nonfiction essay ideas

108 Engaging And Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

So you want to write a nonfiction book . Good for you! What are you going to write about ?

I know. That question stumps most everyone.

What indeed? Coming up with creative nonfiction ideas isn’t for the faint of heart.

Nonfiction is a big, broad genre of book writing, and narrowing it down to an area in which you have some expertise, background , or interest can be daunting.

And even if you kinda, sorta know what you want to write about , you’re not exactly sure how to begin or how to get your creative juices flowing.

That’s why we’ve created a varied list of nonfiction writing prompts for you — so you can narrow down your choices or pinpoint precisely the type of nonfiction you want to write.

108 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

Ready to get started? Read through this list of creative nonfiction ideas, and make a note of any that resonate with you.

Or just start writing about one of the nonfiction prompts and see where it takes you.

If you’ve been wondering, “What are some nonfiction topics I might write about?” then these prompts can help you narrow down ideas for your next book project.

1. You’ve developed a new creative side-hustle, and you have enough business to bring in at least a few hundred (or even thousand) a month.

2. You know how to prepare for a specific kind of disaster, and you want to make others aware not only of the imminent danger of that disaster but how best to prepare for it.

3. The Missing Ingredient: What is one thing most people forget or overlook when making or doing something?

4. This is something most people don’t know about ______.

5. You could be more (or less) ______.

6. You need more _____ in your life.

7. Discontent is not (always) a lack of gratitude. Here’s why.

8. The right music can change everything for you. Here’s how.

9. Swap this for that and see how it changes your life!

10. Be your own devil’s advocate? Why would you want to do that?

11. What on earth does logic have to do with creative writing (or creative anything)?

12. Are your morning/nighttime habits keeping you poor? Or did they for a while?

13. How do you go on after your best friend dies (or leaves you)?

14. What one thing could you add to your workspace to make you happier and more productive?

woman typing outdoor patio writing prompts

15. What one thing in your life would you love to change? And what can you do to change it — and help others do the same?

16. Your doc says, “No more alcohol for you!” So, you look for ways to relax without it.

17. You used to take everything personally — thinking everyone was comparing you to someone else.

18. Why do bad things pile up the way they do? And what can you do about it?

19. Why would anyone want to live in < city /state/country>

20. Yeah, your desk is cluttered — and you’re okay with that.

21. Your oldest kid is driving you nuts, and you have to admit your role in that.

22. Your pets have all but destroyed an entire room in your home.

23. So, you want to do something dangerous (skydiving, parasailing, bungee jumping, learning parkour, etc.).

24. You’ve always wanted to travel to ______. How can you afford it, and what do you need to know?

25. Investing is a scary business. How do you even begin?

26. You’re moving, but you can’t find a buyer for your house. Why not rent it out instead — and how do you do that?

27. You have no Christmas budget, but you want to make this Christmas one your kids will remember fondly.

28. You learned something from writing your last book that has changed the way you write them.

29. Everything started to fall into place once you finally narrowed your focus to the kind of writing you really want to do.

30. When you changed this little thing in your diet, you started dropping weight faster than ever before.

31. Something you didn’t know about your body has been working behind the scenes, turning your own efforts against you.

32. Caffeine has always been one of your besties, but now your doc says you have to cut back — or even cut it completely from your diet!

33. Your path from the 9-to-5 job to full-time self-employment hasn’t been like the ones described by the experts whose books you’ve read, but you know you’re not alone.

34. Serendipity is nice and all, but something else is responsible for your success, and you want others to know what that is — and how they can make it work for them.

35. When was the last time you actually kept a New Year’s resolution? How did you keep it, and what difference did it make?

36. How big is your daily to-do list? And what kind of daily planning works for you?

37. What changes have you made to your monthly spending that have made a huge difference for you?

38. Desperation (i.e. lack of money and/or time) made you do it. You learned how to do something yourself, you did it well, and people are saying good things.

39. One of your kids has said, “I don’t read. I have ADHD.” You have ADHD, too, though, and you read plenty. You become determined to find out if something else is going on.

40. Adding this spice to every day’s menu has made a big difference in your health — as well as your enjoyment of cooking.

41. Only when you discovered and addressed a deficiency in a certain nutrient did you begin to feel more energetic, alive, and creative than you remember ever feeling before.

42. Your doctor suggests a new therapy for your condition but warns you that it could damage one of your other organs.

43. No one told you how hard it would be to withdraw from SSRIs (or how long it could take), but through trial and error, you found a way.

44. Everyone around you is telling you to quit taking your SSRI, but you know that — somehow — it has actually helped you.

man sitting on sofa with computer writing prompts

45. Your kids have special needs, and you’re fed up with people making assumptions about their intelligence or their parenting when they act up in public.

46. You find an approach to homeschooling (or partial homeschooling) that restores your kids’ curiosity and love of learning and creating.

47. Your oldest wants to drop out of school, because so-and-so did it, and “Look how successful he is!”

48. Your marriage was deteriorating until you made this one, small change.

49. For years, all you had to do was look at a donut, and you’d gain weight. Then you changed one thing

50. You made a goal: “In the next 100 days, I will ______.”A hundred days later, you’ve exceeded your goal .

51. The first day of that “staycation” you wanted has arrived.

52. You went on a mission to where?

53. You’ve increased your own self-confidence and helped others to boost theirs, too.

54. Ditching both Netflix and your gym membership has changed your life for the better….

55. Changing your beliefs about something has caused some tension at home but has also made it possible for you to earn and accomplish more than you used to think was possible.

56. Childhood memories and the emotions attached to them have held you back for years, but not anymore.

57. Your high school education led you to college, which led you to a job you hated but felt stuck with for years.

58. What app or online tool has changed the way you do business?

59. Families can take a heavy toll on a house. What repair work have you had done to restore your home and what have you learned to do yourself?

60. Your second grader hates school and thinks reading is boring.

61. One of your kids is a writer and wants to take a page out of her main character’s book and dye her hair purple.

62. One of your kids has come out to you as gay, bisexual, or asexual.

63. One of your teenage kids has chosen a different religion and no longer wants to go to church with his family.

64. A brush with death has changed your priorities, and you’ve made some drastic changes.

65. You’ve hit your forties and found a list you made 10 years ago of the things you wanted to accomplish during your 30’s.

66. You’ve had an epiphany in the shower, and after exploring it with a journal entry, you’re thinking, “This could be a book!”

67. You’re looking at a goal and thinking, “What kind of person do I have to be to accomplish this goal in the time I’ve set for it?”

68. What does it mean to be neurotypical as opposed to neurodiverse?

69. How has marriage changed your perception of married life?

70. You learn that one of your kids is autistic, and you and your spouse have very different reactions to the news.

71. You and your spouse have opposing beliefs with regard to gender differences and sexual orientation, and it’s becoming a problem.

50 Creative Nonfiction Prompts Guaranteed to Inspire

But not to worry. I present one whole hefty list of prompts just for creative nonfiction writers.

One small note before you dive in: don’t be afraid to mix and match the prompts. Each suggestion was meant to highlight a specific line of inspiration. There is absolutely no reason that two or three of these can’t be explored within one piece.

In fact, just use my tiny suggestions as springboards. Good luck!

1. Explore a scene or story from your memory by reimagining it from an alternate perspective. Write the event from the point of view of a passing bystander, another person close to the event, a pet, or even an inanimate object. When choosing your narrator, pay attention to how objective they would have been, what they would have paid attention to, and what sort of background knowledge they would have had about the scene.

2. Tell the nonfiction story that you don’t want your mother to read. You know the one. Don’t censor yourself.

3. Recall a moment in which you felt a strong spiritual or unidentifiable energy. Describe the scene in vivid detail, with special attention to the senses. Connect that scene to your relationship with your own religious beliefs or lack thereof. Examine how you incorporated that experience into your worldview.

4. Create a timeline of events depicting your life by using newspaper headlines. Try to focus on events that didn’t involve you directly, but connect them to the pivotal events in your life.

5. Tell the story of one of your family holiday gatherings. Identify any of your family’s common trademarks, such as your one aunt that seems to tell the same joke at every Christmas, or your two uncles that always hide from the rest of the family by doing the dishes. Explore how you are linked within this family dynamic, and how these little quirks evolved and changed over the years.

6. Tell the story of a location. Possibly one that is very close to your heart that you already know well, or a new one that inspires your curiosity. Pay particular attention to your own connection to the location, however small or large that connection may be.

7. Choose a location that you’ve come to know as an adult. Compare how you interact with this setting now to how you interacted with similar settings when you were a child. How has your perspective changed?

8. Describe a time in which you expected or wanted to feel a religious or spiritual moment, but couldn’t. What were you hoping would happen? How do you choose to interpret that?

9. Recall a key lesson that parents or family members tried to impart onto you as a child. For example: “live with a healthy mind and healthy body,” or “put others before yourself.” Revisit that lesson as an adult and connect it to how you have come to interpret it as you grew up or in your adult life. Feel free to pick a less serious lesson and have a little bit of fun with it.

10. Revisit a special birthday from when you were younger. Describe specific details, with emphasis upon the senses. Now that you have years of context, how do you feel about what your parents and family did or did not do for you? What does that event mean to you now?

11. Choose an event in your life that someone else remembers differently. Describe both memories and debate the differences. Who do you think is right? Why do you think you remember it differently?

12. Choose a strong emotion and think of two memories associated with it. What are the links between those two memories?

13. Think of a lesson you learned recently and apply it to a memory. How would your behavior have changed if you had applied the lesson back then?

14. Choose a commonplace or otherwise unremarkable memory and describe it in the most dramatic and absurd way possible. For inspiration, I’m leaving you with some quotes from Douglas Adams. “The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don’t.” “He leant tensely against the corridor wall and frowned like a man trying to unbend a corkscrew by telekinesis.” “It was a deep, hollow malevolent voice which sounded like molten tar glurping out of a drum with evil on its mind.”

15. Have you seen those bizarre Illuminati videos in which some automated voice tries to prove that Arch Duke Ferdinand is actually alive and has a monopoly on the world’s dairy farms? For this prompt, think of people in your life who have believed in crazy conspiracy theories, and write about the time they first shared them with you. Think of how your beliefs might seem naïve to them, and explore the tension between the competing versions of history.

You Can’t Make This Stuff Up

16. What do you want more than anything in your life? Write about the burning hot core of your desire, and how that desire has changed over your life.

17. Recall what stressed you out most as a child. Was it the creaking stairs leading to the basement? Or being lost at the store? Explore your current relationship to that stressor. Did you ever move past that fear or anxiety? How do you interact with it now?

18. What relationship in your life has caused the most pain? Write the key scene in that relationship, when everything was at stake.

19. Write about a road trip you took, and about where all your fellow travelers ended up in life versus where you ended up. Are you glad you didn’t end up where they did, or are you jealous?

20. How has your identity changed over the course of your life? Write a scene from your teenage years that epitomizes the type of person you were, and then write a scene from recent life that shows how you’ve changed.

21. What event in your life has angered you the most? Write the scene where it happened, and tell us what you would do if it happened again.

22. What single experience most shaped who you are? Describe the experience in a single, vivid scene.

23. Who was your first friend to die? Write about how you learned of their death, and how you and their other friends mourned them.

24. Choose a happy or comfortable memory and write it in a way that makes the memory creepy or eerie to the reader. Don’t change the basic facts of the event, only select different facts and present them differently.

25. Show yourself in a scene pursuing the thing you want most in the world. Try to show the reader, without telling them, about your character flaws.

26. If you could throw five items into the fire, what would they be and why? To be clear, by throwing them in this fire, there would be no trace of them left anywhere, even if it’s something on the Internet or a memory. This is a very powerful fire. What would the consequences be?

27. What physical object or family heirloom ties together your grandparents, your parents, and yourself? Describe this object in great detail, and what it has meant to generations of your family.

This is seriously the best anthology out there for creative nonfiction.

Lee Gutkind and Annie Dillard have created a fantastic repository of classics.

In Fact: The Best of Creative Nonfiction

28. Tell a story from your life in inverted chronological order. Start with the end, then backpedal to the middle, then tell the beginning, and then fill in the rest of the gaps.

29. Write about your favorite trip or journey, and how that high level of happiness was eventually threatened.

30. Look at some photographs of your childhood. Look at the pictures of your old room, the clothes you wore, and the places you had been. Try to remember a friend from that time period, and describe the first memory of a time when they pressured you or made you uncomfortable or angry.

31. Take a small, boring moment that happened today and write as much as you can about it. Go overboard describing it, and make this boring moment exciting by describing it in intense detail with ecstatic prose. Eventually connect this small, boring detail with the grand narrative of your life, your bigger purpose and intentions.

32. Describe the best meal you ever ate. Then describe a conflict you had with the people you shared it with, one that happened before, during, or after.

33. Recall an individual that you particularly hated. Describe their cruelty to you, and try to write yourself into an understanding of why they might have done it.

34. What was the best/worst letter you ever received or wrote? Write about the situation surrounding that letter, and why it was so important.

35. Recall a name you’ve given to a toy, a car, a pet, or a child, and tell us the story of how you and your family selected that name. Who fought over the name? What was the significance of that name? What happened to the animal or thing you named?

36. Write about experiencing the craziest natural event you’ve ever seen — tornado, earthquake, tsunami, hurricane. Dramatize the physical danger of the natural event as well as the tension between you and the people you were with.

37. Tell the story of the most important person that has shaped your town and its culture (you might have to do some research). How did the activity of that person influence the way you grew up or live currently?

How do you find good creative nonfiction stories?

This book masterfully teaches you how to discover the stories others will want to hear.

Creative Nonfiction: Researching and Crafting Stories of Real Life

38. Scientists have wondered for years how nature and nurture plays into the development of human minds and their choices. Explore where you and your siblings are today and the choices that brought you there. Would you like to trade places with your sibling? Would you be happy living in their shoes? How have your personal choices differed over the years?

39. Write a scene of a time when someone older than you gave you advice, and write about how you followed it or ignored it and the consequences.

40. Write a single, three-paragraph scene when your sexual desire was thwarted by yourself or someone else.

41. Describe a scene when you were stereotyping someone. Did someone challenge you, or if you only felt guilty by yourself, how did you change your behavior afterwards?

42. Describe the biggest epiphany of your life, then backtrack and tell the lead-up to that scene or the aftermath. In the lead-up or aftermath, show how the epiphany was either overrated or every bit as valuable as you’d previously thought.

