I’ve just returned from a short story workshop in Oregon. I had to read around 240 stories by different authors before attending. Although I work with new authors and have been a member of various critique groups, this was the largest volume of stories I’ve read in a short period. If nothing else, it would certainly make me think twice about editing a magazine. 

However, you do learn a lot from such a process. I’ve been writing short fiction for several years now, and sold around 40 stories. But the experience of reading so many from a wide range of professional authors has got me thinking about the fundamentals of short fiction writing, away, perhaps, from the more prescriptive ‘do this, don’t do that’ guide books on the subject. 

Short stories are, after all, the closest equivalent we have to story-telling around the community fire. It may now be more a case of the individual in front of the screen but the principles probably haven’t changed so much. The question is, what exactly are the principles of good story-telling? 

At this point, I can feel the teachy tug towards talking about the 7-point plot structure, Show Not Tell, POV, etc. But I’m going to resist it, mainly because I think one of the reasons there is a high degree of predictability about a lot of short fiction today is that the craft lessons begin too far forward. 

So, in the beginning . . . 

A very long time ago, before there were galaxies far, far away, the universe was awash with energy that only wanted to expand and be free and playful and spiritual. But every time it tried to express itself nothing appeared, just some inarticulate pulses that rapidly faded away. 

And so energy had to slow down somewhat, take a bit of time to build a platform or two on which to perform. Planets were formed, full of theatrical possibilities: mountains and seas and animals and weather and pain and pleasure. Now there’d be some shows! Energy passed into all the different bits of matter, and lives were played out in births and deaths and the journeys in-between. 

And yet . . . it all became rather predictable after a time. Something was missing. The cycles of the planets and the lives upon them were always the same. Perhaps it was because the universe was in effect telling its own story. An independent story-teller therefore might change things. 

And so the writer was created. 

Always torn between paying the bills and letting rip with his imagination. Or his imagination and the desire to win prizes. Or to be loved. Or to be respected by his peers. Or whether to go with a PC or a Mac. His head is part god and part boulder. Which wouldn’t be so bad if he decided before writing anything what balance to aim for between the two. But instead, he gets an idea, or steals one from someone else, putting it down to simply borrowing from the collective writers’ pot, then gets half way through the story before realising he doesn’t know why he’s writing it. Not wanting to waste all those words, however, he carries on anyway and finishes it. Sends it out. Is rejected. Is bought. 

Before he knows it, his writing is running along a well-worn channel, the only problem being that he doesn’t really know where the channel starts or finishes. And the problem with any well-worn channel is that it tends to be predictable and therefore joyless, lacking in surprise, delight and excitement. 

Just to complicate things, a writer has two beginnings. His first is when, without a care in the world, he writes stories with both eyes on the stars. Words flow and creativity fires his blood. The trouble is, no one can get the energy from his pages; it’s got no matter to perform through. So, he has to learn the matter stuff: to put together the prose platforms on which his story can be enacted. 

Every kind of writer then starts from the same place. At least they do in terms of technique. But all that learning has dulled their beginning place. They know how to write, so they write, and straight away they’re zooming along that well-worn channel. They may even make a lot of money in the process. But they may also never recover the thrill of the first beginner writer they used to be with eyes fixed on the stars. 

So, I think a true writer has to find the true beginning of every story. It won’t be in the selection of a stock character to fit a stock setting to solve a stock problem. The end of its tail will be flying about in a blood-fizzing ocean storm of joy, whether dark or funny or charming or painful. He’ll resist the channel and spend some time trying to grab hold of that tail, knowing that when he catches it, the ride will be a joint one: its energy, the matters that he’s learned, and most important of all, his desire to produce something unique from all three. 

Next: finding the true universals . . .