Short Story Tips: 10 Hacks to Improve Your still more consequences?

How does Huck change,

Creative Writing first when he teams up with Jim, and later when he
realizes how much Jim depends upon him?)
Writing short stories means beginning as
close to the climax as possible — everything else is Show Don't (Just) Tell
a distraction. A novel can take a more meandering
What details from the setting, dialog, and tone help
path but should still start with a scene that sets the
you tell the story?
tone for the whole book.
At the climax, what morally significant choice
A short story conserves characters and
does your protagonist make?
scenes, typically by focusing on just one conflict,
and drives towards a sudden, unexpected (Your reader should care about the protagonist’s
revelation. Go easy on the exposition and talky decision, and ideally shouldn’t see it coming.)
backstory — your reader doesn’t need to know
everything that you know about your characters. 2. Write a Catchy First Paragraph

1. Get Started: Emergency Tips In today’s fast-moving world, the first sentence of
your narrative should catch your reader’s attention
What does your protagonist want? with the unusual, the unexpected, an action, or a
conflict. Begin with tension and immediacy.
(The athlete who wants her team to win the big
Remember that short stories need to start close to
game and the car crash victim who wants to survive
their end.
are not unique or interesting enough.)
3. Developing Characters
When the story begins, what morally significant
action has your protagonist taken towards that In order to develop a living, breathing, multi-
goal? faceted character, it is important to know way more
about the character than you will ever use in the
(Your protagonist should already have made a
story.
conscious choice, good or bad, that drives the rest
of the story.) Imagining all these details will help you get to know
your character, but your reader probably won’t
What obstacles must the protagonist overcome
need to know much more than the most important
in order to reach the goal?
things in four areas:
(Simply having a rival is not that interesting. Yes,
a) Appearance. Gives your reader a visual
Harry Potter defeats Voldemort, but first he must
understanding of the character.
mature into a leader with the moral clarity and
teamwork skills necessary to defeat Voldemort. A b) Action. Show the reader what kind of person
short story can’t possibly tackle that kind of your character is, by describing actions rather than
character development, but a character who faces simply listing adjectives.
internal obstacles and must negotiate messy moral
trade-offs is more dramatically interesting than the c) Speech. Develop the character as a person —
hero in the white hat who must use the right don’t merely have your character announce
weapon to defeat the villain in the black hat.) important plot details.

What unexpected consequences — directly d) Thought. Bring the reader into your character’s
related to the protagonist’s goal-oriented mind, to show them your character’s unexpressed
actions — ramp up the emotional energy of the memories, fears, and hopes.
story?
4. Choose a Point of View
(Will the unexpected consequences force your
Point of view is the narration of the story from the
protagonist to make yet another choice, leading to
perspective of first, second, or third person. As a
writer, you need to determine who is going to tell a) Explosion or “Hook.” A thrilling, gripping,
the story and how much information is available for stirring event or problem that grabs the reader’s
the narrator to reveal in the short story. The narrator attention right away.
can be directly involved in the action subjectively,
b) Conflict. A character versus the internal self or
or the narrator might only report the action
an external something or someone.
objectively.
c) Exposition. Background information required for
5. Write meaningful dialogue.
seeing the characters in context.
Dialogue is what your characters say to each other
d) Complication. One or more problems that keep
(or to themselves). Each speaker gets his/her own
a character from their intended goal.
paragraph, and the paragraph includes whatever
you wish to say about what the character is doing e) Transition. Image, symbol, dialogue that joins
when speaking. paragraphs and scenes together.
6. Use setting and context. f) Flashback. Remembering something that
happened before the short story takes place.
a) Setting includes the time, location, context, and
atmosphere where the plot takes place. g) Climax. When the rising action of the story
Remember to combine setting with reaches the peak.
characterization and plot.
h) Falling Action. Releasing the action of the story
b) Include enough detail to let your readers picture after the climax.
the scene but only details that add something to
the story. (For example, do not describe Mary i) Resolution. When the internal or external
locking the front door, walking across the yard, conflict is resolved.
opening the garage door, putting air in her bicycle
8. Create conflict and tension.
tires, getting on her bicycle–none of these details
matter except that she rode out of the driveway Conflict produces tension that makes the story
without looking down the street.) begin. Tension is created by opposition between
the character or characters and internal or external
c) Use two or more senses in your descriptions of
forces or conditions. By balancing the opposing
setting.
forces of the conflict, you keep readers glued to the
d) Rather than feed your readers information about pages wondering how the story will end.
the weather, population statistics, or how far it is to
Yourke’s Conflict Checklist
the grocery store, substitute descriptive details so
your reader can experience the location the way a) Mystery. Explain just enough to tease readers.
your characters do. Never give everything away.

7. Set Up the Plot b) Empowerment. Give both sides options.

Plot is what happens, the storyline, the action. c) Progression. Keep intensifying the number and
Jerome Stern says it is how you set up the situation, type of obstacles the protagonist faces.
where the turning points of the story are, and what
the characters do at the end of the story. d) Causality. Hold fictional characters more
accountable than real people. Characters who
Understanding these story elements for developing make mistakes frequently pay, and, at least in
actions and their end results will help you plot your fiction, commendable folks often reap rewards.
next short story.
e) Surprise. Provide enough complexity to prevent
readers predicting events too far in advance.
f) Empathy. Encourage reader identification with Her father drove up in a new 1964 Chevrolet
characters and scenarios that pleasantly or Impala, a replacement for the one that burned up.
(unpleasantly) resonate with their own sweet
d) Monologue. Character comments.
dreams (or night sweats).
I wish Tom could have known Sister Dalbec’s
g) Insight. Reveal something about human nature.
prickly guidance before the dust devils of Sin City
h) Universality. Present a struggle that most battered his soul.
readers find meaningful, even if the details of that
e) Dialogue. Characters converse.
struggle reflect a unique place and time.
f) Literal Image. Setting or aspect of setting
i) High Stakes. Convince readers that the outcome
resolves the plot.
matters because someone they care about could
lose something precious. Trivial clashes often The aqueducts were empty now and the sun was
produce trivial fiction. shining once more.
9. Build to a Crisis or Climax g) Symbolic Image. Details represent a meaning
beyond the literal one.
This is the turning point of the story–the most
exciting or dramatic moment. Looking up at the sky, I saw a cloud cross the
shimmering blue sky above us as we stood in the
While a good story needs a crisis, a random event
morning heat of Sin City.
such as a car crash or a sudden illness is simply an
emergency –unless it somehow involves a conflict
that makes the reader care about the characters.

10. Find a Resolution

The solution to the conflict. In short fiction, it is

difficult to provide a complete resolution and you
often need to just show that characters are
beginning to change in some way or starting to see
things differently.

Yourke examines some of the options for ending a

story.

a) Open. Readers determine the meaning.

Brendan’s eyes looked away from the priest and up

to the mountains.

b) Resolved. Clear-cut outcome.

While John watched in despair, Helen loaded up

the car with her belongings and drove away.

c) Parallel to Beginning. Like the beginning

situation or image.

They were driving their 1964 Chevrolet Impala

down the highway while the wind blew through their
hair.