Six musicians in a broken-down van each tell the worst show they ever played.Why now: the tow truck is two hours off. Frame ends: they play tonight's set to the tow driver, in the rest stop.
A courier reads the delivery notes on one address's orders and follows a story across a year.Why now: tonight's note says Last one. Frame ends: the door opens before she knocks.
A grandmother asleep in her chair dreams her own grandmother's kitchen, where she is the child again.Why now: the family is arguing over the recipe next door. Frame ends: she wakes and names the missing spice.
A barber tells a nervous groom the story of the worst haircut he ever gave.Why now: the wedding is in an hour. Frame ends: the groom sits still at last, and asks who the customer was.
A beekeeper tells a boy sent to apologize why her hives all face the orchard wall.Why now: his ball went through her shed window. Frame ends: he leaves with a jar of honey and a job for Saturday.
A cab driver ending his shift tells a silent passenger about the fare who once paid with a parrot.Why now: the meter is off and the rain is heavy. Frame ends: the passenger speaks at last, to ask its name.
A clockmaker tells an impatient customer why the town clock runs seven minutes slow.Why now: his watch will take seven minutes more. Frame ends: he walks out and sets the watch by the tower.
A cook tells the new dishwasher how the restaurant earned its one terrible review.Why now: the same critic has booked a table tonight. Frame ends: the dishwasher is sent out to take the order.
A father stuck in traffic tells his daughter how he failed his driving test four times.Why now: her test is on Friday. Frame ends: the road clears, and he lets her park the car at home.
A ferryman tells his only passenger why the river has two names.Why now: the crossing takes exactly one story. Frame ends: the passenger steps off on the bank with the other name.
A grandmother shelling peas tells her granddaughter how she once lost the farm at cards and won it back.Why now: the girl lost her bus fare on a bet today. Frame ends: she is dealt a hand and taught when to fold.
A librarian tells a child about the one book that has never come back late.Why now: the child's book is nine weeks overdue. Frame ends: the fine is paid by reading one page aloud.
A lighthouse keeper tells the inspector who has come to close the light about the one night it went dark.Why now: the closing papers are on the table. Frame ends: the inspector misses the last boat on purpose.
A locksmith opening a jammed front door tells the homeowner about the one lock he refused to pick.Why now: she wants her late father's desk opened next. Frame ends: he hands her the picks and talks her through it.
A mother braiding hair tells her daughter where the family's odd last name came from.Why now: a classmate laughed at it today. Frame ends: the daughter writes it large on her notebook cover.
A mountain guide tells a client who wants to push on about the day she did not turn back.Why now: the cloud is coming down. Frame ends: they go down together, and the client books again for June.
A night nurse tells a boy who cannot sleep about the patient who walked out of the ward on stilts.Why now: his cast comes off tomorrow. Frame ends: the stilts are in the supply closet, and she lets him look.
A piano tuner tells a house's new owner about the last person who played its piano.Why now: one key will not hold its note. Frame ends: the owner asks him to leave that key as it is.
A retiring teacher tells her replacement about the one student she was wrong about.Why now: the class list lies on the desk between them. Frame ends: the replacement circles one name in pencil.
A shepherd tells a lost hiker how the valley's one bridge was built by two families who did not speak.Why now: the bridge is the only way down. Frame ends: the hiker crosses, and waves back from the far side.
A tailor letting out a coat tells its wearer about the three people who owned it before.Why now: each seam he opens has a name inked inside. Frame ends: the customer inks in a fourth.
An aunt driving her nephew to the airport tells him why she never left town.Why now: he is leaving for good. Frame ends: at the curb she asks him to send her the price of a ticket.
An old sailor mending nets tells a tourist how the harbor's bronze statue came to face inland.Why now: she only asked the way to the pier. Frame ends: she follows the statue's gaze and finds out for herself.
A circle of tellers 20
A book club that has not read the book takes turns confessing what each did instead.Why now: the host has baked for a discussion. Frame ends: the host confesses too, and they pick a shorter book.
A retiring ship's crew each describe the worst storm they remember, and it is the same storm.Why now: the ship is sold tomorrow. Frame ends: the buyer was the cabin boy that night, and tells it last.
The cast of a canceled play sit on the dark stage, and each describes the part they never got.Why now: the set comes down in the morning. Frame ends: they play one scene for the janitor.
Children at a sleepover take turns telling the strangest thing that is actually true.Why now: the flashlight has one set of batteries. Frame ends: the smallest child's story is about this house.
Fishing crews kept in harbor by fog hold a contest for the best lie.Why now: nobody can sail and the cafe is warm. Frame ends: the fog lifts, and the winning lie is tied up at the dock.
