Welcome to the philosophical and spiritual musings of...
Blogging Dating Politics Relationships Personal Development Spirituality
 

Monday, November 07, 2005

Eight rules for writing fiction

I found this on the weekend and thought it was excellent advice for a budding young (or not so young) writer such as myself. I thought I'd share it with you:
  1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.

  2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.

  3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

  4. Every sentence must do one of two things -- reveal character or advance the action.

  5. Start as close to the end as possible.

  6. Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them -- in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

  7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

  8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.
-- Vonnegut, Kurt Vonnegut, Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons 1999), 9-10.
Categories:

Posted on 11/07/2005 10:33:00 AM


If you have found value in what Alan (the author) has given you, please leave a donation for him so you can enjoy the spirit of giving too.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment


(C) Alan Howard 1998 - 2006