If you’ve been here for a while, you’ll know I have a soft spot for fairytale retellings — stories we think we know, reshaped to explore power, voice, consequence, and choice.

January’s Daily Writing Prompts theme is Ever After: a 31-day collection of fairytale writing prompts for teens, inspired by myths, legends, and folklore from around the world. These prompts move beyond glass slippers and tidy endings, asking writers to question what “happily ever after” really means — and who it’s written for.

Designed for secondary English classrooms, these creative writing prompts encourage originality, perspective shifts, and deeper narrative thinking — but they’re just as powerful for independent writers of any age.

Fairytale Writing Prompts That Begin Where the Story Usually Ends

The opening days of Ever After draw on fairytales rooted in folklore rather than fantasy gloss. These are stories of transformation, secrecy, and inherited rules — where magic doesn’t rescue anyone for free.

A girl opens a letter sealed with a snake’s scale.
A witch finally tells her own story.
A quiet child carries someone else’s sky.
A moon-born girl watches Earth from behind bamboo — and code.

These prompts ask writers to rethink the moment after the spell works, and to imagine the cost of that magic lingering on.

World Folklore, Reimagined

January’s prompts span cultures and centuries, borrowing from global folklore and reshaping it for modern writers.

From East Asian legends to ancestral tricksters and oral storytelling traditions, Ever After invites writers to explore stories that existed long before they were softened, simplified, or repackaged. They’re ideal for writers who enjoy mythology, cultural storytelling, and fairytales that feel old — but unsettled.

Villains, Witches, and Power

Midway through the month, familiar figures shift.

Mermaids do not give up their voices.
Spinners are not desperate — they are strategic.
Birds remember bones the world tried to bury.
Cinderellas do not always become kind queens.

These prompts centre power, perspective, and consequence. They are especially effective for perspective writing, unreliable narrators, and characters who refuse the role they were assigned.

What “Ever After” Really Means

As the month draws on, the prompts become quieter — and sharper. They ask what happens once survival replaces romance, once the kingdom still has to function, once love is no longer enough.

Endings are not neat here. They are earned, unresolved, and honest.

What You Can Expect

Every daily prompt includes:
◆ A title
◆ A stunning, high-quality image
◆ An opening line
◆ A closing line
◆ A plot idea

You can use one element or all five — they work either way. They’re ideal for creative writing lessons, warm-ups, assessments, homework, exam practice, or personal writing sessions with no classroom required.

And yes, they’re designed for everyone. Whether writers lean toward fantasy, myth, gothic retellings, folklore, or emotionally driven storytelling, Ever After offers something to spark the imagination.

New to Daily Prompts?

Give them a try. I offer a completely free month of daily writing prompts on TpT so you can test them out with no risk — whether you’re using them in class or writing purely for yourself.

Spoiler: they work.

Final Thoughts

Ever After is a collection of fairytales reimagined — stories that question the endings we were given and ask what happens when magic fades, power shifts, or love costs more than promised.

Whether you’re teaching, writing alongside your students, or rediscovering your own love of storytelling, these January prompts invite you to begin again — and to write what comes after.

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