Five cousins clearing their grandmother's attic each tell the story of the one thing they want to keep.Why now: there is one box each. Frame ends: two stories claim the same lamp, and it goes to her neighbor.
Grandchildren at a long table are each asked for one story about the woman whose birthday it is.Why now: she asked for stories and no presents. Frame ends: she corrects every one of them.
Hikers at a fire each tell the story behind one scar, patch or dent on their gear.Why now: one hiker's new boots have nothing to tell. Frame ends: the boots get their first story on the walk out.
Jurors waiting for the clerk to return swap stories of the one time each was wrongly blamed.Why now: the door is locked until the form is typed. Frame ends: one juror asks to vote again.
Neighbors sitting on the stairs in a power cut each tell who lived in their rooms before them.Why now: the elevator is stuck between floors. Frame ends: the lights come back during the top floor's story.
The night shift at a bakery has a rule: whoever is kneading tells the story.Why now: the radio broke in March. Frame ends: the bread is late, and the first customer asks how it ended.
Night workers who share the 3 a.m. bus have a rule that the newest rider tells a story.Why now: tonight a stranger boards. Frame ends: the driver misses a stop to hear the finish.
Old rivals at a class reunion each tell how they remember the same school race.Why now: the trophy on the table has no name on it. Frame ends: the school's groundskeeper tells an eighth version.
Passengers on a stalled night train take turns saying who is waiting for them at the other end.Why now: the lights are out and the phones are dead. Frame ends: the platform shows who told the truth.
Seven strangers snowed into a mountain hut agree that each will tell the story of their worst journey.Why now: the stove must be watched all night. Frame ends: the plow comes during the seventh, and nobody gets up.
Six musicians in a broken-down van each tell the worst show they ever played.Why now: the tow truck is two hours off. Frame ends: they play tonight's set to the tow driver, in the rest stop.
Students in detention must each tell the truth about why, and the teacher will guess who is lying.Why now: nobody leaves until the hour is up. Frame ends: the teacher tells why she was once kept in.
Traders camped at a desert well each tell what they carried on their first crossing.Why now: custom has the newest trader listen before speaking. Frame ends: she is asked what she carries.
Villagers waiting out a flood in the schoolhouse each tell the story of the one thing they carried there.Why now: the road is under water until morning. Frame ends: the school builds a shelf and keeps the stories.
Wedding guests waiting at the wrong hall each tell how they know the couple.Why now: the bus back is an hour away. Frame ends: no two stories describe the same couple; there are two weddings.
A found document 20
A bottle washes up holding page one of a story and directions to page two.Why now: it is the last week of summer. Frame ends: the finder writes page nine and corks it.
A bundle of postcards from different ports tells one story when put in the right order.Why now: the finder has the flu and a week in bed. Frame ends: one card is missing, and she writes it.
A carpenter finds forty years of notes penciled inside a wall, each signed by a different workman.Why now: the wall comes down today. Frame ends: he signs the last stud and closes it up again.
A desk bought at auction holds a box of unsent letters, all addressed to the same lighthouse.Why now: the buyer is driving up the coast anyway. Frame ends: she delivers them to the keeper's son.
A family cookbook has one recipe crossed out so hard that the pen tore the page.Why now: someone has asked for that dish at the reunion. Frame ends: three aunts explain it three ways.
A field notebook left on a hut shelf describes a bird that is in no guide.Why now: the reader is snowed in with nothing else to read. Frame ends: at dawn something sings on the roof.
A grandmother's knitting patterns have notes in the margins on who each sweater was for.Why now: her grandson is unraveling one for the wool. Frame ends: he knits it back, a size larger.
A guest book in a mountain inn has one visitor who signs every tenth year, with a longer note each time.Why now: this is a tenth year. Frame ends: the reader waits in the lobby past closing.
A lighthouse logbook gives the weather for every day and, in pencil, one line more.Why now: the museum wants it typed up. Frame ends: the typist is told to skip the pencil, and does not.
A repair log taped inside a grandfather clock lists each time it stopped and what the house was doing.Why now: it stopped this morning. Frame ends: the new entry is the shortest: Wound it.
A school's lost-and-found ledger records, in forty hands, the one umbrella nobody claims.Why now: the school closes in June. Frame ends: the last entry, in a child's hand, reads Claimed.
A ship's cook kept a diary in the margins of her recipe book.Why now: her granddaughter is cooking from it for the first time. Frame ends: tonight's supper goes in the margin.
A translator hired to put an old diary into English begins to think its writer is still alive.Why now: the client wants it by spring. Frame ends: she mails chapter one to an address in the diary.
