How I Put A Story Together

[Ruby]

Hi Gregsta,

Your next assignment is another photo story.

Your task is to pick one person from this picture, and create a short story from that character's point of view.

This story it to be told in the "First Person Perspective".
To read more about this perspective, check out the first reading assignment.

Here is your photo:

http://www.bdsmlibrary.com/forums/at...2&d=1157104565

Please start a new thread - in the Level Three area - for this assignment as we will be practicing different view points for the same photo.

Have fun!

Ruby

[Sir_G]

How many stories do I have in progress at one time? I think the most was two. I tend to like finishing what I start before moving on to the next, otherwise I feel very scattered and lose motivation.

At this stage I've only ever tackled short stories. I've quite enjoyed the slightly longer short stories though. The feeling of satisfaction when they are finished is quite a high. When I finished "The Awakening", I felt stoned. Awesome experience.

If I think a story is good enough for an assignment I will use it as the assignment. Seperate assignments that have a specific theme or task are usually very challenging and force me to write outside my comfort zone. I'm trying to get my head around writing the next one from the photo in the first person. Very uncomfortable prospect that. (So thanks Ruby. Not.)

My prefered genre is anything that interests me at the time. I put together a newsletter for my Long board club and it is obviously surfing related. I love writing about it and the characters we have in the club. BDSM is a passion so I find it very easy to write about.

[Ruby]

Seperate assignments that have a specific theme or task are usually very challenging and force me to write outside my comfort zone. I'm trying to get my head around writing the next one from the photo in the first person. Very uncomfortable prospect that. (So thanks Ruby. Not.)

Excellent. It sounds like we stepped way out of your comfort zone. Purrrrfect!

[TheKnothead]

How do I put together a story? I’m kind of like Aesop in the old “shoot from the hip” style. I have an idea, or am given a topic. I let it germinate for a few days. I think about it, but I try not to think about it too hard and I don’t try to direct it in any way…just let whatever comes to mind show up. I should, but rarely ever have, written these ideas down…in no particular order.

At length, I have a basic idea of what my story is about, who’s in it and roughly what is going to happen. I then sit down and literally blast it into Word as fast as I can download it out of my head. I don’t care about structure, flow, spelling, grammar, or even if things are out of sequence. I just try to get all the highlights, key dialogue, imagery and action out of my head and on to paper, (into the document).

I then spend the next several days, or weeks cleaning it up, filling in gaps, finding the right words. Edit pass…after edit pass…after edit pass. I use version control; after each pass I do a save as and create a new document, so that my previous versions are still available to me. This lets me feel freer to chop things out, or mix things up, because I can always go back and retrieve discarded pieces if I want. I haven’t written very many stories and I should point out that the story I set out to write and the story I ended up with were rarely the same.

I would much prefer a more structured approach. I was just introduced to the triple “O” outline in level two. I think this has great potential use for me. I also am greatly impressed by the way some of the others here in this thread develop and focus on characters prior to giving much thought to the story line. I think that’s a fantastic idea…just never occurred to me, my characters just kind of develop in front of me as the story evolves.

So, how do I put together a story? So far, I’d have to say by dumb luck and determination.

[Ruby]

Thanks, TheKnothead, for sharing your tips and techniquies with us.

The Triple O outline, huh? I'll dash over to Level 2 to read up on that one.

As for longer pieces, those that start small and just keep getting bigger and bigger, character planning sheets can be a great aid.

Here are a few samples:

http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson...ning-sheet.pdf

http://www.gailmartin.com/character_work_sheet.htm

http://www.eharlequin.com/cms/learnt...=030113wz01001

Search on google for "character outline" and you'll find a bunch more. Find one you like and modify it for your own use. If you are writing a short story, you may need one, but if you are writing a series or anything bigger, they do come in handy.

Please let me know when you're ready for your next writing assignment.

Ruby

[cariad]

I have not written enough fiction to have an established pattern of how I work. However to date…

Assignment one for both level one and two. The basic idea evolved from seemingly nowhere, and I really cannot remember the process which led to the plot of the first part. Having got the basic plot worked out in my mind – something which could have been summed in about 25 words I then spent a little time, very relaxed, with my eyes closed ‘seeing’ that part of the story almost as a series of stills from a film. During the process the characters became real and as did their setting, and a few key lines also emerged. I made a note of those lines, although I found they were lodged in my memory anyway.

