft. Write without stopping: a red scarf, windshield wiper, chrome, doily, blowtorch, spatula, CD-ROM, postage stamp, frittering, static cling, radio silence, kismet, calamity, heartburn, bandage.

Thank you to all our contributors: Almost An Author, Alyssa Hollingsworth, Anne R. Allen, Bang2Write, Christopher Fielden, Darcy Pattinson, Elizabeth S. Craig, Flogging The Quill, Grammar Girl Quick and Dirty Tips, Helping Writers Become Authors, Katie McCoach, Lauren Carter, Insecure Writer’s Support Group, Mandy Wallace, NaNoWriMo, Nail Your Novel, Novel Publicity, One Stop For Writers, Pro Writing Aid, PsychWriter, re:Fiction, The Journal, The Writer’s Workshop, Well-Storied, Women On Writing, writing.ie, Writing-World.com!

RBE | Golden Cat for You | 2025-02

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