The Poet of Revolutionary Paris
Set your story in Paris during the French Revolution. Your main character is a young poet who uses their writings to convey messages of freedom and justice, risking their life as they become entangled in the underground networks of revolutionaries.
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 a choice only this hero would make.
- Make the adults well-meaning but wrong.
- Use the way your hero texts to show who they are.
Writing young adult books
Ages 12 to 18: firsts, identity and everything at stake.
Young adult fiction is written for teens, with protagonists usually 14 to 18. Every genre lives here, from fantasy to thrillers to romance. What makes it YA is the voice: immediate, intense and inside a teenager's head.
What readers expect
- A teen protagonist
- An immediate, close voice
- Identity and independence
- Big feelings, taken seriously
A tip before you start
Write from inside a teen's head, not from an adult looking back. That immediacy is what separates YA from an adult book with a young hero.
More YA Historical Fiction prompts
- The Paris Resistance NewspaperCraft a tale about a group of teenagers in 1940s Paris who start a secret newspaper to resist the occupying forces during World War II. Delve into…
- The Soldier's Hidden DiarySet in the backdrop of the American Civil War, write from the perspective of a teenage girl whose brother is fighting in the war. She finds a hidden…
- The Girl at the AcademyTransport your readers to Victorian England where a teenage girl, aspiring to be a scientist, must disguise herself as a boy to attend a prestigious…
- The Samurai ScrollCraft a narrative about a group of teenage friends in 16th century Japan. They stumble upon a mysterious, ancient scroll that leads them on an…
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