Messages for Washington
Imagine it's the year 1778, and you're a spy for George Washington during the Revolutionary War. Write about your most dangerous mission to intercept British messages, involving coded letters and secret meetings in colonial taverns.
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.
- Choose one real detail of the period, like a price, a law or a song, and build a scene around it.
- Keep the famous event offstage and show its ripples.
- Make the dialogue sound of its time without becoming hard to read.
Writing historical fiction
Step into another time and feel what it was like.
Historical fiction is set in the past, usually at least 50 years before it was written. Real events and people often appear, but the story belongs to its characters. Readers come for the immersion: the smells, the rules, the dangers of a world that's gone.
What readers expect
- A vivid, well-researched setting
- Real events as backdrop or engine
- Characters shaped by their era
- Details that feel lived, not looked up
A tip before you start
Research deeply, show lightly. One telling detail in a scene beats a paragraph of facts.
More American Historical Fiction prompts
- The Chicago SpeakeasyCraft a narrative around a speakeasy owner in Chicago during Prohibition in the 1920s. Introduce figures from history, the complexities of running an…
- The Louisiana Plantation HeiressSet in a small Louisiana town in the 1800s, write from the perspective of a young woman who inherits her father's plantation but finds herself…
- Jazz Age New OrleansWrite a story about a family living in New Orleans during the jazz age. Explore their daily lives, the cultural upheaval due to the emerging jazz…
- An Italian Family in New YorkIn the early 1900s, amidst the bustling growth of New York City, an immigrant family arrives from Italy, clutching their few belongings and dreams of…
Fifteen minutes in? Keep going.
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