There are as many different ways to tell a story as there are people. There is no right way to tell it… but there are many, many ways to go very, very wrong. This is just a list of things I try to keep in mind when I write, and in no particular order.
Telling a story is not reporting the news. It is not enough to simply cover who, what, when, where, and why – in fact, it is often preferable to intentionally leave large holes where one or more of these questions is concerned. If you paint the whole picture, there’s nothing left for the reader to do except read, at which point your story might as well be a textbook. A compelling story requires an investment of imagination from the reader. Your job is to provide only enough of the story to prime that pump.
Details are important. They bring the story to life, provide an opportunity for themes and running threads, and give you handles with which to tie different parts of the story together. Still, you want to use detail very sparingly. The story is not the details, and if you bury your reader in minutia your tale will be lost to the noise. What details you provide should be authentic, meaning not incorrect, but they should be no more specific than you’d expect a layperson to follow. If you have a character ordering a laptop, for instance, “Dude, you’re getting a Dell!” is sufficient. There’s nothing to be gained by having him order an HP 6715b CNU6719SQR#ABA with the 3-year-warranty, and likely something to be lost.
Details should be relevant. If I make a point of explaining that the partial gravity is 15/64thsG instead of a proper 1/4G, then at some point that should play into the narrative (though at the moment I don’t actually know when or how). Details like this are often used as foreshadowing. It’s a common convention.
Typically it is best to obey common conventions. Typically it is best to maintain a consistent tense, a consistent voice, a consistent pace. Any of these rules can be broken for effect, but it’s best not to abuse narrative stunts.
It’s important to establish environment, but it’s important to establish it from the character’s perspective. You must not abandon the story just to wander off and explain something. Doing this stops the story, breaks the reader’s stream of imagination, and requires you to re-prime the pump when you’re done rambling. Much better to have it explained as part of the character’s experience and maintain continuity. (for instance, I can’t say “the Deltas carry Converters” and then launch into some ramble about what a Converter is. It is OK for the reader to wonder about that until one of the characters, who cares what a converter is, wanders down to the contraption and experiences it for himself)
Character’s appearances should only be described to the extent demanded by the story. If it is important that the character be blonde and beautiful, say only that the character is blonde and beautiful. It will be much more meaningful to your reader to picture what is beautiful to them.
Personality development is boring. Nobody cares that Bob is gruff, arrogant, and authoritarian, at least not just to read about it like that. If you cannot demonstrate a character trait through the character’s actions, then it just doesn’t matter. Characters are people, too, and are as apt as anyone you know to do incredibly stupid things. You must let them, you cannot force your characters to do things that are, ahem, “out of character” or they will not be believable.
Narrative should move. A picture is worth a thousand words, but a thousand words paint a very boring picture if that picture is not moving. Your only tool with which to create this motion is words, and any that are spent that do not propel your story forward are wasted energy. If your words stagnate, your reader stagnates.
Not only should narrative move, it should already be moving on the very first word. There is no ‘A long, long time ago’. So what if it was a Dark and Stormy night. It was neither the best nor worst of times, and you are (probably) not Dickens. These sorts of openings are fine for a fairy tale, but you don’t want to open your novel with “Once upon a time there was a gunfight,” you want to open with “Burly McBaddass crouched behind the garden wall, listening as the bullets whistled around him – and then he heard his chance. He sprang and returned fire, at least one round finding its mark. Sometimes, Burly thought, opportunity sounds like an empty magazine hitting the ground.”
You must be authentic. If you don’t believe it, your reader won’t believe it. If you cannot see it in your mind, neither can your reader. If you’re boring yourself, imagine how it’s going to feel to someone else.
If you have any hope of writing a good story, you must read good stories. Everybody knows when they’ve read a good story. Everybody knows when they’ve read a bad story. Read a lot of both. Pay attention to what makes them good, and what makes them bad, and strive to bring good in and push bad out of your own work.
And finally, probably most important of all, don’t believe a word anybody else tells you about how to write, including these, because nobody can write your story except you, and you have to do what works for you.
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