• 100 stakes
  • Checked October 2026

Ideas for Stakes for Stories

Three things a character could lose, each with its deadline and one way to raise it.

Ideas for Stakes for Stories

Show all 100
  1. A time traveler has one trip left in the machine and two things to put right.Clock: the charge holds for one jump. Raise it: mending either one undoes the other.
  2. A whole town's night shift eats at one diner, and its cook has given two weeks' notice.Clock: fourteen days. Raise it: nobody ever wrote the recipes down.
  3. A fishing boat is one family's whole income, and the engine has started to knock.Clock: the season opens Monday. Raise it: the mechanic can come Tuesday.

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All 100 stakes

A place or a good name 20

  • A baker's blue-ribbon streak at the county fair stands at eleven years. Clock: judging is at noon. Raise it: her oven quits the night before.
  • A boy told his class he can do a backflip, and his name is now on the talent show list. Clock: the show is in nine days. Raise it: his grandfather is flying in to watch.
  • A class president will be remembered for the one promise she made, a water fountain that works. Clock: her term ends in June. Raise it: the principal wants something in return.
  • A debate captain draws the side she does not believe. Clock: seven minutes at the podium. Raise it: her father is in the audience, and he does believe it.
  • A first-chair violinist can be challenged for her seat by anyone in the section, and someone has. Clock: the challenge is played before Monday's rehearsal. Raise it: the judge is her old teacher.
  • A girl won the art prize with a drawing her friend started. Clock: the winners' assembly is Friday. Raise it: the friend is asked to hand her the ribbon.
  • A goalkeeper who has never let in a penalty faces the striker who taught him to dive. Clock: one kick. Raise it: the scout in the stands came only for this.
  • A junior reporter's first front-page story contains one fact she has not confirmed. Clock: the presses roll at midnight. Raise it: her source stops answering the phone.
  • A lighthouse log has not missed a night in forty years, and the keeper has the flu. Clock: dusk. Raise it: the only other person on the rock is nine years old.
  • A magician has promised the town a trick nobody has seen before, and it does not work yet. Clock: the curtain rises Saturday at eight. Raise it: a rival buys a front-row seat.
  • A new girl has one lunch period to pick a table before the tables pick for her. Clock: the bell rings in twenty minutes. Raise it: two tables wave her over at once.
  • A retiring umpire has never made a call anyone could prove wrong, and tonight there are cameras. Clock: nine innings. Raise it: the last play of the game is at home plate.
  • A spelling champion must defend a title his family has held for three generations. Clock: the bee starts at nine tomorrow. Raise it: the word list changed this year.
  • A squire must pass the trial that all three of her older brothers passed on the first try. Clock: the trial is at dawn. Raise it: the horse she drew has never finished the course.
  • A student keeps her scholarship only while her grades hold, and one class is slipping. Clock: the final exam is in two weeks. Raise it: the only tutor is the boy she beat for the award.
  • A swimmer will lose her lane on the relay team if a girl two years younger beats her time. Clock: time trials are Friday at four. Raise it: the younger girl is her sister.
  • A tour guide's five-star record rides on a visitor who has decided to dislike everything. Clock: the tour ends at sunset. Raise it: the visitor writes for a travel magazine.
  • A translator's reputation rests on one word she is no longer sure of. Clock: the book goes to print Thursday. Raise it: the author is at sea for a month.
  • An apprentice cook has one dinner service to prove she belongs on the line. Clock: the first table is seated at six. Raise it: the owner's mother has booked table one.
  • An inventor has told her backers that the machine works. Clock: the demonstration is at ten tomorrow. Raise it: it worked once, and she does not know why.

