  Short Stories
This week: The "Rules", Part One Edited by: Jay's debut novel is out now!  
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This issue:
The "Rules", Part One
Ever feel like you don't know "the rules" of writing? Worry not, no one really does...
What's a writing "rule" you don't understand or want to know more about? |
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So recently I've gotten into some interesting conversations about the "rules" of writing and I've been thinking about it in more detail, because I think it's something we all run into at some point in the writing process.
The unspoken, or perhaps spoken-but-often-repeated-incorrectly, advice is something we all run into as part of the reviewing and critiquing process as well. I think most of us are guilty of not really fully understanding a common truth or two. I find a lot of the things people parrot as "rules" can be quite confusing and may even hold the writer back. Simply repeating the instructions without a greater understanding of what they're meant to teach you is a hindrance. I'm generally of the school of thought that one needs to know the rules in order to break them, but that requires breaking down some of these rules into less complicated pieces.
I've spent an entire newsletter on my personal bugbear of parroted advice, "Show, don't tell," in ye olde archives: "That "Show, Don't Tell" Thing Again"
It's an especially complicated one because it's very tempting to adhere to it, but it's very easy to go overboard in demonstrating something rather than describing it plainly so that you can be easily understood. It's tempting to test your simile and metaphor engines to avoid boring and repetitive description, but it's worth considering some scenarios where this can be really problematic.
Describing skin colors, for example: while it has been done in published work, it's really not ideal in contemporary writing to compare the color of a person to a food or beverage. It's much more simple to say what they are (avoiding "yellow" and "red" and other colors that aren't actually skin tones). Frankly, I think "don't compare people to food" is a good rule to adhere to, and it might be one of my few writer rules that I WILL stick to! Avoid the temptation to describe someone in overly flowery language, just tell us who they are.
I definitely want to encourage you to think about other places where demonstration of details is more important than simply stating the facts! Only writing in factual statements makes things sound like a police report, so use that simile and metaphor engine on the world around your characters instead.
I'm opening the forum, as it were, and see what kinds of rules everyone finds are their least favorite or least understood "rules" of writing. What do you find frustrating or wish were better explained? Let me know and I'll try to come up with some more in-depth advice or explanations for some of them! I would love to help clarify or break down those "rules" of the road that are confusing, often given out incomplete, or just plain confusing!
Until next time,
Take Care and Write on!
Jay |
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I received a lot of really great feedback on "A Classic Formula" : some of it to my personal email and some of it to the newsletter mailbox. Apologies if I missed anyone, like I said, there were quite a few!
Casey  writes:
Thanks so much for supplying that skeleton for a short story. I shy away from writing shorts or flash fiction because there is nothing in front of me as a guide to control. I will use the Dent formula as a guideline and try my hand at shorts for a change.
I write mainly form poetry because I have practiced so much that I now do it without thinking. With that Form comes a sense of freedom. So Form/Structure (following an outline) does 'free you up' to get at the heart of what you are trying to create and makes the writing a lot more fun.
Excellent! That's exactly what this form is for, and don't be afraid to bend it or change the shape a little, it's just there to help free you up to think about the details that really make the story yours.
Quick-Quill  writes:
What you've just described is laid out in Larry Brooks' Story Engineering. I have been to a number of his seminar's and our writing group used his books as workbooks. He has a meandering style, but his basic concept works. So many pages this should happen, then another so many pages and this should happen... If you read your favorite books they fall right into his graph, give or take a few pages.
Yes, many have relied on this formula over the years! It's deceptively simple. Michael Moorcock in particular during the heyday of his pulp anti-hero, Elric, used an inflated version of this same form to generate novellas around 60k in length, and specifically references the Harvey Dent model in his guide to the "three-day novel."
Innerlight Author  writes:
Dear Editor, I like thinking outside the box that way my stories take on a life of their own.
I think that's true for a lot of writers! Do you have any good suggestions for ways you've done well with the outside-the-box approach? I think it would be really engaging for others here as well.
p2kpradeep writes:
Usually when I write shorts, I just focus on telling the story as it unravels in my imagination. It is hard to follow a vague formula like "Introduce the characters and the conflict in the first 1/4 of the narration". One character may need to be introduced only toward the end, while another may qualify only for a brief mention somewhere in between. In some stories the conflict may become evident post the half-way mark, while in some others a subtle hint of conflict may be present throughout till the end (hope that makes sense). By the way, I could share the draft of my recent unpublished short (about 850 words), as an academic case in point, and would be obliged if you or someone else could review it in light of such a structural formula as is mentioned in this post. Many thanks in advance
I'd love to see what you're talking about if you'd like to submit it for the newsletter. I am not sure that I agree that adding a character very late in a short story is a good idea; I find that in general a character added very late to a story under 2000 words is being added to supplement a flaw that occurs earlier in the work; there is not a lot of space to accomodate a large cast of characters in a short story, so one really needs to make each one count.
It's entirely true that subtle hints of conflict may be present throughout but I'm not sure where that contradicts the advice to make sure that you start right out with the conflict. The "level" of conflict varies from story to story but no matter how mild or dire it still needs to be *compelling.* Hope that helps clarify a bit? Let me know!
Boulden Shade (fka Jeff Meyer) writes:
I have to agree on your pick of John Yossarian's "The Story Box." That was a hell of a story.
I also agree with your general blueprint to writing a short story. Essentially, those are the elements you need for ANY story. How we get there varies greatly. Some people use an outline; some (like me) start writing and let the story take them wherever it's going. But the fact is that the character, setting, conflict, and resolution all need to be there.
Your point about word count was a sore spot to read. Fact is, magazines, contests, etc have word-count parameters. I'm not a guy that likes to keep track of word count, but your emphasis on this reminded me that, to be a good writer, I need to START keeping track.
Good newsletter; I think is IS helpful. Thanks for posting this for all of us to read.
I'm really glad you enjoyed it! I try to pick a little of everything but every once in a while I run into a story I can't refuse, yknow? And thank you for grasping the larger point of the blueprint! It's definitely not the most intuitive way to write, if you're the kind of person who needs to find your way into a story.
One method for working with this kind of outline I've found works for me if I'm running high on the wordcount is to use it when I'm editing rather than in the initial drafting if I need to whittle down, so that I'm sure to keep the core elements and maybe cut out that non-essential subplot even if it was fun to write.
Thanks, yinz! Please don't forget to write in about the writing "rules" you don't like or don't understand and if I get some good ones, I'll make them the topic of a future newsletter!
All the best,
Jay
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Short Stories: September 13, 2017 Issue [#8502]
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