43. Write about a fork in the road in your life, and how you made the decision to go the direction you did.

44. Explore an addiction you had or currently have. Whether the addiction is as serious as alcohol or cigarettes, or something much more mundane like texting, video games, or internet usage, describe in vivid detail the first time you tried it. If you quit, tell the story of how you quit.

45. Recall a scene in which you chose to remain silent. Whether it was your boss’s racist rant, or just an argument not worth having, explore the scene and why you chose not to speak.

46. Revisit a moment in your life that you feel you will never be able to forget. What about that moment made it so unforgettable?

47. What makes you feel guilty? Revisit a moment that you are ashamed of or feel guilty for and explore why that is. Describe the scene and the event and communicate why you feel this way.

48. Write about a moment in which you acted selflessly or against your own benefit. What motivated you to do so? What were the circumstances? How did you feel after words?

49. Write about the most pivotal scene in a relationship with someone in your extended family — Uncle, aunt, cousin, grandmother. Describe the tension or happiness you shared, and how that came to affect your relationship from that point onward.

50. If all else fails, try a writing-sprint. Set an alarm for 5, 10, or 15 minutes and write as much as possible within that time span. Even if you begin with no inspiration, you might be surprised with what you come up with by the end.

The definitive guide to creating riveting true life stories.

Storycraft: The Complete Guide to Writing Narrative Nonfiction

For added pressure, try these writing websites:

Write Or Die

If you stop writing for more than 5 seconds, everything you’ve written disappears. It’s like writing with someone with a whip behind your chair. But with this new update you can choose to get positive reinforcements, too, like a kitten or candy, or to have your words disemvoweled rather than disappear.

A points-based system to encourage writers to write 750 words every single day. You get bonus points for not skipping days, and bonus points for writing more than 750 words.

Written? Kitten!

Every 100 words you write, you get shown a picture of a kitten. Ah, simple motivation. No word whether a dog version of the site is in the works for those who are more dog people.

For more on creative nonfiction writing, I suggest Creative Nonfiction . This website works with its print magazine counterpart to specifically cater to creative nonfiction writers and operates as an excellent starting point for more inspiration. Happy writing!

25 Great Nonfiction Essays You Can Read Online for Free

Alison Doherty

Alison Doherty is a writing teacher and part time assistant professor living in Brooklyn, New York. She has an MFA from The New School in writing for children and teenagers. She loves writing about books on the Internet, listening to audiobooks on the subway, and reading anything with a twisty plot or a happily ever after.

View All posts by Alison Doherty

I love reading books of nonfiction essays and memoirs , but sometimes have a hard time committing to a whole book. This is especially true if I don’t know the author. But reading nonfiction essays online is a quick way to learn which authors you like. Also, reading nonfiction essays can help you learn more about different topics and experiences.

Besides essays on Book Riot, I love looking for essays on The New Yorker , The Atlantic , The Rumpus , and Electric Literature . But there are great nonfiction essays available for free all over the Internet. From contemporary to classic writers and personal essays to researched ones—here are 25 of my favorite nonfiction essays you can read today.

“Beware of Feminist Lite” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The author of We Should All Be Feminists writes a short essay explaining the danger of believing men and woman are equal only under certain conditions.

“It’s Silly to Be Frightened of Being Dead” by Diana Athill

A 96-year-old woman discusses her shifting attitude towards death from her childhood in the 1920s when death was a taboo subject, to World War 2 until the present day.

“Letter from a Region in my Mind” by James Baldwin

There are many moving and important essays by James Baldwin . This one uses the lens of religion to explore the Black American experience and sexuality. Baldwin describes his move from being a teenage preacher to not believing in god. Then he recounts his meeting with the prominent Nation of Islam member Elijah Muhammad.

“Relations” by Eula Biss

Biss uses the story of a white woman giving birth to a Black baby that was mistakenly implanted during a fertility treatment to explore racial identities and segregation in society as a whole and in her own interracial family.

“Friday Night Lights” by Buzz Bissinger

A comprehensive deep dive into the world of high school football in a small West Texas town.

“The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Coates examines the lingering and continuing affects of slavery on American society and makes a compelling case for the descendants of slaves being offered reparations from the government.

“Why I Write” by Joan Didion

This is one of the most iconic nonfiction essays about writing. Didion describes the reasons she became a writer, her process, and her journey to doing what she loves professionally.

“Go Gentle Into That Good Night” by Roger Ebert

With knowledge of his own death, the famous film critic ponders questions of mortality while also giving readers a pep talk for how to embrace life fully.

“My Mother’s Tongue” by Zavi Kang Engles

In this personal essay, Engles celebrates the close relationship she had with her mother and laments losing her Korean fluency.

“My Life as an Heiress” by Nora Ephron

As she’s writing an important script, Ephron imagines her life as a newly wealthy woman when she finds out an uncle left her an inheritance. But she doesn’t know exactly what that inheritance is.

“My FatheR Spent 30 Years in Prison. Now He’s Out.” by Ashley C. Ford

Ford describes the experience of getting to know her father after he’s been in prison for almost all of her life. Bridging the distance in their knowledge of technology becomes a significant—and at times humorous—step in rebuilding their relationship.

“Bad Feminist” by Roxane Gay

There’s a reason Gay named her bestselling essay collection after this story. It’s a witty, sharp, and relatable look at what it means to call yourself a feminist.

“The Empathy Exams” by Leslie Jamison

Jamison discusses her job as a medical actor helping to train medical students to improve their empathy and uses this frame to tell the story of one winter in college when she had an abortion and heart surgery.

“What I Learned from a Fitting Room Disaster About Clothes and Life” by Scaachi Koul

One woman describes her history with difficult fitting room experiences culminating in one catastrophe that will change the way she hopes to identify herself through clothes.

“Breasts: the Odd Couple” by Una LaMarche

LaMarche examines her changing feelings about her own differently sized breasts.

“How I Broke, and Botched, the Brandon Teena Story” by Donna Minkowitz

A journalist looks back at her own biased reporting on a news story about the sexual assault and murder of a trans man in 1993. Minkowitz examines how ideas of gender and sexuality have changed since she reported the story, along with how her own lesbian identity influenced her opinions about the crime.

“Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell

In this famous essay, Orwell bemoans how politics have corrupted the English language by making it more vague, confusing, and boring.

“Letting Go” by David Sedaris

The famously funny personal essay author , writes about a distinctly unfunny topic of tobacco addiction and his own journey as a smoker. It is (predictably) hilarious.

“Joy” by Zadie Smith

Smith explores the difference between pleasure and joy by closely examining moments of both, including eating a delicious egg sandwich, taking drugs at a concert, and falling in love.

“Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan

Tan tells the story of how her mother’s way of speaking English as an immigrant from China changed the way people viewed her intelligence.

“Consider the Lobster” by David Foster Wallace

The prolific nonfiction essay and fiction writer travels to the Maine Lobster Festival to write a piece for Gourmet Magazine. With his signature footnotes, Wallace turns this experience into a deep exploration on what constitutes consciousness.

“I Am Not Pocahontas” by Elissa Washuta

Washuta looks at her own contemporary Native American identity through the lens of stereotypical depictions from 1990s films.

“Once More to the Lake” by E.B. White

E.B. White didn’t just write books like Charlotte’s Web and The Elements of Style . He also was a brilliant essayist. This nature essay explores the theme of fatherhood against the backdrop of a lake within the forests of Maine.

“Pell-Mell” by Tom Wolfe

The inventor of “new journalism” writes about the creation of an American idea by telling the story of Thomas Jefferson snubbing a European Ambassador.

“The Death of the Moth” by Virginia Woolf

In this nonfiction essay, Wolf describes a moth dying on her window pane. She uses the story as a way to ruminate on the lager theme of the meaning of life and death.

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Home / Book Writing / Nonfiction Topics to Write About: 30+ Ideas to Get You Started

Nonfiction Topics to Write About: 30+ Ideas to Get You Started

If you're an aspiring nonfiction author or blog writer (or both), you may feel that you don't have as much to write about as fiction authors. After all, fiction writers are only limited by their imaginations, whereas nonfiction writers can't just make stuff up. But if you think about it, that's not quite right. Some of the best nonfiction books take a look at old ideas through a new lens. And that lens is the author's imagination.

So whether you're struggling to generate new ideas or just want to break away from your current work in progress, we've got a list of great nonfiction topics to write about.

Tips for writing great nonfiction.
How best to pick from the list of nonfiction topics.
Tips for vetting your nonfiction book idea.

Use Creative Writing to Generate Emotions
Keep Your Purpose in Mind
Bring Something New to the Table
Informational Writing Prompts
Memoir Writing Prompts
Personal Essay Writing Prompts
How to Vet Your Nonfiction Book Idea

Writing Excellent Nonfiction

For some people, nonfiction writing comes easily, whereas fiction is a little trickier. For others, the opposite is true. The fact is, writing nonfiction is not all that different from writing fiction. With the tips below, you'll see what I mean.

Whether you're writing a piece of narrative nonfiction or a handbook on becoming an entrepreneur, you'll want to tell a story . After all, anyone can put down words that tell someone how to do something, but this isn't how great writing works. We're story-centered creatures. It's how we relate to the world.

So use a narrative to get your point across. If your readers feel something as they read your book, it's more likely to stick with them. And that's exactly what you want!

The writing prompts below are split into sub-sections based on the purpose they serve. While a lot of nonfiction is designed to help the reader solve a problem, this is not always the case. Some sub-genres of nonfiction are for readers who want to be entertained or informed. Luckily, it's pretty easy to tell the difference.

So whichever writing prompt you choose, keep your purpose in mind the whole time. Always ask yourself, as you write, if each sentence is serving the purpose of the piece.

While the prompts below are fairly broad, they require an ingredient that I can't provide in this article: you. It's your job to bring the prompt or prompts alive with your own experience, imagination, and outlook. There's no use in writing a book, essay, or article that a hundred other people have already written.

But if you have a unique take on the subject, or can provide a compelling way to deliver the information to the reader, then you have a nonfiction piece worth writing.

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Nonfiction Writing Prompts

Pick a prompt below that sounds intriguing to you. Take a moment to think about how you would provide a unique perspective on the subject. Or, simply use them as writing prompts to practice your craft!

First, we'll start with the informational nonfiction writing prompts. In other words, these are designed to solve a specific problem or explain something to the reader. These are often called expository nonfiction prompts.

1. Write about your health and fitness journey. Have you overcome any obstacles, tried any fad diets, or had any close calls? What can you share about your experience that can help others?

2. Write about your career or industry. How did you get to be where you are? What can you share about your experience that can help others?

3. Write about a skill that you have. How much time did you put into developing it? What practices worked best? What would you tell someone who is just now trying to learn the skill?

4. Explore your spirituality or religious beliefs. Finding ways to maintain your beliefs or practices is hard these days, so share with the reader how you've managed to do it, and how they can do it, too.

5. Write about finances. Are you better off than your peers? Have you been successful, or have you had major ups and downs? What can you share about your experience that can help others?

6. Are you an organized person? If so, write about how you stay organized. Don't skimp on the details of any systems or tactics you've developed!

7. Do you know how to maintain a home or a vehicle? If so, write a guide on how best to stay on top of regular maintenance while still saving time and money.

8. Have you overcome anxiety or stress? If so, share with readers how you stay on top of it while still functioning in society.

9. Do you know how to knit or make homemade decorations? If so, share your skills in a book or blog post.

10. Do you know all the best spots to eat, relax, or pass the time in your city? Write a guide of all the little-known gems to help people visiting for the first time.

Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

Unless you're a subject matter expert, you may be more interested in the writing prompts below. With the creative writing prompts in this section, you have a little more freedom when it comes to writing style. You can rely heavily on personal experience with the following prompts , as well, just make sure you're telling a true story!

11. Write about the most impactful time in your life. What lessons did you learn that other people would be interested in?

12. What does it mean to be happy? Is it possible to be happy all the time? If so, how?

13. Have you done any traveling, whether foreign or domestic? If so, you could regale readers with travel-writing stories.

14. Are you a fan of historical nonfiction? This nonfiction genre requires a lot of research, but if you have a unique angle on a moment in our history, it could be well worth the effort.

15. Write about a person who has influenced you without ever having met you. See if you can find and interview others who've been similarly influenced.

The memoir is a creative nonfiction genre in which everyone can write. Although it's hard to sell these kinds of books unless you're a well-known figure, they're great for developing the writing skill it takes to craft other types of books and stories.

16. Using a series of cultural or worldwide events, tell the story of your life. Whether it's a historic law that passed or the release of an impactful movie, see if you can weave important moments in your life into an entertaining narrative.

17. What does truth mean to you? Present times from your own life where the truth was important.

18. Write about what is important to you now. Has it always been a priority, or has the definition of importance changed over your life?

19. Write about a trip that changed your life forever. This could be a vacation, a road trip, or a simple trip to the grocery store.

20. Write about your life by describing the good times you've had with any and all the pets you've had over the years.

If you want more memoir writing prompts, we have an entire article dedicated to this type of narrative nonfiction here .

If a full nonfiction book sounds like a bit much for you, a nonfiction essay may just be the best alternative. This is a personal story told from the heart. It can be about almost anything, but most of these essays generally have to do with one specific topic or moment in the writer's life.

21. Try your hand at literary journalism by writing a series of articles about your life and achievements from the point of view of an impartial journalist.

22. Write a short story in which you are the protagonist and you're dealing with a real-life scary or difficult situation. What really happened, and what could you have done differently?

23. Everyone's afraid of something. What's the biggest fear you've worked to overcome? And how did you do it?

24. Write a personal essay about how music has impacted your life. What songs were playing at important events in your life? How has music defined who you are?

25. What makes you a unique person? What makes you the same as others? Write an essay on what it means to be an individual in a world full of individuals.

26. Think about a person you deeply admire. Write about why you admire them, exploring things like their personality traits, goals, philosophies, and other positive qualities.

27. Write about a location that holds a special meaning for you. This could be a home, a town, or even an entire state. Discuss how this place has impacted your life.

28. Pick a piece of work that has resonated with you. This could be a book, a movie, or a piece of artwork. Explore the themes it explores and why it has resonated with you.

29. The search for purpose is tricky for some. Whether you have found a purpose or are still searching for one, discuss what this means to you.

30. Explore a belief or tradition that is meaningful to you. How has it influenced your life, and why is it important to you? What positive effects have come because of this belief or tradition?