A friendship or a family tie 20

  • A boy always lets his little sister win, and she has entered the real tournament against him. Clock: round one is at ten. Raise it: she has practiced in secret, and she is good.
  • A boy has forgotten his best friend's birthday for the second year running. Clock: school lets out at three. Raise it: the friend remembered his, with a handmade card.
  • A boy has to tell his best friend that he wants to be on the other team this year. Clock: teams are picked at recess. Raise it: the friend has already written both names down.
  • A brother promised to be at his sister's recital, and his team has just made the final. Clock: both start at seven. Raise it: she is playing the song he taught her.
  • A daughter is asked which parent she will spend the holiday with. Clock: tickets are booked tonight. Raise it: each parent says, and means, that either answer is fine.
  • A dog walker and an old man talk every morning, and she has been offered a route across town. Clock: she answers by Monday. Raise it: he has started saving her the crossword.
  • A father and son talk only through the dog, and the dog is going to live with the daughter. Clock: she drives up on Sunday. Raise it: the dog has to choose a car door.
  • A friendship made at summer camp has to last the first school year apart. Clock: the first letter is due in a week. Raise it: one of them makes a new best friend on day one.
  • A girl keeps her place in a group of friends only by keeping a secret that hurts someone outside it. Clock: the rumor reaches a teacher by Friday. Raise it: the someone was her friend first.
  • A girl must tell her pen pal of six years that the pony in her letters was never real. Clock: the pen pal lands at noon tomorrow. Raise it: she is bringing a saddle blanket as a gift.
  • A girl read her best friend's diary, and the friend is about to ask her straight out. Clock: the walk home takes twelve minutes. Raise it: the diary said something kind about her.
  • A grandfather says he will stop telling his stories if one more grandchild looks at a phone. Clock: dessert. Raise it: tonight's story is how he met their grandmother.
  • A grandmother will teach the family recipe to one grandchild, and it is not the one who wants it. Clock: she teaches it on Sunday. Raise it: the chosen cousin offers to trade it for a favor.
  • A mother and daughter have one car ride left before the daughter moves across the country. Clock: four hours of highway. Raise it: neither has mentioned the argument from March.
  • A stepfather has one camping trip to stop being called by his first name. Clock: two nights. Raise it: it rains, and he packed the wrong tent.
  • Two best friends apply to the same summer program, which takes one student from each school. Clock: letters arrive Friday. Raise it: each secretly wrote the other's recommendation.
  • Two brothers have not spoken since they sold the boat, and the buyer wants to sell it back. Clock: the offer stands one week. Raise it: he will sell only to the two of them together.
  • Two cousins run a tree house by one rule, that both must agree, and one wants to let a third kid in. Clock: the third kid moves in next door on Saturday. Raise it: the one who wants in wrote the rule.
  • Two friends have a band, and a bigger band wants only the drummer. Clock: the offer ends at midnight. Raise it: the two have a show together that same night.
  • Two old friends who fell out over an unanswered letter are seated together at a wedding. Clock: the reception ends at ten. Raise it: the letter is in her purse, still sealed.

A home or a living 20

  • A beekeeper's whole yard feeds on a clover field that her neighbor plans to pave. Clock: the trucks come the first dry week. Raise it: he needs the money as much as she needs the clover.
  • A bookshop stays open only if it sells four hundred books this month. Clock: the thirtieth. Raise it: the landlord's niece wants the space for a phone store.
  • A boy and his mother live above the laundromat she runs, and the owner is selling the machines. Clock: the buyer comes Saturday. Raise it: the apartment goes with the job.
  • A boy's family moves every spring, and this is the first house he has asked to stay in. Clock: the lease ends in May. Raise it: his mother is offered her best job yet, two states away.
  • A family loses the farm if this harvest does not cover the loan. Clock: the bank comes on the first of October. Raise it: the best field floods in September.
  • A family of traveling players eats only if the next town lets them perform. Clock: the council votes at noon. Raise it: the last troupe through left without paying its bill.
  • A family restaurant has one review coming, and the grandmother who cooks cannot smell with her cold. Clock: the critic's table is at eight. Raise it: only the youngest knows the sauce by taste.
  • A family's apartment is for sale, and the tenants may buy it if they can match the offer. Clock: ten days. Raise it: a neighbor they barely know suggests buying the building together.
  • A fishing boat is one family's whole income, and the engine has started to knock. Clock: the season opens Monday. Raise it: the mechanic can come Tuesday.
  • A food truck cannot open without its permit, and the inspector has found one thing. Clock: the next inspection is in two days. Raise it: the part is on back order.
  • A girl's horse will be sold unless she can pay for its stall herself. Clock: the first payment is due in a month. Raise it: a buyer comes to look in two weeks.
  • A lighthouse family will be moved ashore when the light is made automatic. Clock: the engineers arrive in spring. Raise it: the youngest has never slept on the mainland.
  • A mapmaker is paid for the finished chart, and the coastline has changed since she began. Clock: the ship that carries it sails on the tide. Raise it: fixing it means admitting sheet one is wrong.
  • A night baker loses his delivery route if the van fails one more morning. Clock: four in the morning. Raise it: the first stop is the hospital kitchen.
  • A ranch hand keeps his cabin as long as he keeps the job, and his knees are going. Clock: the fall roundup. Raise it: the owner's son is home, and watching.
  • A robot repair shop loses its license if a single mended robot fails. Clock: the audit is tomorrow. Raise it: the owner's own helper has started dropping things.
  • A street musician's corner is hers by custom, and a louder act has set up across the road. Clock: the lunch crowd comes at noon. Raise it: the louder act is good.
  • A tailor's shop lives on one customer, a theater, and the theater has a new costume director. Clock: fittings for the spring show start Monday. Raise it: the new director sews.
  • A woman rents out rooms to keep her house, and the last lodger has given notice. Clock: the tax bill is due on the first. Raise it: the only one to answer the ad once outbid her for it.
  • A young teacher's contract is renewed only if her class passes the reading test. Clock: the test is in May. Raise it: her strongest reader moves away in April.