A few days later, when there were no time pressures or other distractions, I sat down in a favourite chair in a still part of the house with my laptop on my lap. I then closed my eyes, relaxed and allowed myself to drift back into the scenes I had previously imagined. I then just typed what was important, action, description, reactions, all as I saw them. At this point not bothering about spelling, typos, grammar or anything else. It took a few sessions like this to write each submission.

At the end of each session I went back and corrected any major errors, particularly typos which I might not be able to translate into English if I left them unattended too long!

When the whole was written, I read through it first silently to make sure there were no logistical errors, and then aloud to correct, or in cases to ‘de-correct’ the grammar and ensure that the flow was as good as I could make it.

My assignments in level 1 were then proof read. Those in level 2, for different reasons were not.

Assignment two for level one. Having instantly made the decision that this was not going to be a ‘so I was taken into the manager’s office and fucked by all the staff’ type fantasy story I thought it would write as though it were real life. I spent a little time choosing my characters and visualising the setting, and then I just sat down and wrote it, each time just thinking, and what would happen next. Having finished it, it went through the same proof reading process.

As I said, my pattern of writing is still in the very early stages of evolution. I would be reluctant to start recording an outline on paper/screen because it would then start to feel dead, although with a longer piece of work I can see myself putting down a series of key words or phrases.

cariad

[Sir_G]

Welcome to level 3 cariad. Ruby is a great teacher/mentor I think you will enjoy the challenge. Above all enjoy the writing.

[cariad]

Thank you Gregsta! I just hope I am up to it - but am determined to give it a shot - and with a little help from my friends - who knows....

hugs

Now then - where did maddie hide that chocolate? Quick, you can tell me now whilst she is not looking.

cariad

[maddie]

I am always looking at my chocolate, cariad. But I'm also always willing to share it with you.

[Ruby]

Did somebody say chocolate???

cariad,

Welcome to Level Three.

That was a wonderful explanation of the process you are going through with this story.

I sent you a PM with some options for your next assignment. Either way, let's keep your story going forward. Please open a new thread in level three, drop the first two parts of your story in it, and then continue. If you'd like to do a spelling and grammar refresh on the second part before your drop it in here, go for it.

To your continued success,

Ruby

[Rhabbi]

Like most of the respondants here, I tend to trip over ideas wherever I am. They just seem to pop up and then float around my head for a bit. The good ones seem to take on a life of their own, and develop plots and characters.

When writing I do not use an outline as this seems to stifle me. This is true even in school work where it would seem that I should be able to make an outline in advance. I recently took a college level course where I was supposed to turn in three different5 outlines for a research paper I was working on. This assignment was literally impossible for me to complete, the only way I can do an outline is to write the paper first, and I did not have enough time to write three seperate papaers, so I simply told the instuctor that I would not do the assignmet. As you can imagine this did not go over well, it seems I was the first poerson ever to say that to her.

Writng, to me, is about the free flow of words onto paper, not trying to force them into a preconceived notion. Every course I have ever taken has stressed the importance of outling, but my mind does not work that way. I have driven coworkers and study group members crazy as they tried to keep up with me. I put things off and do not folow a schedule, yet I always meet the deadline.

[anonymouse]

How do I put together a story?

I rarely draft outlines before I begin writing. What usually happens is I pick an idea (I always have a storm of them in my thoughts) for characters, setting, and something Stephen King calls the 'what if?'

My characters are an amalgam of various people I know or have met. As people I've known for many years, both in reality and through use of them in my stories, they become characterized with the idiosyncracies I know them to have. I find this very useful to invent characters that have a solid and believable identity. It also makes it very easy to write interactions of characters because, at one level I'm 'inventing' this but on another, I simple ask myself, 'What would (real person A) say in this situation?' or 'How would (real person B) react?' In other words, I find it a good way to animate my characters.

Settings are often also based on real life locations, or amalgams of various places. As with character animation, settings can be made more vivid when I add in memories of little details I might have noticed in the real world source. Often, as in real life, it isn't the big things that catch our attention but rather, small and seemingly insignificant details will pop out of the landscape. In other cases it might be something that is slightly incongruous to the setting -- an old-fashioned hat stand in an otherwise ultra-modern office, for example. It opens the gates to questions like 'Why is that here?' and 'What type of person wears a hat to work these days?' (refers back to characterization).

And lastly, the 'What if...?' factor. (Paraphrasing from memory) Stephen King describes it this way:

You take something you see every day that is so familiar to you that you never notice it. For example, one of those mechanical space ship rides you see in shopping malls everywhere. What if a five year old got into one of those and it really took him into space?

