by Jacob Woods

Created on: September 18, 2011

Writing short stories is an important part of our creative, academic, and professional lives. Of course not all professions will be required to write short stories, but most people will be required at one point in their life to write a short story. Many people enjoy the craft and are looking to improve how to go about writing a short story. Fortunately, there are many ways to approach the process.

A short story can be difficult because you must include characters, conflict, resolution, and an underlying message in a rather short space on the page. The great thing about short stories is they often make up longer fictional pieces in novels and creative non-fiction. Mastering the short story is mastering the skill of fictional writing.

Characters – The first question to answer is who are your characters? Your character can just be a single person going through a small internal conflict. Or you could have multiple characters who are having a conflict in the story. The key is deciding who those characters are. What is their personality profile? For a great character building tool, use personality pages to read about different personalities. Now accompany that personality with a list of real life experiences. Answer questions like, how does this character view the world and how would they act in any given situation? What motives and fears do they have based on their personality?

Plot – In a short story your plot line needs to be relatively short lived. Though, a lot can happen in a short story. Where does your character start? Where does your character end? This question must be answered emotionally, time wise, through location, and more. What happens to the character and why? What brings that character through to their resolution? Are they happier or angrier at the end? And what does that leave your reader with?

Message – A message can be difficult to work into the course of a short story. Nonetheless, a good underlying moral or purpose of the story is essential to the elements of a good short story. Is the message that everyone can reach happiness? Is it that everyone is terrible at their core? Is it the fact that evil bunnies can find true love at the end of a brilliant rainbow? What is the underlying purpose of the story?

Conflict – The message can only be brought out by using the elements of fictional writing. One way a writer does that is by illustrating conflict. The conflict must arise, and must be resolved. And in longer works, the conflict may not be completely solved until later in the book. The craft is to get the reader to continue reading. And sometimes readers are never satisfied with the solution of the conflict.

These are the elements of a short story that are most important to consider. And these portions are brought out through a careful selection of words. The shorter the story, the more important the word choice. Choose carefully!

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