There's a lot to like about being a creative nonfiction writer. In many ways, it requires the same skills as fiction writing, but with narrower parameters to keep you on track. No matter what kind of writing you like to do, the prompts above can help you hone your skills. But what about when you think you have an idea for a potential bestseller? Before you invest the time in writing the whole book (or the book proposal), it's worth vetting the idea. Luckily, this is easy to do with Publisher Rocket.

You can think of the information you get from Publisher Rocket as the foundation for your nonfiction writing career. You get insights directly from Amazon on:

Keywords – Metadata to position your nonfiction book on Amazon.
Competition – Allowing you to see what other nonfiction books are selling well and how stiff the competition is.
Categories – Allowing you to position your book in the right categories and subcategories to increase your chances of success.
Amazon Ads – Helping you quickly configure a list of profitable keywords for running ads to your published nonfiction book.

Check out Publisher Rocket here to learn more about using data to position your book for success on Amazon.

Dave Chesson

When I’m not sipping tea with princesses or lightsaber dueling with little Jedi, I’m a book marketing nut. Having consulted multiple publishing companies and NYT best-selling authors, I created Kindlepreneur to help authors sell more books. I’ve even been called “The Kindlepreneur” by Amazon publicly, and I’m here to help you with your author journey.

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21 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Inspire True Stories

by Sue Weems | 0 comments

If you've ever wanted to tell a true story using more literary techniques, then the genre you're exploring is creative nonfiction. Let's define creative nonfiction and then try some creative nonfiction writing prompts today.

Title "21 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts" with photo of a stack of old letters

What is creative nonfiction?

Creative nonfiction is a literary genre of writing that uses fiction techniques and stylistic choices to express real-life experiences. It depends on story elements especially, so everything you've learned about structure will serve you well in creative nonfiction.

It often includes personal essays, memoirs, biographies, and other related genres such as travel writing or food writing. Creative nonfiction writers strive to make their pieces engaging to readers with narrative techniques typically found in fiction, such as vivid descriptions and dialogue, but in addition to that, they approach their subject matter with a thoughtfulness about the larger meaning of experiences.

It's an extremely flexible form. You can begin by writing out a personal experience and then layering it with narrative or thematic elements. You can infuse your writing with poetic elements to make the writing more lyrical. The possibilities for your writing practice are endless.

Because of that, it's the perfect form for practicing new techniques and experimenting with your storytelling. You could use any nonfiction prompt, but let me give you a few to try today. Remember the one thing you want to do is tell a true story (or as true as you can tell it!).

And if you've always dreamed of writing a memoir, check out our full guide to writing a memoir here .

21 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

1. Tell a personal story about a time you lost something that changed your life.

2. Relate a childhood experience where you felt locked out literally or figuratively.

3. Think about a road trip—maybe not the epic, once-in-a-lifetime trip, but a smaller one that surprised you with something on the way. Write about the vivid details and what defied your expectations.

4. Write about finding unexpected love or friendship.

5. Tell a story about the last time you felt at home.

6. Relate a time when you had to leave something important or precious behind.

7. Tell about a time you had to dig.

8. Write about the first time of drove or traveled alone and it changed you.

9. Tell about a painful or poignant goodbye.

10. Relate a favorite memory about a significant figure in your life.

11. Write the story of the most difficult decision you made in each decade of your life.

12. Tell the story of a birth: of a person, an idea, a business, a relationship.

13. Relate the most life-changing conversation you've had using only dialogue. (or stream-of-consciousness or alternating point of view)

14. Recreate the earliest significant experience you had with school or learning.

15. Write about a tiny object that changed your life.

16. Tell the story of an argument that ended in a surprising or unexpected way.

17. Recreate a scene where you had to defend yourself or someone else.

18. Share a story about trying something new (whether you failed or met success).

19. Write about the moment you knew you had to keep a secret.

20. Tell about a time you interacted, viewed, or read a piece of art and it changed you.

21. Share about a letter, email, or text that disrupted your life and caused you to change course.

Put your writing skills to the test

Now it's your turn. Dig into those childhood memories or visceral experiences that have made you who you are. Tell the story and then look for ways to explore literary technique as you revise.

Choose one of the prompts above and set your timer for fifteen minutes . Write the experience as vividly and direct as you can. Often, the magic of creative nonfiction comes in revision, so don't worry about focusing on too many stylistic choices at first.

When finished, share your creative nonfiction piece in the Pro Practice Workshop here , and encourage a few other writers while you're there.

Sue Weems is a writer, teacher, and traveler with an advanced degree in (mostly fictional) revenge. When she’s not rationalizing her love for parentheses (and dramatic asides), she follows a sailor around the globe with their four children, two dogs, and an impossibly tall stack of books to read. You can read more of her writing tips on her website .

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76 Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Help You Write Better, More Engaging Content

By: Author Paul Jenkins

Posted on Published: September 9, 2022 - Last updated: July 31, 2023

Categories Writing , Inspiration

Do you sometimes struggle to come up with ideas for your articles or nonfiction works? Are you looking for ways to improve your writing and make it more engaging for your readers? If so, then you need to check out these nonfiction writing prompts! These prompts will help you come up with topics to write about and will also help you improve your writing skills. So what are you waiting for? Start using these prompts today!

33 Creative Nonfiction Prompts to Get Your Creative Juices Flowing

As a writer, it can be easy to get caught up in writer’s block. You may not know what to write about or which angle to approach a topic from. If you’re feeling stuck, why not try your hand at nonfiction? Nonfiction writing can be a great way to flex your creative muscles and explore new topics.

Write about a time when you had to confront your fears. What were you afraid of? How did you overcome your fear?
Write about a journey you went on- literal or metaphorical. What did you learn from the experience?
Write about someone you admire and why they inspire you.
Write about a memory that still makes you laugh.
Write about a time when you had to stand up for yourself or someone else.
Write about an experience that taught you a valuable lesson.
Write about a goal you’ve set for yourself and why it’s important to you.
Write about someone who has made a positive impact on your life.
Write about a hobby or interest you have that others may find surprising.
Write an open letter to someone- living or dead, real or fictional- thanking them for their impact on your life.
Write about an important issue facing the world today and what needs to be done to address it.
Write about a time when you overcame adversity.
What was your best childhood memory?
Who has been the biggest influence in your life and why?
What is your favorite family tradition?
What was the most defining moment of your teenage years?
Write about a time when you had to confront a difficult truth.
What was the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make?
What are some of the life lessons you’ve learned so far?
How have you grown and changed over the years?
What does happiness mean to you?
Tell the story of a defining moment in your life.
Write about a time when you had to confront a difficult truth about yourself.
Write about a hobby or interest you’ve always been embarrassed to admit to.
Write about a memory that still makes you laugh (or cry) every time you think about it.
Write about a place you’ve always wanted to visit but haven’t had the chance yet.
Write about someone who has had a major influence on your life, for better or worse.
Write about a time when you had to do something you were really scared of.
Write about a physical object that has sentimental value to you.
Write about a time when you took a stand on something even though it was unpopular.
Write about an experience that challenged your assumptions or worldview in some way.
Write about a person who you admire but don’t necessarily agree with.
Write about a time when you had to make a tough decision with no clear right or wrong answer.

10 Nonfiction Short Story Prompts

Your most memorable childhood experience
A time when you faced a challenge head-on
A life-changing event
An emotional moment that still stays with you
A time when you had to let go of something or someone important to you
A moment of happiness or success
When you had an “aha!” moment
A time when you had to confront a fear
An experience that taught you a valuable lesson
A memory that still makes you laugh (or cry!) today

11 Nonfiction Personal Essay Prompts

Crafting a personal essay is one of the most challenging parts of the writing process. You have to distill your experience to its essence and find a way to communicate it in a way that will resonate with your audience. No wonder many writers find personal essays some of the most difficult pieces!

Write about a transition period in your life (moving, starting a new job, going away to college, etc.) and how it affected you.
Pick an object with sentimental value and write about its history and what it means to you.
Write about an event from your childhood that you still think about today.
What are your earliest memories? Write about them in as much detail as possible.
Who is someone you admire and why?
What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced in your life? How did you overcome them?
What do you think makes you unique?
What are some of your biggest accomplishments? Why were they important to you in the moment, and how do they continue to affect your life today?
Write about a time when you had to grapple with an ethical dilemma. How did you ultimately make your decision, and what were the consequences?

11 Journal Writing Prompts

Journaling is a great way to engage with the events of your day and process your thoughts and feelings.

Write about a time when you had to face a difficult truth.
What are some things you’re grateful for?
What does your idea of the perfect day look like?
How do you define happiness, and what are some things that make you happy?
Choose one thing that you’d like to change about yourself and write about why you want to change it and how you plan to go about doing it.
Do you have any lingering unresolved anger or resentment towards anyone? Why not try writing a letter to that person, even if you don’t plan on sending it? Getting your thoughts out can help you to let go and move on.
What would be your dream vacation spot? Write about all the details: where would you stay, what would you do, what would you eat?
Have you ever experienced something miraculous? Whether big or small, share your story.
Sometimes our biggest fears turn out to be unfounded. Write about a time when this happened to you.
When was the last time you did something for the first time? How did it feel?
Write about someone who has had a positive influence on your life. Why are they important to you?

11 Memoir Writing Prompts

A memoir is a way to tell your story and share your experience with others. Memoirs can be written about a personal experience, someone else’s experience, or even a topic you feel passionate about.

What is the earliest memory you have? What do you remember about it? How does it make you feel?
Write about a time when you were faced with a difficult decision. What were the options? What did you decide? Why?
What are some of the defining moments in your life? Why were they so significant?
Write about a person who has had a major influence on your life. Who are they, and what did they teach you?
What has been your most challenging experience? How did you face it? What did you learn from it?
Describe a time when you had to overcome adversity. What was the situation, and how did you manage it?
Is there someone in your life that you admire and look up to? Who are they, and what qualities do they possess that you admire?
Write about an event that has shaped who you are today. What happened, and how did it change you?
What are some of the defining moments of your childhood? Why were they so significant to you at the time?
Tell the story of a significant relationship in your life. What was this relationship like, and what did it teach you about yourself and others?
Everyone has regrets in life. What is something you regret, and why do you feel that way about it now?

Telling your story can be a powerful way to connect with others, process your experiences, and heal from trauma. If you’re stuck, try using one of these memoir writing prompts.

What Makes a Good Nonfiction Writing Topic

Searching for a good nonfiction writing topic can sometimes feel like looking for a needle in a haystack. There are just so many options out there! How do you choose one that will be interesting to write about and read?

Here are a few factors to keep in mind when choosing a topic for your next nonfiction piece:

Potential interest to the audience : You want to choose a topic that you think people will want to read about. Ask yourself- would you want to read an article on this subject? If the answer is no, it’s probably not worth writing about. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule, but in general, it’s good to err on the side of writing something that you think people will find interesting and useful.
Something you care about: It can be easier (and more fun!) to write about something you’re passionate about. When you care about your topic, it shows in your writing, and readers can sense that. Of course, you don’t have to be an expert on the subject- part of the reason you’re writing is to learn more about it yourself! However, if you aren’t interested in the topic, it will be harder to find the motivation to write about it.
Originality: You also want to ensure that you’re choosing a topic that hasn’t been written about too much before. Finding an original angle on a well-explored subject can be difficult, but it’s not impossible. Some of the best pieces take a new perspective on a familiar topic. However, if you find that there are already dozens of articles on the same subject you wanted to write about, it might be time to move on and choose something else.

What Is a Creative Nonfiction Essay?

A creative nonfiction essay uses the real-life experiences of the nonfiction writer as material for the piece. This type of essay can be written in first person point of view and is usually focused on a single event, experience, or moment in time.

What separates a creative nonfiction essay from a simple narrative essay is the addition of literary devices such as metaphors, similes, and other poetic language. This allows the writer to create a more emotive piece that engages the reader on a different level. In addition, creative nonfiction essays often use flashbacks and other devices that help create a more linear story.

While creative nonfiction essays can be based on real-life experiences, they are still stories that need to be well-crafted to engage the reader. This means that writers must be aware of good storytelling elements, such as conflict, resolution, and character development. By incorporating these elements into their essays, writers can create compelling pieces of creative nonfiction.

Creative nonfiction essays are an interesting and challenging genre for writers. By combining real-life experiences with elements of good storytelling, writers can create engaging and emotive essays that will resonate with readers.

How to Write Creative Nonfiction

Creative nonfiction is a genre of writing that uses fiction and nonfiction elements to tell a true story. Unlike traditional journalism or academic writing, creative nonfiction allows writers to use literary devices such as metaphor and simile to bring their stories to life.

The first step in writing creative nonfiction is deciding what story you want to tell. This can be a personal story from your own life or the story of someone else you have been told. Once you have decided on a story, the next step is to start researching. This will help you to understand the events that took place and the people involved.

Next, it’s time to start writing. The key to writing creative nonfiction is to be as honest as possible. This means being willing to share your thoughts and feelings about the events that took place. It’s also important to use literary devices such as metaphor and simile to bring your story to life for the reader.

Finally, don’t forget to edit and revise your work before publishing it. This will help ensure that your story is free of errors, flows smoothly from beginning to end, and help you become a professional creative nonfiction writer.

How to Write a Good Nonfiction Essay

A nonfiction essay is a piece of writing that aims to present information about a certain subject. It can be based on anything from real-life events to personal experiences. To write a good nonfiction essay, there are some key elements that you need to keep in mind:

Decide on a topic

The first step is to decide on a topic for your essay. The topic can be anything from a personal event to something you have read about or seen. If you are having trouble deciding on a topic, try brainstorming with friends or family members. Once you have settled on a topic, the next step is to start researching.

Do your research

Before you start writing, you must do your research. This means looking for sources that will help you support your claims in your essay. When looking for sources, make sure they are credible and reliable. Once you have found some good sources, the next step is writing your essay.

Write your essay

When you are writing your essay, there are a few things that you need to keep in mind. First, ensure that your essay has an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Second, make sure that all of your claims are supported by evidence from your research. And third, try to make your essay as interesting and engaging as possible.

Edit and revise

Once you have finished writing your essay, it is important to edit and revise it. This will help you improve the quality of your work and increase your chances of getting published. To edit and revise your work, try reading it aloud or getting someone else to read it. This will help you catch any errors or awkward phrasing you might have missed.

Submit your essay

The final step is to submit your essay to a publisher or contest. Doing this will allow you to get feedback from professionals and potentially have your work published for others to see.

How Do You Write a Nonfiction Book in 30 Days?

How is it possible to write an entire nonfiction book in such a short amount of time? Well, it certainly isn’t easy, and it isn’t for everyone. But if you have a clear vision for your book and you’re willing to put in the hard work, then it is possible.