A town or a community 20

  • A caravan loses its turn at the oasis if it arrives after its rival. Clock: the wells are shared out at the new moon. Raise it: the short road crosses the rival's land.
  • A choir that has sung every December for a century is down to seven voices. Clock: the concert is in six weeks. Raise it: the piece has eight parts.
  • A dragon spares the valley as long as someone visits each week to hear its poetry. Clock: every seventh day. Raise it: this week's listener falls asleep.
  • A fishing village's harbor fills with a little more silt on every tide. Clock: the big boats can get out until autumn. Raise it: dredging costs more than the fleet earns.
  • A harbor town's summer depends on its lighthouse tour, and the stairs have failed inspection. Clock: the season opens in May. Raise it: the one carpenter who knows spiral stairs retired to a boat.
  • A mill town's one mill will close unless a buyer is found. Clock: the whistle blows for the last time on Friday. Raise it: the only bidder wants the land.
  • A mountain village is cut off all winter unless the pass is marked before the snow. Clock: the first snowfall. Raise it: the one man who knows where the poles go has moved to the city.
  • A neighborhood garden grows on a lot the city has put up for auction. Clock: bidding opens in thirty days. Raise it: the tomatoes ripen in forty.
  • A school's music program ends unless the band places at the regional contest. Clock: the contest is in three weeks. Raise it: the only tuba player moves away.
  • A small-town library has to prove that anyone uses it. Clock: the budget vote is Tuesday. Raise it: the checkout machine broke in March, so there are no records.
  • A space station's garden feeds everyone aboard, and one bed has gone yellow. Clock: the supply ship is sixty days out. Raise it: the yellow reaches a second bed.
  • A street of shops will be passed by the new road unless drivers are given a reason to turn. Clock: the road opens in spring. Raise it: the shopkeepers cannot agree what the reason is.
  • A team that has carried a town's name for eighty years folds if it loses its field. Clock: the lease ends with the season. Raise it: the last home game decides the league.
  • A town loses its only school if enrollment drops below forty, and it stands at forty-one. Clock: the count is taken on the first day of term. Raise it: the forty-first family is packing.
  • A town's right to its water lapses unless someone finds the original deed. Clock: the hearing is Monday. Raise it: the deed was last seen in a book given to the rummage sale.
  • A village keeps its charter only while its bell is rung each morning, and the bell rope has frayed. Clock: dawn. Raise it: the only rope long enough is holding the ferry.
  • A village well is failing, and the only one who can find water is a girl nobody takes seriously. Clock: the cistern holds nine days. Raise it: she is wrong once, in front of everyone.
  • A whole town's night shift eats at one diner, and its cook has given two weeks' notice. Clock: fourteen days. Raise it: nobody ever wrote the recipes down.
  • The festival that pays for the fire brigade's year depends on one dry weekend. Clock: Saturday morning. Raise it: the forecast changes on Thursday.
  • The last ferry to an island stops running unless the islanders can fill it. Clock: the company decides after the summer timetable. Raise it: a bridge would take ten years.