This approach isn't really any different to that used by researchers, except they refer to it as their problem statement or hypothesis.

So anyway, I wasn't sure whether this is Assignment 1 here, but there you have it -- how do I put together a story.

anonymouse

[Ruby]

Rhabbi and anonymouse,

Thank you for those wonderful posts.

It's clear you are both ready for this level.

Rhabbi, I chuckled through your comments about research paper. I once asked an programmer to estimate how long it would take him to write a new feature for a customer. He told me he didn't work that way and instead coded the feature, then informed me how long it took him. I'll spare you and won't ask you to do any outlines. :-)

I'm looking forward to reading your next assignment.

Anonymouse,

I nodded my head as I read your methodology for characters and places. I also find the "what if" a wonderful tool.

Please check your PMs in a few minutes and we can define your next assignment together.

Ruby

[anonymouse]

Thank you, Ruby. It's great to be here

anonymouse

[moptop]

I have so far used the 'shoot from the hip' method, because I have not completed anything other than short stories. However, most of the short stories I've written really aren't, or could not be: they could very well be the first chapter or two of something much bigger. My beginnings are easy: the characters (central characters), the place, the environment, the mood, the words, all flow out. Much the same as writing a poem: it is the moment of inspiration.

However, where I stick is with plot. I have several things that I have written, where this image, this world, these people have plonked themselves into me (and I have had to plonk all that onto paper quickly, because it is an over-riding demand on me). They appear unasked, unlooked for.

And then - what? some of these are years old. But I still think about them, still know them, and in fact am still working on them. The stories are emerging, gradually, gradually... and I know damn well that to make them come to fruition, I actually will have to sit down, concentrate and make myself write that plot down. I don't believe any outline I do will ever be chapter by chapter - that is part of the flow of the writing. And I certainly reserve the right to allow my plot to change as I go! but I know that I will need the tool to help me cristalise and clarify my ideas, and to understand whether I actually have a story that works.

Additionally, I have never written down my characters; but, I know this is because I always start with my principle characters, and they live in me, or I am them, when I write. There are some exceptions - generally, stories I have written as a specific exercise in writing, rather than ones that have arrived from the muse. In fact, only one story I started from inspiration has characters in that I really don't understand and need to study and consider in order to create them. I do recognise, however, that if I ever get my act together to work on one of the novels, then I will have to introduce various other characters, who I will have to create specifically. These people, I will actually need to make up a description and personality for, I know.

I read, re-read, re-type, read on screen and on paper (the printed word very often has a life of its own that just does not come out on screen. I make a lot of changes when I have the physical paper in my hands). I agonise. I put it away in a drawer...

I find writing from photographs an immense challenge. That is mainly because the photographs - at least, the ones given here - all seem to be the end of the story. How to get from the end back to the beginning, well! I would find it extremely difficult, but probably also very salutory, to have to do that. After all, it would make me actually create a complete story, rather than just having an idea and some words and throwing them at people.

Rhabbi, Anonymouse, very pleased to join you here.

[anonymouse]

Welcome to Level 3, moptop :-)

Your comments about writing stories to photos are interesting. Like you, I find it challanging but never really understood why it should be as difficult as it can be. You've clearly answered that for me and in fact, your explanation about having to write a reverse narrative makes the task much easier.

anonymouse

[Ruby]

Hi moptop,

Welcome again to Level 3!

About plotting:
If you think it's important, what is keeping you from doing it?

I often have a story idea in mind, with a few things that will happen, but other than that, I let my characters lead. Sometimes, in order to be true to them, the ending must be changed. Many times, I start in the middle of a story and write from the front and the back at the same time.

It's about whatever works for you.
Finding the right tools can be a huge timesaver.

Your comment about photographs is very interesting. I can see how many of them here appear to be the end of the story. Let's see if we can find some for you that are waiting for the "what happens next?" question to be answered.

Write on!

Ruby

[tessa]

I just typed out my whole "How I put a story together" post and it got eaten by the evil server monster! And since all I have right now are bad words, I'll have to come back and redo later.

2nd damn time today.

[Mad Lews]

I just typed out my whole "How I put a story together" post and it got eaten by the evil server monster! And since all I have right now are bad words, I'll have to come back and redo later.

2nd damn time today.

And the lord spake unto the multitude... "Thou shalt back up, though the time is short and thy skirt be raised "Back up" without fail and you shall be rewarded in the ether life."

Mad

[Rhabbi]

I just typed out my whole "How I put a story together" post and it got eaten by the evil server monster! And since all I have right now are bad words, I'll have to come back and redo later.

