TECHNIQUES TO WRITING A GREAT STORY

Just as a good soup must have certain ingredients to make it delicious and tasty, so also, a captivating and interesting story must also have certain techniques to be captivating and keep the reader interested.

Below are the techniques needed to make a great story:

a.     Action: this is what you or the character did/does in the story. To write this, you need to ask yourself a question. What did I do?  Write down the actions done in details. Unfortunately most of us write stories with just actions - actions only will make your story boring.

a.     Feelings/Emotions: Here you add details of how you or the character you are writing about feels, their thoughts and what they are worrying about. Writers should know that everyone has a reservoir of emotions. At one time, our readers have been happy, sad, angry, and hungry. The only way to tap into their emotional reservoir is to express the feelings of the characters.

a.     Description: This is when you give the reader details of what you see, hear or feel. The reader wants to see the setting of the story, the characters and things happening around the writer. This can only be possible when you describe, giving your reader a mental picture of what you are talking about. By describing, you give life to your story.

a.     Dialogue: What did you or the characters in your story say? These are the exact words said by the characters. It must be inside an inverted comma or quotation marks. Example “Where are you coming from?” grandpa said with a frown on his face.

A dialogue enables the reader to know the character’s personality. However, you must be careful not to fill your narrative with dialogues.

When these four techniques are applied, readers are interested and writing becomes captivating. So, when next you are writing a narrative, let this four techniques come in handy.

Have fun writing and teaching!

Esther Chibuzor,

Your Writing Coach. 



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