A kingdom, a world or the future 20

  • A city in the clouds stays up only while its bells are kept in tune. Clock: the great bell goes a little flat each night. Raise it: the tuner is losing her hearing.
  • A colony's air is made by a forest that one bored teenager is paid to watch. Clock: the first brown leaf showed this morning. Raise it: the manual is on the ship that left.
  • A comet turns aside only for a song sung by everyone at once, and nobody can agree on the song. Clock: it passes closest in nine days. Raise it: the two largest cities sing in different keys.
  • A generation ship's last working library loses one shelf of memory a day. Clock: the shelf marked How to Land goes in a month. Raise it: only the youngest crew still read.
  • A kingdom's spring will not come until its heir learns to apologize. Clock: the seed grain lasts until a thaw that is not coming. Raise it: the heir has never been wrong aloud.
  • A peace has lasted exactly as long as an unfinished chess game between two queens. Clock: one of them has seen the winning move. Raise it: she is the one who needs the peace less.
  • A realm's only map is in the memory of one old ferryman. Clock: he retires at the year's end. Raise it: he will teach only someone who can sit still.
  • A robot city shuts down for good unless a human still remembers its password. Clock: the yearly restart is at midnight. Raise it: the one who knows it learned it as a bedtime rhyme.
  • A seed vault holds every crop there ever was, and its keeper can keep one drawer cold. Clock: the generator's fuel lasts till morning. Raise it: one drawer has no label.
  • A time traveler has one trip left in the machine and two things to put right. Clock: the charge holds for one jump. Raise it: mending either one undoes the other.
  • A treaty between two realms holds only while a pair of pen pals keep writing. Clock: the courier leaves at each full moon. Raise it: one of them has nothing left to write.
  • A truce between the sea people and the shore people ends if the shore breaks its yearly promise. Clock: the lowest tide of the year. Raise it: no one living knows what was promised.
  • A world's stories vanish when nobody tells them, and the last storyteller has lost her voice. Clock: one story fades each night. Raise it: tonight's is the one about why people forgive.
  • An empire's calendar is kept by one clockmaker, and a missed day puts every festival out of season. Clock: the leap day only she remembers is tomorrow. Raise it: she is snowed in, three valleys away.
  • Every ship steers by one star chart, and its maker's apprentice has found an error in it. Clock: the fleet sails at the turn of the season. Raise it: the fix shames the woman who raised her.
  • The last night train between two countries runs only while one passenger still rides it. Clock: the 11:40 leaves tonight. Raise it: tonight's only passenger means to get off for good.
  • The last speaker of a language has one student, and the student wants to quit. Clock: lessons end with the school term. Raise it: the language holds the only directions to a lost farm.
  • Magic drains out of the world each time a spell is wasted, and the royal wizard likes to show off. Clock: the well of it is ankle-deep. Raise it: the princess wants a spectacle for her birthday.
  • The moon will leave unless someone answers the letter it sent. Clock: it is a little smaller every night. Raise it: the letter is written in tides.
  • The sun over a small planet has to be wound each evening, and the winder has overslept. Clock: no dawn unless it is wound by midnight. Raise it: the key is not on its hook.

How it works

Each of these 100 ideas for stakes for stories is something a character stands to lose, from a lane on the relay team to a kingdom's spring. Under it are the clock that makes it urgent and one way to raise it.

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Five sizes of stake

The smallest is one person's place or good name: a seat in the orchestra, a blue-ribbon streak. Next comes a bond between two people, then a home or a living, then a whole town. The largest group puts a kingdom, a world or the future at risk, and most of those still rest on one person.

The clock and the raise

A deadline forces the choice, so each stake has a line marked Clock: time trials on Friday at four, the bank on the first of October. The line marked Raise it is what goes wrong partway through: the younger swimmer is her sister, the best field floods in September.

  • Pair a small stake with a large one. A reader worries about the town through the one family that is packing.
  • Name the stake on the first pages, before anything threatens it.

Questions and answers

What are good stakes for a story?

Ones a reader can picture being lost. On this list a bookshop stays open only if it sells four hundred books this month, and a brother has promised to be at his sister's recital on the night of his team's final.

How do you raise the stakes in a story?

Add a second cost to the first. Every line marked Raise it does that. A student's only tutor is the boy she beat for the scholarship. A village needs a bell rope, and the only one long enough is holding the ferry.

Do the stakes have to be life or death?

No. No death is the named stake in any of these 100. A place on a team, a friendship, a lease and a town's only school are enough when the loss is real to the person facing it.

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