2nd damn time today.

Try typing it in a word file and then pasting it. It is how I do all my work around here, especially when Rabbit is busy catching up on his work.

[tessa]

And the lord spake unto the multitude... "Thou shalt back up, though the time is short and thy skirt be raised "Back up" without fail and you shall be rewarded in the ether life."

Mad

You are a helpful lil' cuss, aren't you?

[Mad Lews]

You are a helpful lil' cuss, aren't you?

always happy to be at your cervix Ma'am
Mad

[Ruby]

Mad, you crack me up.

Rhabbi, great suggestion.

Hang in there, Tessa.

[tessa]

Ok, here I am again, pasting it from Word this time. ~a look towards Mad~ Thank you, Rhabbi.

How do I put a story together? Actually, it kind of puts itself together. I have an idea, a flash of a scene, a character that emerges in my mind and won't shut-up, and from there, the story just starts itself. From there, ideas come together and flow from me. Getting the story out of my mind and in type is a rush of doing. None of my stories, to date, have had an ending in mind at the start. It's as if the story "grows up" as I write, with the present being known but the future yet to be set.

After it's in it's rough form, I like to let the story just be for a while. During the "let it be" time, other ideas and ways of getting what I want from the story come to me. When I go back and read it after letting it alone for a few days, I am able to better see what works, what needs to go, who needs to have sex with who- that sort of thing.

Outlining is not an easy tool for me to utilize either. It tends to make things less organized for me. I like to make notes about characters, plot or settings, but that's about it. It's important to me to keep the details straight, not start off with a "Mark" and end up with a "Drake" (which I did once). It just helps the flow of writing if details are managed in some way, for me anyway. Because if I don't manage the story, it manages me. While the latter may be all right for certain things, it's not so great in my writing.

This Writer's Block has been a wonderful way to take risks in my writing, ones I might never have attempted otherwise. The use of dialogue or plot to weave my story for me have not only been encouraged, but supported, so I'm trying more of that as I develop ideas. Don't know if every idea will be worth its thought, but that's what we are here for, to find out, right?

~giggles a little cause I'm here~ Woohoo!

tessa

[anonymouse]

I just typed out my whole "How I put a story together" post and it got eaten by the evil server monster! And since all I have right now are bad words, I'll have to come back and redo later.

2nd damn time today.

Sometimes, my 'quick replies' turn into much lengthier essays. When this happens I usually copy the post to the clipboard just before posting to avoid possible problems.

If it's a really long post, I'll copy/past into word at some stage during writing it. Something to remember about MS Word is it doesn't always paste neatly back into message windows. In order to avoid word-wrap issues, save the MS Word document as plain text, open in Notepad, turn off 'word wrap', then copy/past back into the message window. It seems a terribly convoluted way of doing things but, it's Microsoft and 'life wasn't meant to be easy'. hehe

anonymouse

PS: If just copying to the clipboard BE VERY CAREFUL if you're using the shortcut keys that you click 'C' for copy and not 'V' for paste! There's nothing more annoying than accidentally erasing a post at this stage!

[tessa]

always happy to be at your cervix, Ma'am
Mad

Oh, Mr. Ma-ad? I told my cervix all about you. She can't wait to meet up with you, have some intense inter...

~realizes my notebook is missing...looks around for it, doesn't see it, sees my pen but not my notebook...a bit frantic as it has all my notes and ideas...finally spots it under the table, bends low to reach it, then sits back up, adjusting my tiny lil' tank top, so I don't flash anyone ~

Anyway, what was I saying? Oh yeah, my cervix and you, meeting up for some...

~pulls my skirt down as it inched up a bit too high on my thighs~

intense...

~thinks of uncrossing my legs, but remembers that I still don't know what panties are~

interdenominational discussions regarding your use of verse earlier.

Hey, what can I say? She's into such things. The perv...

[tessa]

Why thank you, anonymouse! That is an incredibly thoughtful, not to mention extremely helpful, thing to do for me.

~gives a hug~

tessa

[anonymouse]

Why thank you, anonymouse! That is an incredibly thoughtful, not to mention extremely helpful, thing to do for me.

~gives a hug~

tessa

You're very welcome, Tessa. I've had the same thing happen to me and I know how maddening it can be

anonymouse

[Rhabbi]

drools

Tries to recover from all the flashing that just occored.

Tessa, gald to see you finaly got to post. lol

[tessa]

Thanks, Rhabbi. It might take me awhile, but I try to do it right when I finally do get at it.