A water-stained manuscript reaches a small publisher with no name on it, and its return address is a hayfield.Why now: the editor needs one good book this year. Frame ends: she prints it with the hayfield on the cover.
A year of lost-cat posters, one a week, tells a story in the changes to the wording.Why now: a girl is paid to take old posters down. Frame ends: the last one says Found, and gives a party date.
An apprentice mapmaker is given her master's first map to copy and finds his errors fixed in another hand.Why now: the copy is her final test. Frame ends: she corrects one more and signs below both.
An inherited atlas has routes inked across it, each with a year beside it.Why now: the heir has two weeks off. Frame ends: she inks a line of her own, in a new color.
Fifty years of one pupil's report cards, kept by a teacher, turn up at an estate sale.Why now: the buyer knows the name on them. Frame ends: he drives them to the pupil, who is now eighty.
Margin notes in a secondhand textbook argue with each other across three owners.Why now: the exam is on that chapter. Frame ends: the fourth owner settles it, in ink.
The minutes of a village committee, read aloud at its last meeting, tell the whole of a forty-year feud.Why now: the hall is being sold. Frame ends: the two families' heirs second the same motion.
A dream 20
A boy asleep in a hayloft dreams he is each animal on the farm in turn.Why now: he must pick one to show at the fair. Frame ends: he wakes and enters the goose.
A boy asleep over his history homework dreams he is in the dullest chapter, a week before anything happens.Why now: the test is tomorrow. Frame ends: he wakes knowing one date, the one he was there for.
A child with a cold dreams that the ships on the bedroom wallpaper set sail.Why now: it is the last night in this room before the move. Frame ends: by morning one ship has turned around.
A commuter who sleeps past her stop dreams the life she would have had at each station on the line.Why now: she has taken this train for twenty years. Frame ends: she wakes at the last stop and gets off to look.
A composer asleep at the piano hears her unfinished piece played by everyone she has let down.Why now: it is due on Monday. Frame ends: she wakes with eight bars, and writes one apology first.
A fisherman asleep in his boat dreams the lake has drained and walks across its floor.Why now: he has caught nothing in a month. Frame ends: he wakes and rows to where the dream's spring was.
A gardener napping in a wheelbarrow dreams the garden a hundred years on.Why now: he must choose today which of two trees to cut. Frame ends: he wakes and cuts neither.
A girl dozing on a long car ride dreams the whole life of the woman in the next car at a red light.Why now: the light is a long one. Frame ends: she wakes as it turns green, and the woman waves.
A girl dreams the ending of the book she fell asleep reading, and it is better than the printed one.Why now: her book report is due. Frame ends: she hands in her ending, and says so.
A grandmother asleep in her chair dreams her own grandmother's kitchen, where she is the child again.Why now: the family is arguing over the recipe next door. Frame ends: she wakes and names the missing spice.
A man asleep on a park bench dreams the park as it was on the day he first sat there.Why now: the bench is to be taken out. Frame ends: he wakes and writes to the parks office.
A mapmaker asleep at her desk dreams she walks the island she has only drawn from sailors' reports.Why now: the map goes to the printer at dawn. Frame ends: she wakes and moves one river.
A museum night guard falls asleep under a painting of a harvest and works a full day in its fields.Why now: it is his last shift before he retires. Frame ends: he wakes with straw in his cuffs.
A new mayor napping at her desk dreams a town meeting run by the statues.Why now: her first vote is tonight. Frame ends: she wakes and votes the way the fountain did.
A shepherd asleep on a hillside dreams the quarrel the two villages below will have in fifty years.Why now: he is carrying a message between them. Frame ends: he delivers it with one line changed.
A student dozing in a lecture on bridges dreams she must cross each one the lecturer names.Why now: her own design is due. Frame ends: she wakes at the one that swayed, and redraws hers.
A tired baker dozing by the oven dreams her town on a morning with no bread.Why now: she means to close the shop. Frame ends: she wakes to a burnt batch and a line at the door.
A translator falls asleep over a poem and dreams she meets it in its own country.Why now: one line will not come. Frame ends: she wakes and leaves that line as it was.
A traveler asleep in an airport dreams the journeys of every bag on the unclaimed shelf.Why now: his own bag is lost. Frame ends: it arrives with a new sticker on it, and he wonders.
An astronomer nods off at the eyepiece and dreams a letter from the star she is measuring.Why now: her funding ends this month. Frame ends: she wakes, the star has set, and she names it in her notes.
Modern frames 20
A boy types to a help-desk chat the whole story of why he needs his grandmother's farm game unlocked.Why now: her village in it is about to be wiped. Frame ends: the agent bends one rule.