Here are a few tips on how you can write a nonfiction book in 30 days:

1. Outline Your Book First

This may seem like a no-brainer, but you would be surprised how many people try to wing it when they write their books. A clear outline of what you want to cover in each chapter will make the actual writing process much easier and less daunting. Trust us, you will thank us later.

2. Set Aside Time Each Day to Write

Trying to cram an entire book into 30 days is unrealistic and very stressful. A better approach would be to set aside time each day to write. Set realistic goals for yourself – maybe aim to write 2-3 pages daily. If you stick to this plan, you will have a much better chance of completing your book within the 30-day timeframe.

3. Get an Editor

Once you have written your first draft, getting someone to edit your work is important. This step is crucial because it will help tighten up your writing and catch any errors you may have missed. A professional editor will also provide valuable feedback on your work which can be very helpful as you revise your manuscript.

4. Promote Your Book

Writing and publishing a book is only half the battle – the other half is promoting it! Make sure to create buzz about your book before it is released and devise creative ways to market it once it hits online stores or shelves.

Ideas for Writing Creative Nonfiction

by Melissa Donovan | Apr 6, 2023 | Creative Writing | 16 comments

Looking for creative nonfiction ideas?

In fiction writing, we’re often inspired by what-if questions: What if an innocent person is convicted of murder? What if humanity finds itself facing total extinction? What if that rabbit hole leads to a fantastical wonderland?

Fiction is driven by imagination.

Ideas for writing creative nonfiction often arise from experience and interest rather than imagination. Instead of asking what-if questions, creative nonfiction writers set out to share their experiences, knowledge, ideas, opinions, passions, and curiosities.

Creative Nonfiction Ideas

Writers who are on a quest for inspiration can find a wealth of creative nonfiction writing ideas. Here are some to get you started:

1. An autobiography is your life story. You get to share your experiences, successes, and failures. The trouble with autobiographies is that readers are rarely interested in reading biographical information about total strangers. Unless you’re a public figure, there will be little interest in your project. However, you can always do some research and investigative reporting and write a biography about someone else, or you can narrow your focus and write a memoir.

2. What is a memoir? A memoir is not a life story; it’s a personal account of a particular experience. For example, if you’ve survived an illness, disaster, or trauma, that experience might provide the foundation for a memoir. Writing of this nature is appealing to readers because it speaks to a specific audience. Young parents whose children are struggling with autism, for example, will be highly interested in reading a memoir by a parent who has raised a child with autism. What makes memoirs so popular is the promise that through personal experience, the writer has obtained expertise and is now sharing it with the world.

A memoir doesn’t have to be about your past experiences. You can set yourself up for writing a memoir. Elizabeth Gilbert set out on a year of adventure and then wrote about it and became a best-selling author. A.J. Jacobs has built a life and a career around experimental adventures. He read all thirty-two volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica and then wrote about it. He spent a year living biblically and then wrote about it. He also experimented with outsourcing his entire life, and then wrote about it. If you’ve ever wanted to embark on a grand adventure or found yourself concocting experimental lifestyles, you may find that they fuel some interesting creative nonfiction ideas.

3. If a memoir is too daunting, try a personal essay instead. Personal essays can be short-form memoirs, in which you share a specific personal experience, but instead of writing an entire book, you can write a handful of pages. You can also use personal essays to express your ideas or opinions on any subject imaginable.

4. Are you an expert? If you’re an expert on any subject, you can share your expertise by writing creative nonfiction in the form of articles and topical essays. Write about the subject you studied in school, the work you’ve done throughout your career, or a hobby that you’ve enjoyed and mastered. Many writers avoid this type of writing, assuming that there is already enough information out there. But new works are being published every day on a wide range of topics. What makes them successful is not necessarily the information that is imparted, but the manner in which it is presented. A unique voice, a new take on the subject, and a fresh way to organize the information are all viable strategies for success in these types of creative nonfiction writing.

5. What’s your passion? You can take your personal experience and acquired expertise on anything in the world and turn it into a writing project. These days, writers share their thoughts and insights on everything from their favorite TV shows and video games to the meals they eat and the books they read. You can write about the philosophy of Star Trek . You could share tips and strategies for playing (and winning) popular video games. If you love coffee and have a penchant for taking pictures, set out to make a coffee table book about coffee. If you spend your mornings gardening and your evenings creating delicious home-cooked meals, you can launch a blog packed with tips and ideas for gardening, cooking, or healthy eating. You don’t have to be an expert or a professional to talk about your passion.

Check out “ A Guide to Writing Creative Nonfiction ” for an in-depth look at writing creative nonfiction

Where do you get creative nonfiction ideas.

Ideas for writing creative nonfiction books, blogs, essays, and articles are all around you. Your questions, passions, experiences, and ideas all have the potential to launch your next creative nonfiction writing project.

Ready Set Write a Guide to Creative Writing

16 Comments

My writing ideas most often come from my dreams or from real life experiences. On occasion another article, nice photography, art or music will inspire an idea for me, but most often they come from my life.

I love to hear from writers about where they get inspiration. In fact, when I listen to interviews with authors, my favorite portion is always when they talk about how they came up with an idea. It’s so interesting! Thanks for sharing your sources of inspiration, Nicole.

Writing ideas are somewhat like the proverbial moths swarming to the light source. There are so many that simple gads of them get away. Yet, I’ve discovered that keeping pen and paper near me as often as possible helps me to capture words or sentences which later make it into the creative nonfiction I love writing.

Even though I write nonfiction I adore fiction. Often fictional characters utter something which speaks to my heart. When that happens I frequently find ways to add the ideas or information to my own writing. Gosh, do you think I need to credit the creators of those fictional beings? 🙂

Yvonne, I believe all fiction writers are inspired by the authors who came before them. If we credited all of them, the acknowledgements pages in our books would be books themselves!

Melissa thanks. You say it all and true that everything is right there in the creative juice of the writer. I happen to pursue on this passion and look after writing relevant articles in my MIndaview Column and complied these as social commentary I’m now graduating as nonfiction writer. I have now a contract from Mr. Tom Wallace of Publisher on Demand Global after evaluating my work “The Needle” (actually a metaphor of 14 years of Martial in the Phil.) and pronounced his verdict: I could be their next best selling author! Hmm what a compliment and a breakthrough.

That’s wonderful, Ricardo! Good luck with your book!

I agree with Yvonne about keeping pen and paper handy. The only thing is, I have sentences, phrases and words on papers all over my world. I guess that is better than no ideas! I always thought I would start publishing with fiction and as it turns out, I am enjoying writing self-help–all from my own experiences. Maybe the “made-up” stories will come later… Diana Fletcher, Author of Happy on Purpose Daily Messages of Empowerment and Joy for Women

Hi Diana. It sounds like you and I have had similar experiences. I always keep pen and paper handy, but the clutter that my ideas and notes generate can be a burden. I also thought I’d start publishing with fiction, but it looks like I’m going to publish a book on writing before I get around to publishing a novel. I have mixed feelings about that!

Great minds think alike, I just wrote a post on getting ideas. I talked about the importance of observing. Sometimes the process of getting an idea can begin with just writing down something you saw in the course of your day. Once you get in the habit of observing, start speculating, using the 5 Ws. This post has some great suggestions in it!

Thanks, Charlotte! Yes, observation skills are critical for writers. If we miss something, our readers will catch it. Sometimes that’s not a big deal. But if it’s a big plot hole, a character behaving out of character, or a gap in our research, failure to observe can be pretty detrimental.

Be mindful. Pay attention. Ray Carver suggested that even an ordinary, mudane event in your life, like brushing your teeth, can be endowed with power.

Great tips, Chaz!

Melissa I have a real story I want to tell in the creative nonfiction genre. It inspired me out of the blue. I.ve never before wanted to write. But then that’s how i got my ladybug tattoo, inspiration from an a-ha moment. So when the notebooks went on sale at the beginning of the school year for 15 cents apiece I stocked up. I write and research every day now. My story may or may not ever be published, but I am having a blast getting it out there!

That’s great, Jo! It sounds like an experience from your life inspired you to become a writer, which is awesome. I wish you the best of luck in all that you write.

I actually wrote a nonfiction novel few weeks ago and thanks to you my writing are so much better just because of these few simple ideas. Thank you Melissa 🙂

You just made my day, Anna. Thanks so much for letting me know that you found these ideas inspiring and helpful. I wish you the best in your writing adventures!

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Creative Nonfiction Prompts 15 Ideas To Inspire Writers & Hook Readers

August 3, 2022

Creative nonfiction refers to true stories that are immersive and engaging.

They are well-told accounts of real-life events, written to engage the reader and take them on a journey and spare them from any boring moment.

This article has included over 15 creative nonfiction prompts to help you get your creative juices flowing and inspire you to write your non-fiction book .

What is creative nonfiction?

Where does creativity come into nonfiction? Nonfiction is real stories and actual events, so where is the room for creativity?

Creative nonfiction writers use literary techniques, like character development, immersive settings , and engaging dialogue, but in the context of a true story.

The stories include real people, real events, and real situations. The way a writer tells the story is where they get creative.

Examples of creative nonfiction writing include:

Narrative essay
Personal essay
Journal entry
Literary journalism

Creative nonfiction writers aim to share real-world information such as an experience, a historical event, or a person’s life – with readers in a way that immerses them in the story as much as fiction.

Understand the use of the word creative in this context. Creative nonfiction authors don’t ‘create’ by making up facts or exaggerating them.

The facts are as they are, but how a writer conveys them and the frame in which they place them constitutes their creativity.

15+ creative nonfiction prompts

Write in a second-person narrative . In this POV, the reader reads as though they are the character. The writer uses ‘you’ to tell the story. Consider a time in history in which to plant your reader and walk them through the experiences of that time. For example, ‘You were born in 1925. At 15 years old, you were drafted, to your dismay. Your experience with gun fighting, limited to sticks and stones on the playground, wouldn’t suffice for the days to come.
Choose a skill, talent, or something you have a lot of experience with, and write a how-to article about it. For example, if you like to blog, write a blog about blogging – its challenges, why you want it, and how to do it well.
Write book reviews. Choose your favorite book or the one you read most recently and write an honest review about your reading experience. What did you like about the story? What did you like about the author? Is there anything that could have made the reading experience more enjoyable?
Do you feel a particular pull towards a vocation in life? Do you feel pulled to a particular career or life path, not because someone encouraged you but because you feel that pull deep down inside? Write about your experience with that feeling and the journey of following it.
Do you have something you’d like to share about faith or belief with others? Write an account of your experiences on your spiritual journey. How do you feel about religion? What about spirituality? Do you have thoughts, opinions, and insights that are unique to you?
Think about your favorite piece of art. If you can’t bring one to mind, go out and find some inspiration. Next, write about that piece of art. Describe it. How do you feel about it? Does it have any significance in other areas of your life? Is it a family heirloom?
Write about time spent with the best teacher you’ve ever had. What was it about that teacher that made learning so easy? How did they help you in other areas of your life?
Consider a dull moment in your day and write it as though it was the most exciting thing ever. Such a writing style lends itself well to humor, so take the joke as far as possible.
Write about a time in your life when you had to learn the hard way. We don’t always have common sense at the ready when faced with decisions, and life is such that mistakes are our most outstanding teachers. Think about mistakes and lessons you’ve learned that would have been less impactful had you not experienced them directly.
Sometimes we meet someone that changes our lives in a matter of moments. Perhaps we meet them once or are in our lives for days or weeks. Then, as life always does, it changes. That person isn’t around anymore, but the old version of ourselves isn’t around anymore either. Write a memoir about someone who passed through your life and made a significant impact.
Write a story about your town or city. Consider the various characters, communities, and events that have taken place in the past and recent years and how the community has shifted and grown. Focus on engaging, real-life characters and their lives.
Do you believe in fate and destiny? Do we have free will, or is that a more remarkable design at play? Write about your experiences with strange coincidences, spiritual experiences, and the concept of free will. Where do you stand? How do your religious beliefs come into play? Have you had experiences that you just can’t explain? What makes you think about how the world works? For a more fact-based and immersive read, include research and references to respected works on the topic.
Write about a significant event in your life from your perspective. Then, rewrite the story from someone else’s perspective, such as a friend or one of your family members.
Write about a time when your efforts paid off, even though you wanted to give up many times. The theme is persistence and consistency and their relationship to success.
Good vs. evil. What makes a person, action, or behavior good or evil? Is it all relative? Just a matter of perspective? Or are good and evil cold, hard facts? Write about a moment when you were unsure if your actions were good or evil. How do you feel about that situation now? What did you learn about yourself and life in general?
Write a story about a crime. You may know every detail, but take the facts you know and craft a story around them. Consider a major bank heist, a serial killer, or the story of a government whistleblower. Crime stories make for outstanding nonfiction because readers experience the pleasure of plot, narrative, settings, and characters while experiencing the thrill of the story being real.

Creative nonfiction writing tips

Writers have room to play when it comes to creative nonfiction. The facts exist and can’t be changed, but how one tells the story is what sets one account apart from another on the same topic.

Still, some basic nonfiction writing guidelines are essential to consider, as free as one is to write from different perspectives, characters, and tones.

Get your facts right

First things first, get your facts right.

If you write about a character from history, such as Julius Caesar or Genghis Khan, ensure everything around that character is accurate. Exert as much of your own efforts as you can in researching the topic.

Understand the time and culture in which they lived. Failing to convey the facts accurately is sure to backfire and damage your reputation, so check the facts.

Explore different points of view

One of the most exciting aspects of creative nonfiction is not the time or place in which the events happen but the people who experience them.

It’s wise to offer your readers multiple perspectives on the same situation, such as a shift from first person to third person narrative or even a second person narrative .

Use literary techniques and elements of fiction

Great creative nonfiction incorporates elements of fiction to tell a story better. Of course, it doesn’t contain the ‘fictional’ part – that would make it fiction. It includes literary techniques and devices such as:

Point of view
Vivid descriptions of settings and characters

These techniques, tools, and devices bolster your story-telling skills. You want your reader to get lost in your story, even if they know the ending.

For example, you may want to write about a historical figure, such as Malcolm X. We know that Malcolm X was assassinated. Still, the story leading up to the assassination is what readers want.

Pose a question

In Creative Nonfiction: A Guide to Form, Content, and Style, with Readings , author Eileen Pollack suggests that creative nonfiction authors pose questions before beginning the writing process.

For example, if you want to write a memoir about a period of your life, consider why you want to write it.

Why is this memory significant? What did it teach me? How am I different today because of that experience?

Such questions help you add dimension to your nonfiction story. The nonfiction aspect is the facts, the ‘what happened.’ Your creativity comes into why it happened and how you see it.

Read, read, read

No matter the genre you want to write, one of the best ways to improve your writing and craft a story that readers will love is to read as much as possible.

Find creative nonfiction authors you enjoy and explore their style.

Consider what makes their writing so engaging and immersive. Is it their descriptive abilities? Is it their use of POV? Is it their use of humor?

Find and experiment with different styles to find your own creative writing approach.

‘Creative nonfiction writers do not make things up; they make ideas and information that already exist more interesting and often more accessible,’ writes Lee Gutkind , founder of Creative Nonfiction. That accessibility is why many readers love creative nonfiction.

History, facts, actual events… These are interesting, but learning about them can be challenging. Many people don’t like to read dense, long historical accounts or complex research, and as such, they miss out on learning about those events.

Creative nonfiction writers offer as much detail about the facts as necessary but don’t rely on them. Instead, they play with other story elements such as the people, the setting , and different points of view.

This approach makes it easier for the reader to immerse themselves in the story and learn about what happened.

‘You don’t have to spend long in archives to see how much drama there is in real life – often more drama than a novelist would dare invent.’ – Charlotte Gray, author, historian

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Mar 16, 2022

Creative Nonfiction Structures (& Prompts to Try Them Out)

This month, Creativity Matters is digging into the ways you can explore creative nonfiction writing in your work. Even if writing a hard-hitting doesn’t interest you, there is a lot more to this diverse genre than most people think.

As we saw last week, everybody is “ready” to write creative nonfiction . It’s just a question of which topic suits your interests best.

But it isn’t just about having great topic ideas. Once you know what you want to write about, you need to consider what structure will best convey that topic to your readers.

Every topic you want to write about has a structure that fits it best. Your job is to find it.

Finding the Right Structure

Last fall, I went to see the Immersive van Gogh art exhibit in Cleveland, an interactive experience with van Gogh’s paintings that has been showing at different locations throughout the country.

The show does indeed immerse you in the artist’s work. Set in a cavernous, darkened room, van Gogh’s art paints itself across the walls and floor, places you in its settings, and allows you to get up close and personal with his most well-known work.

You can walk around the room, lie on the floor, sit on a cushion next to the walls, or sit on a bench, and the more times you sit through the show, the more opportunities you have to view it from different angles.

What caught my attention about experiencing van Gogh’s body of work in this manner was just how diverse his paintings are. Most people know him for the cool, calming shades of yellow and blue in The Starry Night , but this style doesn’t characterize all his work.

Van Gogh was known for using different color palettes depending on the subject he was portraying. For example, his paintings of the working class use darker colors, while his art inspired by natural settings and flowers explodes with lighter shades.

If he had reversed the two color palettes, it would have created an uncomfortable dissonance in his work—the difficult lives of miners and farmers would not come across as well with vibrant yellows, greens, and blues.

Van Gogh was also meticulous about his choice of medium, as he did not only colorful works, but simple sketches. His drawings using graphite and charcoal are less recognizable than his paintings, but convey so much about his subjects and natural settings that the use of color would detract from.

The point is that the real-life subjects you choose to write about can take any structure and use any media that will best communicate the ideas behind them.

The most thought-provoking essays play with form and structure in a way that creates a unified experience for readers, helping them to better understand the topic.

Here are a few creative nonfiction structures you can play with as you experiment with topics that intrigue you.

Frame Story

A framed essay features an opening and conclusion that connect in some way, providing bookends for the main story. You see this a lot in novels and films—think Old Rose in Titanic telling the sub crew about how her voyage on the ship changed the course of her life, or adult Gordy in Stand by Me writing his memoirs after learning that his childhood friend has been killed.

One way I like to use this structure is to think of a present-day event that triggers a memory from the past. Begin with the present event, then segue into the memory, then return to the present day at the end. The idea is that the introduction and conclusion should reinterpret the events of the past, showing how they remain relevant to your life today.

Lyric Essay

Nonfiction is a great genre for poets to try because it is inquisitive in the same way poetry is. Just as poetry can help uncover meaning through unique images and combinations of words, evocative language can also be used to explore your topics.

While frame essays are driven by storylines, lyric essays are driven by the musicality, tone, and rhythm of language. One experiment I’ve had some success with is to take a poem you’ve written and rewrite it as prose. You may find that it translates to this new structure word for word, or that individual phrases and images remain with new scaffolding in place.

I’ve written in the past about the importance of writing in other genres , and lyric essays are a great way for poets in particular to get their feet wet with nonfiction.

(NOTE: Do you want a free poetry workbook? You can grab one here .)

Hermit Crab Essay

I had a hermit crab when I was a kid, and once, I saw it change its shell. It was fascinating to see that for these fragile creatures, a shell offers protection and shelter, and that multiple different shells can fit that purpose.

I would even decorate the shells and leave them around its aquarium to see which ones it would pursue.

Hermit crab essays use different forms to portray deeply vulnerable and sensitive stories. They can, for example, take on the structure of grocery lists, postcards, letters, social media posts, personality quizzes, instruction sheets, how-to guides, and more.

Think of a genre apart from a traditional essay that you can use to convey the topic you want to write about, specifically, how you can use the conventions of the genre to explain it to readers.

Braided Essays

This nonfiction structure takes two or three ideas that may not appear related and weaves them together in interlocking segments, using numbers or white space to indicate a break between the sections.

I find that this structure can help you see the relationship between different things that come to mind when you think about your topic. Writing about those relationships can help you interrogate your thoughts on the subject, making you consider why these diverse subjects come to mind.

I’ve also discovered that braided essays work well when art is used as inspiration. Pick a work of art that inspires you—a book, movie, song, theatrical production, visual work, etc—and freewrite about what the experience of that art makes you think of.

Then, write an essay in alternating sections that relates that work to a particular experience or moment in your life.

There are many more structures for creative nonfiction, but these are the most fun to experiment with, and after all, that’s our goal for this Creativity Matters series.

Remember, your goal in using these prompts isn’t to write a completed essay or become a nonfiction expert. Your job is to have fun and see what you can make!

In the meantime…the Ultimate Writing Project Workbook can help you get started.

This free workbook contains prompts, worksheets, templates, and more cool stuff to help you work on your writing.

Plus, you get BOTH the fiction and nonfiction editions of the book when you sign up.

Click here to get more information and request your FREE copy!

Creative Nonfiction: How to Spin Facts into Narrative Gold

Creative nonfiction is a genre of creative writing that approaches factual information in a literary way. This type of writing applies techniques drawn from literary fiction and poetry to material that might be at home in a magazine or textbook, combining the craftsmanship of a novel with the rigor of journalism.

Here are some popular examples of creative nonfiction:

The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang
Intimations by Zadie Smith
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Translating Myself and Others by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Madwoman in the Attic by Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar
I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino

Creative nonfiction is not limited to novel-length writing, of course. Popular radio shows and podcasts like WBEZ’s This American Life or Sarah Koenig’s Serial also explore audio essays and documentary with a narrative approach, while personal essays like Nora Ephron’s A Few Words About Breasts and Mariama Lockington’s What A Black Woman Wishes Her Adoptive White Parents Knew also present fact with fiction-esque flair.

Writing short personal essays can be a great entry point to writing creative nonfiction. Think about a topic you would like to explore, perhaps borrowing from your own life, or a universal experience. Journal freely for five to ten minutes about the subject, and see what direction your creativity takes you in. These kinds of exercises will help you begin to approach reality in a more free flowing, literary way — a muscle you can use to build up to longer pieces of creative nonfiction.

If you think you’d like to bring your writerly prowess to nonfiction, here are our top tips for creating compelling creative nonfiction that’s as readable as a novel, but as illuminating as a scholarly article.

Write a memoir focused on a singular experience

Humans love reading about other people’s lives — like first-person memoirs, which allow you to get inside another person’s mind and learn from their wisdom. Unlike autobiographies, memoirs can focus on a single experience or theme instead of chronicling the writers’ life from birth onward.

For that reason, memoirs tend to focus on one core theme and—at least the best ones—present a clear narrative arc, like you would expect from a novel. This can be achieved by selecting a singular story from your life; a formative experience, or period of time, which is self-contained and can be marked by a beginning, a middle, and an end.

When writing a memoir, you may also choose to share your experience in parallel with further research on this theme. By performing secondary research, you’re able to bring added weight to your anecdotal evidence, and demonstrate the ways your own experience is reflective (or perhaps unique from) the wider whole.

Example: The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Creative Nonfiction example: Cover of Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking

Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking , for example, interweaves the author’s experience of widowhood with sociological research on grief. Chronicling the year after her husband’s unexpected death, and the simultaneous health struggles of their daughter, The Year of Magical Thinking is a poignant personal story, layered with universal insight into what it means to lose someone you love. The result is the definitive exploration of bereavement — and a stellar example of creative nonfiction done well.

📚 Looking for more reading recommendations? Check out our list of the best memoirs of the last century .

Tip: What you cut out is just as important as what you keep

When writing a memoir that is focused around a singular theme, it’s important to be selective in what to include, and what to leave out. While broader details of your life may be helpful to provide context, remember to resist the impulse to include too much non-pertinent backstory. By only including what is most relevant, you are able to provide a more focused reader experience, and won’t leave readers guessing what the significance of certain non-essential anecdotes will be.

💡 For more memoir-planning tips, head over to our post on outlining memoirs .

Of course, writing a memoir isn’t the only form of creative nonfiction that lets you tap into your personal life — especially if there’s something more explicit you want to say about the world at large… which brings us onto our next section.

Pen a personal essay that has something bigger to say

Personal essays condense the first-person focus and intimacy of a memoir into a tighter package — tunneling down into a specific aspect of a theme or narrative strand within the author’s personal experience.

Often involving some element of journalistic research, personal essays can provide examples or relevant information that comes from outside the writer’s own experience. This can take the form of other people’s voices quoted in the essay, or facts and stats. By combining lived experiences with external material, personal essay writers can reach toward a bigger message, telling readers something about human behavior or society instead of just letting them know the writer better.

Example: The Empathy Exams by Leslie Jamison

Creative nonfiction example: Cover of Leslie Jamison's The Empathy Exams

Leslie Jamison's widely acclaimed collection The Empathy Exams tackles big questions (Why is pain so often performed? Can empathy be “bad”?) by grounding them in the personal. While Jamison draws from her own experiences, both as a medical actor who was paid to imitate pain, and as a sufferer of her own ailments, she also reaches broader points about the world we live in within each of her essays.

Whether she’s talking about the justice system or reality TV, Jamison writes with both vulnerability and poise, using her lived experience as a jumping-off point for exploring the nature of empathy itself.

Tip: Try to show change in how you feel about something

Including external perspectives, as we’ve just discussed above, will help shape your essay, making it meaningful to other people and giving your narrative an arc.

Ultimately, you may be writing about yourself, but readers can read what they want into it. In a personal narrative, they’re looking for interesting insights or realizations they can apply to their own understanding of their lives or the world — so don’t lose sight of that. As the subject of the essay, you are not so much the topic as the vehicle for furthering a conversation.

Often, there are three clear stages in an essay:

Initial state
Encounter with something external
New, changed state, and conclusions

By bringing readers through this journey with you, you can guide them to new outlooks and demonstrate how your story is still relevant to them.

Had enough of writing about your own life? Let’s look at a form of creative nonfiction that allows you to get outside of yourself.

Tell a factual story as though it were a novel

The form of creative nonfiction that is perhaps closest to conventional nonfiction is literary journalism. Here, the stories are all fact, but they are presented with a creative flourish. While the stories being told might comfortably inhabit a newspaper or history book, they are presented with a sense of literary significance, and writers can make use of literary techniques and character-driven storytelling.

Unlike news reporters, literary journalists can make room for their own perspectives: immersing themselves in the very action they recount. Think of them as both characters and narrators — but every word they write is true.

If you think literary journalism is up your street, think about the kinds of stories that capture your imagination the most, and what those stories have in common. Are they, at their core, character studies? Parables? An invitation to a new subculture you have never before experienced? Whatever piques your interest, immerse yourself.

Example: The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan

Creative nonfiction example: Cover of Michael Pollan's The Botany of Desire

If you’re looking for an example of literary journalism that tells a great story, look no further than Michael Pollan’s The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World , which sits at the intersection of food writing and popular science. Though it purports to offer a “plant’s-eye view of the world,” it’s as much about human desires as it is about the natural world.

Through the history of four different plants and human’s efforts to cultivate them, Pollan uses first-hand research as well as archival facts to explore how we attempt to domesticate nature for our own pleasure, and how these efforts can even have devastating consequences. Pollan is himself a character in the story, and makes what could be a remarkably dry topic accessible and engaging in the process.

Tip: Don’t pretend that you’re perfectly objective

You may have more room for your own perspective within literary journalism, but with this power comes great responsibility. Your responsibilities toward the reader remain the same as that of a journalist: you must, whenever possible, acknowledge your own biases or conflicts of interest, as well as any limitations on your research.

Thankfully, the fact that literary journalism often involves a certain amount of immersion in the narrative — that is, the writer acknowledges their involvement in the process — you can touch on any potential biases explicitly, and make it clear that the story you’re telling, while true to what you experienced, is grounded in your own personal perspective.

Approach a famous name with a unique approach

Biographies are the chronicle of a human life, from birth to the present or, sometimes, their demise. Often, fact is stranger than fiction, and there is no shortage of fascinating figures from history to discover. As such, a biographical approach to creative nonfiction will leave you spoilt for choice in terms of subject matter.

Because they’re not written by the subjects themselves (as memoirs are), biographical nonfiction requires careful research. If you plan to write one, do everything in your power to verify historical facts, and interview the subject’s family, friends, and acquaintances when possible. Despite the necessity for candor, you’re still welcome to approach biography in a literary way — a great creative biography is both truthful and beautifully written.

Example: American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin

Creative nonfiction example: Cover of American Prometheus

Alongside the need for you to present the truth is a duty to interpret that evidence with imagination, and present it in the form of a story. Demonstrating a novelist’s skill for plot and characterization, Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin’s American Prometheus is a great example of creative nonfiction that develops a character right in front of the readers’ eyes.

American Prometheus follows J. Robert Oppenheimer from his bashful childhood to his role as the father of the atomic bomb, all the way to his later attempts to reckon with his violent legacy.

