Writing Advice

Writing Advice:
Writing A Story

There are so many things involved in writing a story, that attempting to cover them all is simply impossible. For one thing, how does one person's creative process work versus another's? What is the author's background? What is the author's education? Is the author writing in a second language? Et cetera.

So I'm not going to try to tackle everything. I'm just going to focus on a few things that apply when writing a story, be it a vignette, a short story, a novella, or a novel. In each case, the following six things apply: Point of View, Drama, Characters, Dialogue, Style, and Voice.

Point of View

Point of view (POV) is all about the narrative and is surprisingly difficult for some to grasp, because it is a rather abstract concept. Point of view is literally the lens through which the story is seen. Think of it as a movie camera, through which the story is told. There are three basic points of view: first-person, second-person, and third-person. First-person is where you would express action in terms of "I" or "we." Second-person is where you would express action in terms of "you." Third-person is where you would expression action in terms of "he"/"she"/"it"/"they." For sake of pragmatism, only first and third will be elaborated on here.

If a story is written purely from first person, then the only things seen are from the perspective of one character. This can make for a very personal feel to the story, and lead to good characterization, if things experienced are compared with past experiences. However, this can also mean that nothing is depicted outside of that one character's direction contact. I have a series of fantast novels I'm working on that I wanted to use a purely first-person POV. So, to not be limited to seeing only what is in the character's Platonic cave, I had to come up with a mechanism for the character to see beyond those stone walls. I came up with something that I think is pretty cool ... with magic.

Stories written purely from third-person focus on the person (or people) being talked about. In my experience, most stories are typically written in first or third person. For example, when Bob lost his balance and fell from the ledge, the crowd gasped and screamed in horror. As you can see, this is written from the perspective of a disembodied narrator who describes what the characters do and what happens to them. You don't see directly through a character's eyes, like you would in a first-person narrative. However, the narrator might be an omniscient narrator, who describes the character's thoughts and feelings about whatever might be going on.

Closely related to POV is perspective. When shifting from sub-chapter to sub-chapter, or from chapter to chapter, or from one story to another, you can change perspective. In essence, this is changing which character is holding the movie camera. This can be a great tool, showing how one person experienced, say, a brutal fight that he only survived due to luck, as opposed to someone watching the same fight, who thought the person was the most amazing warrior ever and was never in any kind of danger. The problem is where you change perspective without making it clear. I don't recommend changing perspective unless you are at least shifting from one sub-chapter to another. It can become confusing otherwise.

Drama

I was reading something fantasy author Stephen R. Donaldson (The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever) wrote about drama. He went into some depth, but the summary goes pretty much like this. Every story has three essential characters: the hero, the villain, and the victim. He defined drama as the process of the characters in the story changing from one of those roles to the next. This sort of realism is why I categorize Donaldson's fantasy novels as "realistic fantasy." They are real people, with flaws, who make mistakes, not all white knights who never do anything wrong or make the wrong choices.

So what else goes into creating drama? We already touched on POV (who tells the story), but there is also deciding what each character knows about events. How did they learn the things they know? What more do they learn throughout the story? (Or refuse to learn?) What do they miss due to point of view or other circumstances? Last, at what cost do they learn these things and how do they impact them, their relationships, or even their ability to survive?

All of these things come down to one word: conflict. It is essential to existence. If there was no conflict, then there would be no progress or evolution. For example, if no one was unhappy with being limited to a landline telephone, then there would never have been reason for a wireless phone. So, if you're one of those people who hear the word "conflict" and gasp, then stop. Not only is it essential to existence, but it's also essential to making a story interesting. In other words, no conflict? Then why am I even reading this? It's boring and has absolutely nothing to do with the real world.

Characters

Characters are just as critical as anything else in the story. Depending on the size of the document, you may not need many characters. For an epic, it's probably going to require more than a few. For one thing, it might get old if the villain never seems to actually die. The light of life is gone ... then he gets back up ... he loses his arm ... but he keeps fighting ... then his other arm ... then his leg ... then the other leg ... then he threatens to bite somebody's ankles off. Might be funny, but not great for maintaining drama and tension. At some point, it makes the story so ridiculous that it's now funny (which sucks if it's not supposed to be funny), or the reader just says, "I'm done," and throws the book aside (which sucks on every level). So there should be layers of characters: main characters, secondary characters, et cetera. Again, think about a movie: you have the main characters, then the supporting cast, then the extras. They're each essential in their own way. That being said, even the supporting cast should be memorable, even if not as amazing as the main cast.

Dialogue

Decision: will this story have any dialogue? Some don't. Some are all about the dialogue. In fact, Plato wrote almost entirely in that form: dialogue. His books were almost completely actual discussions that he has with Socrates, or idealized discussions that might have taken place had they discussed a certain topic, or when Plato was writing after Socrates' death.

I had a teacher tell me in high school that I should show, not tell. In other words, describe an event, rather than having the characters talk about it. Well ... to an extent, that's true. But what about after the event? Do the characters talk about what happened? Do they refuse to talk about it? Does the dialogue illustrate something otherwise unrealized? To take the previous example of the fight survived by mere luck, the warrior might learn how he or she is actually perceived by discussing the events with another character or overhearing a discussion. Otherwise, it would be very difficult to learn what the other person thinks and/or feels.

Dialogue can also lead to misunderstanding. Face it, people are imperfect, and communication is imperfect. Unless the characters can establish direct telepathic communication with each other, they will never understand exactly what the other person means. There will always be gaps. So where the drama (or comedy) comes in is how one character fills in those blanks.

Style

Some stories, especially poetry, can be all about style. When writing a poem, particularly if follows a specific rhyme or meter, form can override content. How are you writing your sentences? How are you breaking down your paragraphs? (Hint: really long paragraphs can make the reader get lost. Imagine yourself glancing away, then looking back and saying, "Wait ... where was I?")

What words are you using? Will your audience understand your jargon? Or is it a conscious choice to never say a specific word, because you are wanting to effect a different look and feel? For example, although there is magic in my New Blood Saga, not once does anyone ever say the word "magic," and never is it included in the narration. Are you describing the sounds around an event? How about the smells? If you think that describing all five senses is necessary, then do it!

Voice

According to a blog published by Carlow University:

a writer's voice refers to the stylistic mix of vocabulary, tone, point of view and syntax that makes words flow in a particular way. Written works can also represent multiple voices, including that of a narrator and individual characters or personas. The voice in a piece of writing is a defining characteristic that touches the reader instinctively.

In layman's terms, if someone reads what you wrote and hears your spoken voice when reading it, then you probably have a strong written voice. If not, then it is probably in need of improvement, or it might not be desirable, such as when writing news. In the case of news, the writer is supposed to be invisible, the conduit for the message. (Editorials are a different story.)

Voice is an extremely difficult thing to teach. Yet it is essential. Ever read a book and, from the first page, it had a definite feel to it? Written voice directly contributes to its tone and mood, which can create a desired effect on readers. I've been telling my students for 25 years to read their work out loud, regardless of what it might be. First, your ear will pick up on things that you will miss when just reading quietly on the screen. Second, your ear can help pick up when something might have shifted in the story. For example, you're tired, so you're getting the skeleton of events down, but it's not as fleshed out as earlier work that day, when you were fresh. It's one more tool in your writer's toolbox.

So there it is. A look at I'm not going to try to tackle everything. I'm just going to focus on a few things that apply when writing a story, be it a vignette, a short story, a novella, or a novel. In each case, the following six things apply: Point of View, Drama, Characters, Dialogue, Style, and Voice.

W.D. Kilpack III: Official Web Site