Person, Place, Thing: Stories Pulled from a Hat

By Erin Cullen and Emily Munro

What would you write if you had to combine a reluctant sorcerer, the end of the world, and an unopened letter into a short story? What about a conscripted poet, a last diner, and a compass that doesn't work? Or a box of killer wasps, the north pole of the moon, a sentient lump of yogurt? Those are not the prompts that ended up in this anthology.

But they could have been.

I'm not sure where I found the idea for the Person, Place, Thing prompt. What I do know is that our writers group has been writing short stories based on drawing a person, place, and thing from a hat since 2015. Our annual meetup where we create and distribute the prompts is now one of my favorite events of the year. It's incredible how creative people become when faced with seemingly impossible combinations (a sports commentator, a dripping cavern, Hurricane Jeff III). And it is incredibly fun to try to guess which parts of the story came from the prompt. We have included the person, place, and thing that prompted each story at the end of each one, so you can have the fun of guessing too.

If you'd like to play along at home by writing your own person, place, thing story, the instructions are simple. You can play by yourself by having friends and family join in the fun.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1949547280
• ISBN13: 9781949547283
• Release Date: August 2026
• Publisher: Lance Schaubert
• Length: 120 Pages
• Weight: 0.21 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.0" x 0.3" x 4.3"