Writing Prompts: What If

How to Develop and Finish Stories 

Find a story that you are stuck on. Next write in the top of a blank page What If. Now write five ways of continuing that story, not ending the story, but continuing the story to the next event, scene, ect. Let your imagination go wild. Loosen up your thinking about the events in the story. Your what if’s can be as diverse as your mind can make them. More than likely, one of the what if’s will feel right, organic, to your story and that is the direction in which you should go. Sometimes you will have to do several groups of what if’s per story, but that’s okay as long as they keep you moving forward.

Exercise from What If Writing Exercises for the Fiction Writer by Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter