The Prompt
Write a story in six sentences and/or no more than 400 words.
Choose a common idiom as your title (no, it doesn’t count towards the sentence/word limit) and then construct your story to subvert the readers’ expectations about the meaning of that idiom.
You can go dark, like, literal, or fanciful…but keep it to six sentences.
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Julie Duffy
Julie Duffy is a writer and the host of StoryADay. She is quite long-winded. She does, however, like a sentence with lots of clauses, and so feels that writing a six-sentence story should be—frankly—a doddle. She might even try it today. In fact she thinks she will. There, done.
Join the discussion: what will you do with today’s prompt OR how did it go? Need support? Post here!
Remember: Please don’t post your story in the comments here (and I talk more about why not, here). Best practice: Leave us a comment about how it went, or share your favorite line from your story.
Here’s your next Game Piece. save the image and share on social media with #storyaday
Prefer paper crafts? Here’s the cut & paste version
This was a fun exercise. My story itself is awful, but I could see using this exercise again in the future for the fun of it. It is really getting through to me that it’s okay to write awful stories, there is no pressure for these first drafts to be any good at all. They can all be redrafted or discarded. But! They might lead to something great in the redrafting.
Okay so here it goes. I think I got my blog working.
Here’s the link for it.
https://giggiwrites.blogspot.com/2026/05/its-raining-cats-and-dogs.html
Back to the relentlessly grim. “It’s an Ill Wind that Blows no Good” is spoken by the wind that bears a novel virus.
“Piece of Cake” was the idiom I chose. Obviously, someone who thinks something’s going to be a piece of cake is in for a big, sad surprise. In this case, it’s a high school boy. I can’t seem to stop writing about high school kids, there’s so much disappointment happening at that age, I guess I have to excise the memory of the pain from it or something.
I really liked this prompt and I see that it was very popular with others, too. I liked doing the math (I mean having my phone do the math) to get the six sentences to equal 400 words. For some reason that got me to write in a humorous way. And I was able to develop my story a lot faster than usual this time; it’s actually closer to being edited than the other stories I’ve written here, the rest are more like outlines, they need a lot of filling in of the spaces. I’ll try using this format for another story since the flip of the title vs the story made things interesting.
Wrote a story in about 5 minutes. It was 153 words and 11 sentences. Combined a few sentences(may have played fast and loose with punctuation) and cut one of the sentences. So, it’s a 135 word story now. And may have figured out a plot point for Deltry Ocelots 4.
Good prompt to get back into things after an editing-focused weekend.
I have created the Editor Fairy who comes along to make your long stories short!
I ended up blowing way past the six sentence part of this prompt with 18 and 1/2 sentences, but!! 234 words. Is there a name for a flash piece that’s like, two and a third drabbles?
These short short prompts are so helpful at this point in the challenge.
Day 18 done
This was fun and challenging at the same time.
I actually wrote 2 stories.
The first one: “It’s Raining Cats and Dogs”
The six sentences was the hard part. They turned into run- on sentences.
The second one I wrote a one sentence paragraph on each of six different idioms.
Since I think I finally got my blog figured out I’ll post the them later. I’ll reply again when I have them up.
Okay, so a bit of a mix here. Let’s say I killed two birds with one stone – i.e., I fulfilled two prompts with one story, although strictly speaking, I only hit the idiom part, not the six sentences and 400 words part.
https://afstoryaday.blogspot.com/2026/05/salivating-seagull.html
Feedback on the story is always welcome.
Great prompt for a reset. I’m 18 for 18 but I’ve clawed out a few of my recent stories, and while there is merit in that, I much prefer spilling something pleasantish onto the page. Mission accomplished. I have plenty of time left in the day to do more Idiom expanding, so will likely indulge in another. This first attempt resulted in the idiom remaining metaphorical with just a dash of harmless literal application sprinkled on top. I fit into 6 sentences and easily fell within word count. I extend the candle of my joyful writing moment in the hope that it lights a contagion of flow, if not with this prompt, perhaps with the next. Happy Writing!
Confession: I knocked the first out before doing warmup and brainstorm. So, after the brainstorming mandate to get literal, I went back and did so. (The six-sentence limit made it possible.) Quite fun!
Warm up takeaway? I enjoy describing succinctly.
MMM, I’m missing something. I don’t do warm-ups and brainstorms, and I’m not sure I could fit that in. Well done on the 18 for 18, t’is brilliant.
Dear Julie,
It saddens me no end that I can’t share my stories on this platform like I used to. I am grateful to you for the opportunities and for helping me grow as a writer.
As today we were asked to write a six-sentence, 400-word-story, I couldn’t let go of this opportunity of sharing my story, could I?
Best wishes.
Red Letter Day
I was so excited to find the postman fishing out a red envelope from his side bag on that scorching, summer day.
“There’s a letter for you, Mr.B.”
“You couldn’t have brought me more happier tidings on a day like this?” I replied, beaming at him.
The postman stretched forward the paper to let me sign against my name without bothering to answer my question.
The letter that made my heart skip a beat, read :
You’re hereby notified to vacate the house by today itself as per West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act 300(2)/1955 with the final reminder that failure to comply with the mandate, will result in dire consequences……
Rathin, Love, share your stories. By Red Letter day, is this like the red letter day the Chinese receive/share on Chinese New Year? as that’s how I read it and love the twist.
Dear Andrew,
Thank you. I have been secretly reading some of your blog posts and they are just out of the world, as always.
Keep writing, sharing and inspiring, my dear friend.
Best wishes for everything you do.
Love you.
As a reminder, I always discouraged sharing and included my reasons. That was never the purpose of this site. There are many other places where you can share stories.
I had no idea this story was in my brain. Fun to unearth my slightly dark side!
Oooh, dark, I’m not quite sure I’ve gone overly dark yet.. Might have to think about that.
I love that ‘huh, where did THAT come from?’ feeling. Congrats!
I dug into a precious memory for this one… a perfect storm!
Thanks for running this!
You’re so welcome. I’m glad it’s working for you.