A courier reads the delivery notes on one address's orders and follows a story across a year.Why now: tonight's note says Last one. Frame ends: the door opens before she knocks.
A family group chat pieces together, message by message, what really happened at the lake one summer.Why now: someone posted an old photo. Frame ends: the one silent member is typing, for a long time.
A long online review of a tent tells the story of the trip it was bought for.Why now: the store asked for stars. Frame ends: five stars for the tent, two for the brother.
A lost phone is answered by whoever finds it, and each finder tells the owner's mother where it is now.Why now: she calls every hour. Frame ends: the fourth finder is her son.
A night-radio caller tells the host a story in installments, one call a week.Why now: the show has been canceled. Frame ends: the host goes off script to ask how it ends.
A podcast host interviews her grandfather about the year the factory closed and gets three versions.Why now: the episode is due Friday. Frame ends: she airs all three, in the order he told them.
A rideshare driver tells each passenger of the night one more part of the same story.Why now: the first rider asked about the photo on the dash. Frame ends: the last rider is in the photo.
A security guard narrates one shop doorway on the monitors to the trainee beside him.Why now: the trainee asked why he never switches screens. Frame ends: someone in the doorway looks up and nods.
A stranger gets a three-minute voicemail meant for someone's sister, telling how the family dog got lost.Why now: one digit was misdialed. Frame ends: she calls back, because the dog is on her porch.
A substitute teacher reads out the regular teacher's lesson plan, which turns into a letter halfway down.Why now: the class is waiting. Frame ends: she finishes it aloud, as the lesson.
A teenager records her great-aunt for a school project, and the great-aunt keeps asking her to stop the tape.Why now: the project is family history. Frame ends: the best story is the one not handed in.
A translation app mishears a traveler, and the shopkeeper answers the story it made up.Why now: the bus leaves in ten minutes. Frame ends: both of them prefer the made-up one.
A video call freezes, and to fill the silence a grandfather tells the story he has been saving.Why now: the picture is stuck but the sound works. Frame ends: the picture returns, and he is holding the proof.
A woman walks a friend abroad down her street on a video call, house by house.Why now: the friend grew up at number nine and cannot visit. Frame ends: number nine's door opens, and waves.
An old phone's photo roll, scrolled backward, tells a story from its ending to its start.Why now: the phone is being traded in today. Frame ends: the clerk is asked for ten more minutes.
An out-of-office reply grows longer each week until it tells why its writer is really away.Why now: one colleague keeps emailing to read more. Frame ends: the reply reads Back Monday, ask me.
The comments under a recipe for plum cake become a year-long story between two strangers.Why now: one asked about swapping the plums. Frame ends: the last comment is a photo of two forks.
The saved places in a secondhand car's navigation tell where it has been.Why now: the new owner taps Home by mistake. Frame ends: she drives there, to return a pair of glasses.
Two roommates on opposite shifts tell each other their days through the shared grocery list.Why now: they have not been home together in a month. Frame ends: one line reads Home early, cook for two.
How it works
Each of these 100 frame story ideas names who tells the inner story and who listens. Under it are the two things a frame needs: why the story is told now, and how the outer story ends.
Read the full guide
Modern frame story ideas
The group Modern frames sets the telling in the present day: a voicemail left on the wrong phone, a family group chat, a podcast interview, a rideshare driver who gives each passenger one more part. The frame closes when a listener answers.
Four older ways to frame a story
One teller, one listener is the plainest. A circle of tellers holds a set of tales, one from each. A found document lets letters, a logbook or margin notes do the telling. A dream ends on what the sleeper does after waking.
Write the frame's ending first: what does the listener do once the story is over?
Let the listener interrupt once, at the point where a reader would.
Questions and answers
What is a frame story?
A story in which a first narrative leads into a second, more important one or into a group of shorter tales. The frame leads the reader from the first story into the one inside it, and the inner story carries the most detail.
What is an example of a frame story?
One Thousand and One Nights, in which Scheherazade tells a set of tales to the Sultan over many nights, and The Canterbury Tales, where every pilgrim has a tale. On this list, seven strangers snowed into a mountain hut do the same.
How do I write a frame story?
Settle three things before the inner story: who tells it, who listens, and why now. Then end the frame on something the listener does. A lighthouse keeper tells an inspector about the one dark night, and the inspector misses the last boat on purpose.
Can a frame story be told through letters or a diary?
Yes. A frame may use documents to explain how the inner story came to light, as novels told in letters do. In the group A found document, forty years of workmen's notes are penciled inside a wall that comes down today.