Writing is a fascinating journey. You may have started off your creative writing journey by creating exciting bedtime stories for the kids, or journaling your thoughts or life experiences as a personal cathartic exercise for the soul. This is an excellent way to start, but if you want to improve your writing skills so that you can write a compelling story, it is time to take your writing to the next level.
A writer who wants to grow in their craft needs to carefully plan out their story, create a strong narrative foundation, consider a range of narrative perspectives, and make strategic decisions regarding plot and character relationships.
For new writers, this may seem overwhelming, but to become a good writer, whether it is writing a short story or novel, the importance of building a compelling story rests on knowing how to build a multi-layered storytelling world. A story world that is vibrant and pulsating with life will grab your reader’s attention and hold it until the very last word.
Take Your Writing to the Next Level
Firstly, a writer needs to be a dedicated reader. Do not despair if you find yourself struggling to read an entire book. There are many storytelling mediums available that will fit your individual learning style: watching a film or television or even taking part in an online writers’ community like Scriggler.
Reading a book will start you off with the basics of how to tell a story. A book has so many advantages for a writer: it is a blueprint for story continuity, character design, it can expand your imagination, teach you about the beauty of language, and take you on a great adventure.
Narrative Building Blocks
- Story ideas: Create an Original Story Idea
In the 21st century, storytelling media has saturated our everyday lives, and it can feel like the creative ideas pool has already been fished out, but with a little creative brainstorming. a wealth of unique story ideas can be discovered.
A creative exercise that will inspire you is genre mixing. Why not try combining two genres like romance and horror or crime and comedy.
- Create a Visually Interesting Opening Paragraph
Creating a visually interesting opening paragraph is paramount to how your reader will experience the rest of the story. The opening paragraph is usually where the setting for the story is first presented to the reader. The best type of setting is one that creates a strong visual for your reader.
Your setting could be a fantasy world, a spaceship, a haunted shack in the woods. Strong action is a great choice like a car chase through city streets. Why not start by introducing your main character, like a vampire who is on the hunt for a new victim in a Dystopian world, or a detective who is interviewing a serial killer. By creating an interesting opening paragraph that your reader can visualize, they will be intrigued and motivated them to continue their journey through your story.
- Narrative Discourse: Making Strategic Decisions
Narrative discourse is the telling of a story. When you start to think about your narrative discourse, strategic planning 101 needs to come into play.
Ask yourself these three questions:
1. Will I start my story start at the end or in the middle of the story?
3. Where will I place the climax (the turning point in a story)?
4. Where shall the rising action or the falling action (the results or the effects of conflict) – take place?
- Don’t Lose the Plot: Create an Exciting Plot
The plot is the order in which the story events are arranged in the narrative. How you organize your plot events can make or break your story.
I am a big believer in story planning. Although writing (especially short story writing) contains a lot of spontaneity, or “let’s just see where the characters take me,” type of feeling, writing a longer narrative like a novel becomes a little easier when there is planning involved.
Learning from professional screenwriters can also help with writing a short story or novel. A lot of screenwriters use a storyboard before they write their screenplay, so before you start writing, try using 8 x 10 speech cards. Using a writer’s program like Final Draft, it a great idea for all writers as it has an easy to use storyboarding option. Storyboarding can help you to arrange and rearrange events to determine which is the best choice for the overall story. The end result will be an exciting plot that will keep the reader glued to the page.
- Character Development: Creating Dynamic Characters
Characters are the most important narrative elements in your story. They are the eyes and ears of your storyworld and they act as active agents who drive the plot forward. They get things done, they react to situations and to other characters. They put the heart and soul into your story. The dialogue and monologues uttered by heroes and villains are often words we fear to say in real life. We can make our characters do things that we are afraid to do in our everyday lives. Creating characters is my favorite part of storytelling.
A good story needs dynamic characters that will grab the attention of the reader. More than just character creation, a writer needs to pay special attention to detailed characterization.
Characterization relates to the personality and idiosyncrasies of each character and includes the external description of a character, as well as their thoughts and feelings.
Character conflict provides movement, that feeling of ebb and flow, and that all important power struggle between two opposing forces: person vs person, God/fate, society, nature etc. The more detailed your character is and the amount of conflict they face will determine how much your reader will be captivated by them, and in turn, be enthralled by your story.
Focalization is the selection or restriction of narrative information in relation to the experience and knowledge of the narrator, or the character. It is through a character’s focalization that the reader can see, hear, and ultimately experience events in the story-world.
It is in the initial planning stages of your story where you can decide who your main focalizer or character is going to be. Will it be your main character or the narrator who provides omniscient narration: the person who knows everything about the characters and the story-world?
You could choose to have dual focalizers.
Margaret Atwood’s novel The Blind Assassin turns traditional storytelling on its head through the use of complex narration.
The Blind Assassin is predominately set in the mid-1930s and follows the conflicted lives of two sisters, Iris and Laura, whose relationship is bound by the endless cycle of abuse at the hands of Iris’s husband, Richard. This groundbreaking novel combines realism with gothic suspense, romance, and science fiction.
Throughout the novel, Atwood uses dual-character narration – first-person narration and third-person narration.
Iris plays the part of both narrative storyteller and character focalizer as she observes and comments on Laura’s harrowing experiences while also documenting her own personal literary journey. The use of a third person narration is used in alternate chapters to present Laura as a silent victim of abuse with no name.
This type of storytelling is not for everyone, but it depends on the type of story you want to tell. It can also help you to discover and develop your unique writing signature that will set you apart from other writers.
Interior Monologue: Exploring a Character’s Inner World
An interior monologue or (streams of consciousness) is a technique that is used to convey the thoughts and feelings of a character directly to the reader. Although this technique should be used sparingly, it provides an extra dimension to characterization, as the reader is given intimate access to the psychology of a character.
I have provided just a few narrative building blocks that will help you to take your writing to the next level. Although there are no hard and fast rules when it comes to storytelling, by putting into practice these building blocks or creative writing tips, you will create a compelling story that will captivate your reader.
Happy Writing!
Reference:
Atwood, M 2000, The Blind Assassin: A Novel, Anchor Books, a Division of Random House, Inc., New York. https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Assassin-Novel-Margaret-Atwood/dp/0385720955