The London Shop Burglaries
Develop a plot around a series of mysterious thefts in a multicultural area of London, where family-owned shops of different communities—Indian, Caribbean, Turkish—are each burglarized. An immigrant detective must bridge cultural gaps to build trust among the shop owners and solve the case before tensions erupt into violence.
Suggested length: A short story: 1,500 to 5,000 words, or flash fiction under 1,000
Start the clock
Pick a sprint, press start and keep going until it stops. Momentum beats polish on a first draft.
Make it yours
Three ways to take this prompt somewhere nobody else will.
- End with the solution in a single line of dialogue.
- Plant the key clue in the first scene, in plain sight.
- Limit it to one location and one night.
Writing mystery books
Who did it? You get every clue and a fair shot at the answer.
A mystery opens with a puzzle, usually a death, and closes with the solution. In between, a detective (professional or not) gathers clues and suspects while the reader tries to get there first. A mystery looks backward, at a crime that has already happened.
What readers expect
- A crime or puzzle early on
- Clues, suspects and red herrings
- A detective the reader follows
- A solution that is surprising but fair
A tip before you start
Play fair. Every clue your detective uses should appear on the page first, ideally hidden in plain sight.
More Multicultural Mystery prompts
- The Jiu-Jitsu WitnessThe teen prodigy of a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu dojo in a multicultural urban neighborhood witnesses a crime that threatens to expose a local politician's…
- Stolen Art in HarlemImagine a story that takes place in a vibrant neighborhood in Harlem, New York, during the Harlem Renaissance. A priceless piece of African art is…
- The Letter and the Stolen ArtifactThe daughter of a Japanese diplomat and a Mexican artist finds an old, cryptic letter in her late grandmother's belongings, pointing to an unsolved…
- The Missing Marrakech CarpetWrite a story set in a bustling outdoor market in Marrakech, where a famous antique carpet goes missing under mysterious circumstances. The…
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