Story will always survive!  Oh Yes!

Story is a timeless, indestructible force--because we hunger to know everything we can about what it means to be human.       

During the late 50s and early 60s there was a TV cop show, Naked City (based upon a 1940s book by Ralph Willett) with a tagline that said: "There are eight million stories in the Naked City...and this has been one of them." That's just a drop in the bucket!  With all of the books in all of the libraries all over the world, there is still room on the shelf for one more!

Ideas for stories come from everywhere. You overhear a phrase in a restaurant or whispered in a corner of the library and it sticks in your mind; you see a little boy protectively holding a potted plant while waiting for the bus; there's an old chair sitting out by the curb that wasn't there yesterday and you notice how forlorn it looks. Whatever it is, it's haunting you and you find yourself spinning a story around it.  Now what?  

The First Questions:

1.  Ask yourself why you need to write this story.  Think about that carefully.  If you don't need to write it, chances are good that you may never finish it. You should write about things, people, concerns that have meaning for you.    

2.  Who is this story about?  And what does this person want more than anything in the world?

3.  Who is the person (or persons or environment or event or physical restrictions) most likely to keep your character from fulfilling his or her want?   Why?   

4.  Is what your main character wants strong enough to interest a potential reader?   In other words, would you want to read this story if someone else wrote it?

5.  What is your main character's back story?  (A back story is what happened to your main character before the story started.)  What is he or she doing when you're not around?  If they're not doing anything but are neatly tucked away between the covers of your notebook until you can get to them again, you haven't breathed life into them yet.

6.  Are you able to walk in the shoes of all your characters?  Can you see things from each character's point of view?  This is how you make characters three-dimensional.  You may not like the bully or ingrate in your story but if you know why they do what they do, that character will have more depth.

7.  Who is going to tell the story?  Is he or she going to tell it in the first person (I saw...) or third person (she saw...)?

8.   Where is your story going to take place?  This is the setting for your story.  Setting and season definitely influence your characters and their actions.  Write a brief sketch of your story's setting. Small town?  Big city?  Apartment building? Hospital room?  Close your eyes and watch your characters interacting.  Where are they?  They are, or should be, somewhere other than floating in air.  What time of year is it?   See it in your mind.  That's the setting.  You get the idea.  

9.   How are you planning to grab your reader's attention?  What conflict can you see on page one of your story that will make readers want to read on to see what happens?  Stories have to have conflict of some kind.  Even comedies have conflict.  No conflict equals a quick slide into boredom.

10.  How do you plan to resolve the conflict?  Think of the various outcomes your story could have.  Fiction is not a blow by blow manifesto of real life; it is a heightened emphasis upon a few focused events built to validate your story.  Coincidences happen in everyday life but they rarely ring true in fiction.  So, unless coincidence is a plausible outgrowth of your story, stay away from it. Your outcome can be funny, shocking, heartbreaking, or comforting, but it has to be valid.  Which of the outcomes you come up with rings the truest?  Go for it.  

Whether you're planning to write a short story or a novel, these first few questions, carefully thought through, will give you a foundation upon which to build so you don't lose your way.

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 In the meantime, enjoy some of my favorite writer quotes!

Stanley Elkin: I would never write about anyone who is not at the end of his rope.

Somerset Maugham: You can never know enough about your characters.

Mark Twain: Don't say the old lady screamed--bring her on and let her scream.

Flannery O'Connor: You can't clobber a reader while he's looking.  You divert his attention, then you clobber him and he never knows what hit him.
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