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The biography tells a story that would fit comfortably in the pages of a tragic novel, but is grounded in historical research. Clocking in at a hefty 721 pages, American Prometheus distills an enormous volume of archival material, including letters, FBI files, and interviews into a remarkably readable volume.

📚 For more examples of world-widening, eye-opening biographies, check out our list of the 30 best biographies of all time .

Tip: The good stuff lies in the mundane details

Biographers are expected to undertake academic-grade research before they put pen to paper. You will, of course, read any existing biographies on the person you’re writing about, and visit any archives containing relevant material. If you’re lucky, there’ll be people you can interview who knew your subject personally — but even if there aren’t, what’s going to make your biography stand out is paying attention to details, even if they seem mundane at first.

Of course, no one cares which brand of slippers a former US President wore — gossip is not what we’re talking about. But if you discover that they took a long, silent walk every single morning, that’s a granular detail you could include to give your readers a sense of the weight they carried every day. These smaller details add up to a realistic portrait of a living, breathing human being.

But creative nonfiction isn’t just writing about yourself or other people. Writing about art is also an art, as we’ll see below.

Put your favorite writers through the wringer with literary criticism

Literary criticism is often associated with dull, jargon-laden college dissertations — but it can be a wonderfully rewarding form that blurs the lines between academia and literature itself. When tackled by a deft writer, a literary critique can be just as engrossing as the books it analyzes.

Many of the sharpest literary critics are also poets, poetry editors , novelists, or short story writers, with first-hand awareness of literary techniques and the ability to express their insights with elegance and flair. Though literary criticism sounds highly theoretical, it can be profoundly intimate: you’re invited to share in someone’s experience as a reader or writer — just about the most private experience there is.

Example: The Madwoman in the Attic by Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar

Creative nonfiction example: Cover of The Madwoman in the Attic

Take The Madwoman in the Attic by Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, a seminal work approaching Victorian literature from a feminist perspective. Written as a conversation between two friends and academics, this brilliant book reads like an intellectual brainstorming session in a casual dining venue. Highly original, accessible, and not suffering from the morose gravitas academia is often associated with, this text is a fantastic example of creative nonfiction.

Tip: Remember to make your critiques creative

Literary criticism may be a serious undertaking, but unless you’re trying to pitch an academic journal, you’ll need to be mindful of academic jargon and convoluted sentence structure. Don’t forget that the point of popular literary criticism is to make ideas accessible to readers who aren’t necessarily academics, introducing them to new ways of looking at anything they read.

If you’re not feeling confident, a professional nonfiction editor could help you confirm you’ve hit the right stylistic balance.

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Essays About Creative Non-Fiction: Top 5 Examples and 10 Prompts

Check out our essay examples and writing prompts guide if you’re writing essays about creative non-fiction.

Creative non-fiction is a skilled and artistic way of telling stories based on true accounts, facts, and interviews. It can include essays, long-form articles, or books. Writing creative non-fiction can be very challenging when writing a literary work as it combines in-depth research and authentic, creative storytelling.

This work requires great attention to detail and getting the facts straight while keeping your readers engaged with your imaginative writing style. In short, authors of creative non-fiction enjoy the best — as well as the paramount challenges — of both the journalistic and poetic worlds.

5 Intriguing Essay Examples

1. Whatever You Write, There You Are by Kristen Martin

2. The 5 Rs Of Creative Nonfiction Story by Lee Gutkind

3. svetlana alexievich’s nobel prize is a huge win for nonfiction writing by katy waldman, 5. legends of the fall by chiqui jabson chua, 1. types of creative non-fiction writing, 2. creative non-fiction writing tips, 3. a personal memoir, 4. a travel guide and experience essay, 5. business writing, 6. a memorable family gathering, 7. the story behind a painting, 8. creative non-fiction works you love, 9. an unforgettable lesson in class, 10. the person who inspires you the most, 1. whatever you write, there you are by kristen martin.

“Creative nonfiction can take many forms, be it a meandering lyric essay or long-form narrative journalism, and its practitioners don’t always agree on how creative one can be with the truth.”

For the most part, the authors of creative non-fiction have to constantly choose between sharing their personal experiences and the universal. While creative non-fiction seems biased toward the latter, authors surprisingly understand their inner selves more deeply when they embark on an outward journey to explore material facts. Nine creative non-fiction authors share their experiences of this so-called “backdoor memoir” phenomenon.

“What is most important and enjoyable about creative nonfiction is that it not only allows but encourages the writer to become a part of the story or essay being written. The personal involvement creates a special magic that alleviates the suffering and anxiety of the writing experience; it provides many outlets for satisfaction and self-discovery, flexibility and freedom.”

Gutkind lets readers into his 5R techniques of being a creative non-fiction journalist. These Rs are real, reflection, research, reading, and riting. This immersion journalist, whose extensive experience included participating in an open-heart surgery as a wallflower observer, talks about the main elements of creative non-fiction while writing one along the way.

“After conducting hundreds of interviews, she arranges people’s intimate testimonies into a choir of almost impersonal witness; the resulting works have been called “novels-in-voices,” immersions in experience that are governed by a fierce, purposeful intellect.”

The Swedish Academy surprised the world in 2015 as it awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature to a creative non-fiction writer, marking a first in half a century since it happened. The move makes a resounding statement in the literary world on the essence of reportorial documentation after years of its unacceptance and criticism as a literary work.

4. Africa’s Cold Rush And The Promise Of Refrigeration by Nicola Twilley

“Over the next four or five hours, as the heat of the day sets in, gradually wilting the cassava leaves and softening the tomatoes, these men will cover hundreds of miles, carrying food from the countryside to sell in markets in the capital, Kigali.”

In this remarkably creative non-fiction, a journalist poignantly and painstakingly chronicles the daily hardships in Rwanda, where men rise before dawn and help bring food to the market in the next town, often just in the nick of time before spoilage. Twilley immerses in Rwanda and its cold chain problem, interviewing scientists, cold economy experts, and policymakers who all work toward making refrigeration happen for the African country.

“In the foothills of western Kyoto, towering bamboo trees sway in the mild wind, turning the sunlight into a delicate jade. Nearby, temples and villas sit amid fine gardens and, not too far uphill, a town pulsates with living traditions from ancient Japan.”

This article is an enjoyable descriptive non-fiction piece, giving us a Kyoto tour in early fall and autumn. We follow the author on her commute through an urban neighborhood, up to the mountain, and into one temple after another. With the author’s vivid imagination and ingenuity for words, the readers are led on to a journey in Japan as though they are experiencing firsthand the stillness of Kyoto’s green trails and the serene beauty of its mountainous landscape.

10 Great Writing Prompts on Essays About Creative Non-fiction

List down the many types of creative non-fiction and explain how they simultaneously promote the presentation of facts and creative storytelling. Like this guide, you may also find your best picks for each type of creative non-fiction.

Essays About Creative Non-fiction: Creative non-fiction writing tips

Taking tips from some of the essay examples above, determine the common denominators in the authors’ techniques in producing creative non-fictional works. Then, explain how these techniques helped the authors achieve their desired effects.

If you were to write your memoir, what events would you be putting in the spotlight? For your essay, imagine how you would structure your memoir. You can choose either a sad or joyous event. What matters the most is to describe memorable experiences so that you can narrate them in exact detail. To ensure your essay will enthrall your readers, read our storytelling guide .

Traveling creates wanderlust, a desire to feed yourself with new information and experiences. For this easy, recall a trip, or embark on a new adventure. First, write about the culture of the place and the people around you. Next, describe the place and culture and share the most important lessons you have learned from this adventure. Finally, describe the other future adventures you’d like to go on.

Business writing is not a usual source of attraction for several writers — especially for writers who chose to write because they despised math. There are joys never imagined in weaving stories from numbers. In this essay, offer your readers some tips to enjoy and make a profit in writing creative non-fictional pieces about business.

For this writing prompt, recount a memorable gathering with family and relatives. To make this pass as creative non-fiction, first detail the purpose of the gathering, the settings, and the decorations as vividly as you can. Then, describe each family member present and their unique qualities that make them unforgettable. Finally, recount the conversations and the emotions surging in you as they chattered away.

Pick a painting that captivates you the most and try to peel into its layers of meaning by researching its history, the stories, and the people that inspired the painter of the work. Next, try to mull the connection between the painting’s story and yours. This could explain what made you entranced at first glance.

If there are creative non-fiction literary works that have shaped who you are today, talk about them in your essay and elaborate on the reasons you have admired the author’s thoughts. Then, convince your readers to pick up this book to see their self-transformation.

Some classroom lessons succeed in keeping us engrossed in learning. Some could form the foundations of a hobby, while some could be our first step toward a professional career path. In this essay, reminisce on a class lecture you will never forget. Explain briefly what the subject matter was at the time and what your professor said about it that was forever etched on your memory.

Each of us has an idol we look up to as an inspiration to reach our goals, whether a historical figure, a fictional character, or a living personality. Share yours and write a piece of creative non-fiction about their story as a hero. Then, point out their qualities, achievements, or advocacies that made you realize your bigger ambitions, find confidence, and believe in yourself.

If you liked this article and want to put these ideas into practice, check out our round-up of storytelling exercises .

Yna Lim is a communications specialist currently focused on policy advocacy. In her eight years of writing, she has been exposed to a variety of topics, including cryptocurrency, web hosting, agriculture, marketing, intellectual property, data privacy and international trade. A former journalist in one of the top business papers in the Philippines, Yna is currently pursuing her master's degree in economics and business.

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Course Syllabus

Flash Essay

Distill experiences, big or small, into their purest essence..

Some experiences beg us to write about them, but we often feel overwhelmed when trying to capture the whole story at once. In this class, we’ll explore the art of flash nonfiction and short essays. Life is made up of moments: big showy ones and small quiet ones—many of them infused with deeper meaning. Sometimes we can easily articulate a moment’s meaning, but often we can only make sense of it peripherally. In a flash essay, the moment and the meaning must be distilled to their purest essence. Through a series of writing exercises, students will generate a list of potential essay ideas and identify key details and imagery to help them dig into the heart of those stories. Students will also write several flash pieces of varying lengths.

How it works:

Each week provides:

discussions of assigned readings and other general writing topics with peers and the instructor
written lectures and a selection of readings

Some weeks also include:

writing prompts and/or assignments
the opportunity to submit one or more flash essays for instructor and/or peer review
an optional video conference that is open to all students (and which will be available afterward as a recording for those who cannot participate)

To create a better classroom experience for all, you are expected to participate weekly in class discussions to receive instructor feedback on your work.

Week 1: Inspiration (Find Your Flash)

What is a flash essay? More importantly: What makes a flash essay sizzle and spark? This week, we’ll dive into the fray with a brief history of the genre and an exploration of what makes an essay part of the “flash” genre. We’ll read a selection of flash essays to get a taste of the form—and to explore our own aesthetics related to the genre. We’ll kick off the course with writing exercises designed to give you a list of potential “jumping in” points for the essays you’ll write throughout this course (and beyond).

Week 2: Distillation (Follow It Down)

This week we’ll follow the advice of Annie Dillard: “Push it. Examine all things intensely and relentlessly. Probe and search each object in a piece of art; do not leave it, do not course over it, as if it were understood, but instead follow it down until you see it in the mystery of its own specificity and strength.” We will examine a variety of writing craft techniques that can be used to distill a story into the small and powerful space of flash. We’ll look at framing your subject matter, choosing and shading details, and using imagery to support meaning.

Week 3: Exploration (Come at It Sideways)

Beyond length, there is nothing about the flash essay that mandates its form or contents. This week, we’ll look beyond the narrative- and personal-essay forms to other kinds of short works, including lyric essays, “hermit crab” essays, and micro-essays. This exploration of forms will also broaden the way we think about our own memoir-based subject matter by enabling us to come at our work “sideways.”

Week 4: Realization (Make It Burn )

We will discuss techniques to revise and sharpen a flash essay to make it ready for publication. We’ll build upon the last three weeks and dive deeper into the nitty-gritty of how every single decision (from word choice to punctuation) counts in a flash piece.

Week 5: Distribution (Send It Out)

Once you have a flash essay, what do you do with it? And what happens if you end up with a flash essay that wants to become something else? This week we’ll explore sending our work out into the world for publication, as well as how to expand a flash into a longer piece. We’ll look at some publications that feature flash essays and cover the basics of how to submit your work to literary journals. We’ll also discuss if and when it’s a good idea to transform a flash essay into something else, such as a longer essay or a collection of flash-sized pieces.

55 Nonfiction Writing Prompts For Middle School

Creative fiction writing is a fun way for students to practice their writing and storytelling skills, but writing nonfiction essays and journal entries is just as important.

Below, you’ll find a list of writing prompts that will encourage students to explore history, form opinions, and spend time on self-reflection.

These prompts cover a wide variety of topics, so even your most reluctant writers should have no problem choosing a prompt that speaks to them.

How to use the prompts

This writing guide can be used as homework or in tandem with your ELA curriculum.

The point is to get students to work on their nonfiction writing skills in a way that is fun and engaging.

Here are a few ways you can use the list below:

Use these prompts for students who finish work early and need something to do.
Pick prompts that line up with what students are learning in other classes (like history or art).
Have each student pick a prompt for someone else in the class to use.

Nonfiction Writing Prompts

Choose a prominent woman in art and write an essay about her accomplishments.
Tell the story of your city or town’s founding.
Who is your biggest role model in history? Why?
Do you think eSports are a viable career path? Explain.
Tell the story about how you met your best friend.
Write a list of ten things people might not know about you.
Talk about a time when you were bullied. How did it feel? How was the situation resolved?
Do you think homework helps or hurts students?
Should girls be allowed to play on boys’ sports teams? Should boys be allowed to play on girls’ teams? Explain.
What is one thing you would change about your community? Why?
Explain your hobby to someone who has never heard of it before.
Do you think kids spend too much time in front of screens?
Choose a prominent woman in science and write an essay about her accomplishments.
Write a news article about something that has recently happened in your town.
If you could meet one celebrity, past or present, who would it be? Why? What would you talk about?
Write about the scariest moment of your life.
Does your family have any holiday traditions that are different from what others do? What are they?
Write about a time when you asked someone to forgive you, or when you forgave someone else.
Is it important to read the book before watching the movie? Explain.
Do you think we should continue with space exploration, or spend more time exploring the oceans? Explain.
What are some steps that can be taken to reduce or eliminate cyberbullying?
Choose a prominent woman in sports and write an essay about her accomplishments.
Write a review of the last book you read.
Why is mental health just as important as physical health?
Explain the qualities that make someone a good friend.
Why is it important to assess more than one point of view when forming an opinion?
Is it important for students to participate in extracurricular activities? Explain.
Describe in detail the last live event you attended (sports, concert, etc).
Write about a time when you conquered a fear.
Choose a prominent man in art and write an essay about his accomplishments.
Write about the best vacation you’ve ever taken.
Do you believe that technology can become addictive? Explain.
Why is it important for students to get adequate sleep?
Do you prefer attending school in a classroom or virtually? Why?
Write about your least favorite chore. What makes it your least favorite? Are there ways to make it less daunting?
Think about somewhere you’d really like to go for a field trip. Write a persuasive letter to your teacher convincing them to consider it.
What do you think is the perfect Halloween costume? Explain.
Choose a prominent man in science and write an essay about his accomplishments.
Write about the role music plays in your daily life and your culture.
Explain the qualities that make someone a good leader.
Write about a time when you taught someone how to do something.
Do you think students should have to ask to go to the bathroom, or should they be allowed to go whenever they need to?
Tell the story of how your parents met.
Which is better: casual dress or school uniforms? Explain.
Choose a topic that people tend to disagree on, and write a short essay from both points of view.
Choose a prominent man in sports and write an essay about his accomplishments.
Write about a special bond you have with a pet or an animal.
Choose a piece of art and write about its history and artist.
Write about the first birthday you remember.
Should tweens and teens spend less time on social media? Explain.
What is the biggest challenge your generation currently faces?
Should the voting age be changed to 16? Explain.
If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be? Why?
Do you think violent video games cause people to be violent in real life?
Write about your favorite summer memory. How old were you? Why is it still so important?

Looking For More?

We offer an abundance of free writing resources for parents, guardians, and teachers to help give young writers the tools they need to succeed.

Don’t hesitate to reach out if you are looking for something specific and can’t find it on our site. We love hearing all of your ideas!

When I first started reading and writing creative nonfiction , I was particularly struck by the “braided essay”—its poeticism, its interlacing movements, its endless possibilities. The beauty of a braid lies in the way it weaves distinct strands into a coherent whole, the way individual strands intermittently appear and disappear.

If you’ve ever felt like your essay was missing something or needed more texture, or if you’re someone who loves miscellany, a braided essay might be right for you. But before I wax eloquent about the braided essay:

What is a braided essay?

A braid is a structure commonly used in the genre of creative nonfiction, though it can easily be adapted for use in other genres. Richard Powers’ The Overstory and Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84 are great examples of novels that use braiding as a structure.

Simply put, a braided essay is one that weaves two or more distinct “threads” into a single essay. A thread can be a story with a plot or simply a string of thought about a specific topic.

A braided essay is one that weaves two or more distinct “threads” into a single essay. A thread can be a story with a plot or simply a string of thought about a specific topic.

If all of this sounds abstract and complicated, don’t fret: the good news is that a braided essay is much easier to understand in practice than in theory. Consider, for instance, Roxane Gay’s “ What We Hunger For ,” which consists of two threads. In thread A, Gay writes about The Hunger Games and the representation of female strength in pop culture. In thread B, she recounts memories of her childhood as a girl. Gay breaks up these two threads into smaller fragments, then alternates fragments from thread A with those from thread B.

This alternating movement draws out themes and ideas from each thread, such that the essay as a whole points to larger ideas and themes.

This alternating movement draws out themes and ideas from each thread, such that the essay as a whole points to larger ideas and themes. In the case of “What We Hunger For,” the result of braiding is an essay that combines The Hunger Games and the writer’s personal experiences to gesture to the themes of strength, trauma, storytelling, the power of reading, and hope for healing. This happens often in braided essay: the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.

What counts as a “thread?”

For something to count as a “thread,” it has to be sufficiently distinct in terms of style and/ or content. To braid these threads together, break each into fragments, then alternate a fragment from one braid with a fragment from another braid. Check out the following diagram to see how this works:

How to braid threads in a braided essay

To help your reader distinguish one thread from another, writers often add a visual break between fragments from different threads. This usually means inserting either an additional section break or an asterisk between fragments.

In addition, while there are no maximum number of threads you can include in an essay, an essay with too many threads can get out of hand really quickly!

What makes a braided essay coherent?

Distinct threads often speak to one thing (or a few things) that unifies the essay. In Maggie Nelson’s Bluets , it is the narrator’s love of blue—established in the very beginning of the book-length essay—that provides coherence to the many threads in the essay, which range from philosophy to personal suffering, vision to pain. In other essays, what unifies the threads becomes apparent only as the essay develops; the pleasure of reading such essays comes from seeing how disparate threads gradually come together. A good example is “ Time and Distance Overcome ” by Eula Biss, which begins as an essay about the history of telephone poles and develops into a meditation on race. Another wonderful example by Biss is “Babylon,” which can be found in her book Notes from No Man’s Land .

The best braided essays, however, unfold associatively, even ambiguously.

The best braided essays, however, unfold associatively, even ambiguously. While coherence is important, making the links between the various threads too neat or too obvious can make an essay feel contrived and boring. When writing a braided essay, it’s always good to remember: your reader is often smarter than you think!

Before we explore how to write a braided essay, let’s look more closely at braided essay examples for inspiration.

Braided essay examples

Rebecca Solnit’s “The Blue of Distance” is a classic braided essay that weaves the narrator’s meditations on the color blue in 15th century paintings and her personal reflections on distance, memory, and longing. This unlikely pairing plunges the reader into a poetic, blue-hued aura, inviting us to contemplate our own relationships with distance and longing. “The Blue of Distance” can be found in A Field Guide to Getting Lost alongside two more essays of the same name.
In “ The Empathy Exams ,” Leslie Jamison draws on events in her personal life and her experiences working as a medical actor to craft a moving meditation on the concept of empathy. This essay also uses the form of a hermit crab essay (for more on hermit crabs, check out #9 in this article) with deftness and to great emotional effect. This essay can also be found in Jamison’s book, The Empathy Exams .
Annie Dillard’s “An Expedition to the Pole” is a fascinating braided essay that interlaces the narrator’s religious experiences in church with reportage on famous polar expeditions. While this essay is rather long, the ending – in which the two separate threads fuse into one – makes it entirely worth it. “An Expedition to the Pole,” which opened up my ideas of what’s possible in a braided essay, can be found in Dillard’s essay collection, Teaching a Stone to Talk .
In “Reality TV Me,” Jia Tolentino’s reflection on her time as a contestant on a reality tv show is intercut with short, ekphrastic descriptions of various scenes from the show. The result is a fun yet compelling meditation on the concepts of reality and performance. This essay can be found in Tolentino’s essay collection, Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion .
Braiding Sweetgrass offers, in the words of its author Robin Wall Kimmerer, “a braid of stories” about nature “woven from three stands: indigenous ways of knowing, scientific knowledge, and the story of an Anishinaabekwe scientist trying to bring them together in service to what matters most.” Expect to be delighted, jolted, and awed by this brilliant book.
Rivka Galchen’s Little Labors is a miscellany of thoughts on motherhood, children’s literature, and great women writers. Enchanting and entirely unique, Little Labors is a great braided essay example in book form.
In A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause , Shawn Wen paints a portrait of the mime Marcel Marceau with a varied collection of materials. At times cutting and moving, this innovative essay is a must-read.

Inspired yet? Follow this step-by-step guide on how to write a braided essay to write your own!

How to write a braided essay

The writing process, by definition, requires many rounds of drafting and revision. For a more general step-by-step guide to writing essays, check out the guides in these articles on writing lyric essays , narrative essays , and memoirs .

1. Get inspired and generate ideas

The best way to learn how to write a braided essay is to read one, and to get an idea of what’s possible. Next, begin making a list of ideas for your essay. If you’re in need of writing prompts, check out our Facebook group !

2. Do a freewrite

Once you’ve chosen one idea, explore its possibilities by doing a freewrite. While freewriting, be sure to keep your pen moving – don’t even stop to correct any grammatical or spelling mistakes! The point of a freewrite is to keep the ideas flowing until you arrive at an idea that feels right. In the words of Peter Elbow, who developed the freewriting strategy, “The consequence [of writing] is that you must start by writing the wrong meanings in the wrong words; but keep writing until you get to the right meanings in the right words. Only in the end will you know what you are saying.” In my personal experience, it often takes at least 10-15 minutes for a freewrite to yield the ideas that feel right.

3. Read your freewrite

As you read what you’ve just written, highlight important themes, ideas, words, and/or motifs. Rely on your intuition in this process. Of these, identify the core of the essay you’d like to write. This is the primary thread of your essay.

4. Begin writing your primary thread

Rather than starting from “the beginning,” however, begin with the thing that resonates most with you. Doing so not only helps you to maintain momentum in the writing process, but also provides an anchor for your writing. Because braided essays are so associative, it can be easy to lose track of what feels right in the process of writing.

5. Start on your other thread(s)

It is often much easier to build a braided essay when you do it bit by bit, rather than thread by thread. The reason is that, with a braided essay, development in one braid often affects another. It’s much easier to develop one thread alongside another. This also makes the final produce much more organic.

6. Read what you have so far

Now that you have written the beginnings of several threads, read what you have and notice how your essay has already morphed. Doing these regular “check-ins” with your braided essay can help you to stay on top of how it is developing. If not, a braided essay can get unruly very quickly!

7. Continue writing

If you’re not sure how to continue, do research. This can be any form of research – from interviews to googling, immersive to archival. As you do research, keep an eye out for opportunities for expansion. Ask yourself: what new associations emerge?

8. Repeat steps 4-7 until satisfied.

Good writing is often built section by section, rather than produced in one burst. As you read what you have written so far, note places to expand and places to cut.

Once you’re satisfied with your braided essay, begin paying attention to the finer things: word choice, sentence structure, figurative words. Revising and editing are key to making your braided essay work. If you’re looking for a fresh pair of eyes to look at your writing, check out our schedule of nonfiction workshops !

Writing a braided essay for the first time can be challenging, but remember to have fun in the process. If you’d like to learn about other forms of creative nonfiction, check out this article !

Write the best braided essays at Writers.com

What will your braided essay be about? Perhaps you’ll combine the most seemingly unrelated topics: your marriage with the history of paleontology; your time in high school with musings on the color orange; the anatomy of an orca with your favorite jacket.

Whatever the braids, write the best braided essays at Writers.com, where you’ll receive expert feedback on the essays you write. Find inspiration in our upcoming creative nonfiction courses , and forge new relationships between seemingly-unalike things.

I have written a braided essay (although I did not know it by this name until reading this post) of approximately 11,000 words. Too long for a short-story; too short for standard creative nonfiction.

Where does one publish a braided essay of intermediate length?

Hi Kathleen,

Good question! I don’t know of any journals off the bat that accept essays of that length–generally, the upper limit will range between 3,000 and 7,500 words. Nonetheless, you might find a good home for your essay at this article: https://writers.com/best-places-submit-creative-nonfiction-online

Best of luck!

Hi Kathleen, This is such a great explanation of the Braided Essay and these examples are amazing. I just bought ‘A Twenty Minute Silence’– thank you for introducing me to this text.

Question: I teach Creative Writing and my students love these Lyric Essay forms, but one student noted, ‘It seems like most collage and braided essays are about serious subjects: loss, heartbreak, grief, abuse, etc. Are there any funny collage or braided essays?’

I thought surely there must be but scanning Brevity and other online journals I could not come across a single ‘funny’ collage or braided essay. There are numerous funny Hermit Crab Essays but do you know of any funny/humorous Braided or Collage Essays?

I can also be reached at [email protected] (should you want to respond or have a response).

Sorry for the long comment here. Really enjoyed reading this! Thanks again.

I’m working on a braided essay for my class at the moment and its about mud and magic. Not a funny story but a fun story about childhood and imagination.

Have you looked up David Sedaris (Santaland Diaries) or Dave Barry? Off the top of my head, I’m sure they’d have something!

[…] writing styles, and this one is called a braided or woven essay. A braided essay is where you take two seemingly dissimilar topics and weave them together into one. In this case, I describe the physical and psychological strength my adoptive mother required to […]

I’m writing my memoir and can see a few threads that I could use for the braided structure, Does braiding work just as well for a book (80,000 words) as for an essay?

The Finest Narrative Non-Fiction Essays

Narrative essays that I consider ideal models of the medium

Linguistics

Perhaps you're the same kind of non- Writer writer. The playful amateur kind who uses it to explore and communicate ideas, rather than making the medium part of your identity. But even amateurs want to be good. I certainly want to get good.

Knowing what you like is half the battle in liking what you create. In that spirit, I collect narrative non-fiction essays that I think are exceptional. They're worth looking at closely – their opening moves, sentence structure, turns of phrase, and narrative arcs.

The only sensible way to improve your writing is by echoing the work of other writers. Good artists copy and great artists steal quotes from Picasso.

You may want to start your own collection of lovely essays like this. There will certainly be some Real Writers who find my list trite and full of basic, mainstream twaddle. It probably is. I've done plenty of self-acceptance work and I'm okay with it.

Twaddle aside, the essays below are worth your attention.

by Paul Ford

Paul Ford explains code in 38,000 words and somehow makes it all accessible, technically accurate, narratively compelling, and most of all, culturally insightful and humanistic.

I have unreasonable feelings about this essay. It is, to me, perfect. Few essays take the interactive medium of the web seriously, and this one takes the cake. There is a small blue cube character, logic diagrams, live code snippets to run, GIFs, tangential footnotes, and a certificate of completion at the end.

by David Foster Wallace – Published under the title 'Shipping Out'

Forgive me for being a David Foster Wallace admirer. The guy had issues, but this account of his 7-day trip on a luxury cruiseliner expresses an inner monologue that is clarifying, rare and often side-splittingly hilarious.

He taught me it is 100% okay to write an entire side-novel in your footnotes if you need to.

by David Graeber

Graeber explores play and work from an anthropological perspective. He's a master of moving between the specific and the general. Between academic theory and personal storytelling. He's always ready with armfuls of evidence and citations but doesn't drown you in them.

by Malcolm Gladwell

This piece uses a typical Gladwellian style. He takes a fairly dull question – Why had ketchup stayed the same, while mustard comes in dozens of varieties? – and presents the case in a way that makes it reasonably intriguing. He's great at starting with specific characters, times and places to draw you in. There are always rich scenes, details, personal profiles, and a grand narrative tying it all together.

Some people find the classic New Yorker essay format overdone, but it relies on storytelling techniques that consistently work.

by Mark Slouka

by Joan Didion

2024 Creative Nonfiction (Up to 2,500 Words)

The Bacopa Literary Review is looking to publish true stories, written beautifully, and based on the author’s experiences, perceptions, and reflections in the form of personal memoir or literary essay (for example, nature, travel, medical, spiritual, food writing).

Guidelines:

You must be 18 years old or older.
Only one submission to Creative Nonfiction, and do not submit to another genre unless this submission has been declined. Your uploaded file must contain only the title and work itself, not the author's name.
One piece, limit 2500 words
Double spaced, Arial 12-point typeface preferred
Submit the file in .doc .docx or .rtf only
Bacopa Literary Review does not accept previously published material

The submission process includes a text entry box titled "COVER LETTER," where you provide the following information:

Name, address, email, phone, title, word count and bio of 50 words or fewe r. This is the only place where your name appears.
Where did you hear about Bacopa Literary Review ?

Stephanie Seguin

Creative Nonfiction Editor

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Alumni Spotlight: Adam McKible Publishes Book

Adam McKible, who earned his PhD in English from UNC in 1998, published a new book in February: Behind the Lines: How Plagiarism Popularized the Harlem Renaissance .

The book explores how an act of plagiarism in 1925 introduced the Harlem Renaissance to millions of Americans. In March 1925, Alain Locke published a special issue of the magazine Survey Graphic called “Harlem: Mecca of the New Negro.” Soon after, Locke organized the New Negro anthology, which scholars agree ushered in the Harlem Renaissance. McKible’s book focuses on how Chester T. Crowell plagiarized much of Locke’s material in another essay:

“But the contents of ‘Harlem: Mecca of the New Negro’ attracted their largest contemporary audience—of at least 2,414,308 readers—not through Locke’s initial work, but through the sort of plagiarism that would earn any student a painful visit to a college administrator. On August 8, 1925, just months after the appearance of the Harlem issue of the Survey Graphic , the Saturday Evening Post published an essay by Chester T. Crowell entitled ‘The World’s Largest Negro City.’ Crowell’s article is notable for at least two reasons: first, because he offers one of the very few representations of African Americans in the Saturday Evening Post that does not rely entirely on the anti-Black racist caricatures that were the Post ’s typical fare and, second, because Crowell flagrantly stole much of his material from Locke’s issue—and he got away with it.”

“Nevertheless, Crowell’s intellectual thievery did introduce millions of Post readers to several core ideas in Locke’s Harlem issue, including the rise of Black cosmopolitanism and the concomitant development of a new political consciousness. And, stealing from Walter White’s Survey Graphic essay, ‘Color Lines,’ Crowell also touched on racial passing, a phenomenon that was facilitated by the urban anonymity afforded to some African Americans after they fled the South during the Great Migration. Rather than raise an alarm, however, Crowell suggested that the vibrancy of Harlem and a concomitant rise in racial pride makes passing for white less appealing for most African Americans—but this element of his argument may have largely fallen on deaf ears. The editorial board at the Newport News Daily Press , for example, saw only peril in a rising Harlem: ‘Every negro who thus ‘passes’ from his own race into the white race is liable to mix negro blood with Anglo-Saxon blood, and that is the danger to which the Anglo-Saxon clubs are calling attention and seeking to guard against. The real menace is in the ‘passing’ to which Mr. Crowell refers.’ Such antipathy toward interracial relations would have been familiar to regular Post readers, who not only consumed anti-Black fiction but were also fed a steady diet of anti-immigrant and white supremacist ideology in the magazine’s pages.”

In Behind the Lines, McKible writes about examples of this plagiarism and ultimately shows how “Locke’s work—through Crowell’s plagiarism—broke through the white noise of Lorimer’s [the white supremacist editor of the Saturday Evening Post ] racist editorial practice and thus provided millions of readers with a more objective view of rising Black modernity in Jim Crow America.”

IMAGES

50 Creative Nonfiction Prompts Guaranteed to Inspire
004 Non Fiction Essay Example Creative Nonfiction Personal Narrative
008 Best Creative Nonfiction Essays Essay Example ~ Thatsnotus
Creative writing in non-fiction Free Essay Example
Step-by-Step Guide How to Write Narrative Essay (2023 Update)
Nonfiction Writing Anchor Chart

VIDEO

Summarizing nonfiction
How to Write a Nonfiction Essay
How to Write Creative Non-Fiction
Creative non-fiction and how to write it, an intro
Creative Nonfiction: Explanation and Writing Task
5 Tips to Improve Your Nonfiction Writing

COMMENTS

108 Nonfiction Writing Prompts (Creative and Engaging Ideas)
Coming up with creative nonfiction ideas isn't for the faint of heart. Nonfiction is a big, broad genre of book writing, ... You're so good at writing academic papers that your college classmates start offering to pay you to write their essays and reports for them. 95. Your in-laws vilify you as a traitor because of the way you voted, and ...
50 Creative Nonfiction Prompts Guaranteed to Inspire
When choosing your narrator, pay attention to how objective they would have been, what they would have paid attention to, and what sort of background knowledge they would have had about the scene. 2. Tell the nonfiction story that you don't want your mother to read. You know the one. Don't censor yourself. 3.
199+ Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Spark Your Creativity
Share your experience with a random act of kindness. 27. Write a narrative creative nonfiction piece about a significant event in your community. 28. Describe a moment when you realized you had grown up. 29. Write about a tradition in your family and its origins. 30. Share a personal essay about a turning point in your life.
Best Nonfiction Writing Prompts of 2023
If you're looking to cut to the chase, here's a top ten list of our favorite nonfiction writing prompts: Write a story about inaction. Write a story about activism. Write about a date that was so terrible you'll never forget it. Write a story inspired by a memory of yours. Write about a secret you've never told the person you love.
25 of the Best Free Nonfiction Essays Available Online
Also, reading nonfiction essays can help you learn more about different topics and experiences. Besides essays on Book Riot, I love looking for essays on The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Rumpus, and Electric Literature. But there are great nonfiction essays available for free all over the Internet. From contemporary to classic writers and ...
40 Nonfiction Writing Prompts to get the Creative Juices Flowing
10. Tell the story of how your city or town came to be. 11. Research the origins of a certain invention and write about how and why it was made. 12. Choose a conspiracy theory. Write an essay that tries to either prove or disprove it. 13. Write a list of little-known facts about an interest of yours.
Nonfiction Topics to Write About: 30+ Ideas to Get You Started
Personal Essay Writing Prompts. If a full nonfiction book sounds like a bit much for you, a nonfiction essay may just be the best alternative. This is a personal story told from the heart. It can be about almost anything, but most of these essays generally have to do with one specific topic or moment in the writer's life. 21.
21 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Inspire True Stories
Write about finding unexpected love or friendship. 5. Tell a story about the last time you felt at home. 6. Relate a time when you had to leave something important or precious behind. 7. Tell about a time you had to dig. 8. Write about the first time of drove or traveled alone and it changed you.
76 Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Help You Write Better ...
Set realistic goals for yourself - maybe aim to write 2-3 pages daily. If you stick to this plan, you will have a much better chance of completing your book within the 30-day timeframe. 3. Get an Editor. Once you have written your first draft, getting someone to edit your work is important.
Ideas for Writing Creative Nonfiction
If you've ever wanted to embark on a grand adventure or found yourself concocting experimental lifestyles, you may find that they fuel some interesting creative nonfiction ideas. 3. If a memoir is too daunting, try a personal essay instead. Personal essays can be short-form memoirs, in which you share a specific personal experience, but ...
Creative Nonfiction Prompts 15 Ideas To Inspire Writers & Hook Readers
15+ creative nonfiction prompts. Write in a second-person narrative. In this POV, the reader reads as though they are the character. The writer uses 'you' to tell the story. Consider a time in history in which to plant your reader and walk them through the experiences of that time. For example, 'You were born in 1925.
Creative Nonfiction Structures (& Prompts to Try Them Out)
This nonfiction structure takes two or three ideas that may not appear related and weaves them together in interlocking segments, using numbers or white space to indicate a break between the sections. I find that this structure can help you see the relationship between different things that come to mind when you think about your topic.
A Complete Guide to Writing Creative Nonfiction
Creative nonfiction writers often listen to their emotions and allow their feelings to affect the shape and tone of their writing. 4. Incorporate literary techniques. One of the things that separates creative nonfiction and literary journalism from other forms of nonfiction is the use of techniques more often seen in the world of fiction.
Most Read in 2021
In that spirit, we've compiled the most-read pieces published on our website in 2021, as well as the most-read work from our archives. And for good measure, we've pulled together a few pieces worth an honorable mention; our favorite Sunday Short Reads; CNF content that was republished elsewhere; and the best advice, inspiration, and think ...
Creative Nonfiction: How to Spin Facts into Narrative Gold
Creative nonfiction is not limited to novel-length writing, of course. Popular radio shows and podcasts like WBEZ's This American Life or Sarah Koenig's Serial also explore audio essays and documentary with a narrative approach, while personal essays like Nora Ephron's A Few Words About Breasts and Mariama Lockington's What A Black Woman Wishes Her Adoptive White Parents Knew also ...
6 Types of Creative Nonfiction Personal Essays for Writers to Try
In this post, we reveal six types of creative nonfiction personal essays for writers to try, including the fragmented essay, hermit crab essay, braided essay, and more. Take your essay writing up a notch while having fun trying new forms. Robert Lee Brewer. Apr 22, 2022. When faced with writing an essay, writers have a variety of options available.
30 Creative Writing Prompts for Memoir or Non-Fiction
30 Creative Writing Prompts for Memoir or Non-Fiction. We all get stuck (or, dare I say it, "writer's block") from time to time. I see this happen in two primary ways with clients. The first is, they'll message me and say, "Elizabeth, I'm supposed to write 2000 words today, and I felt like I did but then when I checked my word count, I was only ...
Essays About Creative Non-Fiction: Top 5 Examples
5 Intriguing Essay Examples. 1. Whatever You Write, There You Are by Kristen Martin. "Creative nonfiction can take many forms, be it a meandering lyric essay or long-form narrative journalism, and its practitioners don't always agree on how creative one can be with the truth.".
24 of the Best Places to Submit Creative Nonfiction Online
11. Hippocampus. Hippocampus Magazine is one of the best creative nonfiction magazines out there, as it focuses solely on the publication of personal essays and nonfiction stories. Their strictly digital publication is highly literary and has many great creative nonfiction examples and pieces.
Flash Essay
In a flash essay, the moment and the meaning must be distilled to their purest essence. Through a series of writing exercises, students will generate a list of potential essay ideas and identify key details and imagery to help them dig into the heart of those stories. Students will also write several flash pieces of varying lengths. How it works:
55 Nonfiction Writing Prompts For Middle School
Creative fiction writing is a fun way for students to practice their writing and storytelling skills, but writing nonfiction essays and journal entries is just as important. Below, you'll find a list of writing prompts that will encourage students to explore history, form opinions, and spend time on self-reflection.
Braided Essays and How to Write Them
The best way to learn how to write a braided essay is to read one, and to get an idea of what's possible. Next, begin making a list of ideas for your essay. If you're in need of writing prompts, check out our Facebook group! 2. Do a freewrite. Once you've chosen one idea, explore its possibilities by doing a freewrite.
The Finest Narrative Non-Fiction Essays
The playful amateur kind who uses it to explore and communicate ideas, rather than making the medium part of your identity. But even amateurs want to be good. I certainly want to get good. Knowing what you like is half the battle in liking what you create. In that spirit, I collect narrative non-fiction essays that I think are exceptional.
Writers Alliance of Gainesville
2024 Creative Nonfiction (Up to 2,500 Words) Ends on Thu, Apr 4, 2024 9:00 PM (in 3 days) The Bacopa Literary Review is looking to publish true stories, written beautifully, and based on the author's experiences, perceptions, and reflections in the form of personal memoir or literary essay (for example, nature, travel, medical, spiritual ...
10 Best Books Spring 2024 Follow Uncanny Journeys in Fiction
Obreht, whose 2011 novel The Tiger's Wife was a finalist for the National Book Award, has written an uncanny piece of speculative fiction. Set in the very near future (so near that most of life ...
Alumni Spotlight: Adam McKible Publishes Book
McKible's book focuses on how Chester T. Crowell plagiarized much of Locke's material in another essay: ... Crowell's intellectual thievery did introduce millions of Post readers to several core ideas in Locke's Harlem issue, including the rise of Black cosmopolitanism and the concomitant development of a new political consciousness.

108 Engaging And Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

108 Creative Nonfiction Writing Prompts

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50 Creative Nonfiction Prompts Guaranteed to Inspire

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25 Great Nonfiction Essays You Can Read Online for Free

Alison Doherty

“Beware of Feminist Lite” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

“It’s Silly to Be Frightened of Being Dead” by Diana Athill

“Letter from a Region in my Mind” by James Baldwin

“Relations” by Eula Biss

“Friday Night Lights” by Buzz Bissinger

“The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates

“Why I Write” by Joan Didion

“Go Gentle Into That Good Night” by Roger Ebert

“My Mother’s Tongue” by Zavi Kang Engles

“My Life as an Heiress” by Nora Ephron

“My FatheR Spent 30 Years in Prison. Now He’s Out.” by Ashley C. Ford

“Bad Feminist” by Roxane Gay

“The Empathy Exams” by Leslie Jamison

“What I Learned from a Fitting Room Disaster About Clothes and Life” by Scaachi Koul

“Breasts: the Odd Couple” by Una LaMarche

“How I Broke, and Botched, the Brandon Teena Story” by Donna Minkowitz

“Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell

“Letting Go” by David Sedaris

“Joy” by Zadie Smith

“Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan

“Consider the Lobster” by David Foster Wallace

“I Am Not Pocahontas” by Elissa Washuta

“Once More to the Lake” by E.B. White

“Pell-Mell” by Tom Wolfe

“The Death of the Moth” by Virginia Woolf

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Nonfiction Topics to Write About: 30+ Ideas to Get You Started

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76 Nonfiction Writing Prompts to Help You Write Better, More Engaging Content

33 Creative Nonfiction Prompts to Get Your Creative Juices Flowing

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What Is a Creative Nonfiction Essay?

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How to Write a Good Nonfiction Essay

Decide on a topic

Do your research

Write your essay

Edit and revise

Submit your essay

How Do You Write a Nonfiction Book in 30 Days?

1. Outline Your Book First

2. Set Aside Time Each Day to Write

3. Get an Editor

4. Promote Your Book

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