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Effective Narrative Writing
Opening/Introducing the characters
Some possible options for opening a story ‘to grab the reader’:
- Using dialogue, e.g. a warning given by one character to another
- Asking the reader a question
- Describing some strange behaviour of one of the characters
- Using a dramatic exclamation (Help!) or dramatic event
- Introducing something intriguing
- Techniques for introducing characters
- Using an interesting name
- Relying on portraying character through action and dialogue
- Using powerful verbs to show how a character feels and behaves
- Giving the thoughts and reactions of the other characters
- Revealing the characters’ own thoughts and ideas
Build – up / Create setting
- Making the characters do something
- Using detail based on sense descriptions – what can be seen, heard, smelled, touched or tasted
- Basing settings on known places, plus some invented detail
- Creating atmosphere, e.g. what is hidden, what is dangerous, what looks unusual, what is out of place
- Using the weather, time of day and season, as well as place
- Lulling the reader into a false sense of security that all is well
Dilemma
- Introducing a problem
- Using ‘empty’ words, e.g. ‘someone’ to create suspense
- Using short sentences to be dramatic
- Strengthening nouns and verbs rather than using adjectives and adverbs
- Employing suspense words, such as ‘suddenly’ and ‘without warning’
- Drawing the reader in by asking a question
- Occasionally breaking the sentence rule to use a fragment to make a point, e.g. Silence.
- Varying sentence openings
Reaction / Events
- Building on many of the techniques used earlier in the story
- Varying sentence structure by using longer sentences to get a rhythm going to describe the increasing tension as events unfold
- Using alliteration and short sentences to portray sounds within the action
- Using metaphor and simile to help paint the scene and describe the feelings of the characters
- Introducing further complications using connecting words and phrases such as ‘unfortunately..’ and ‘what we hadn’t noticed was…’
Resolution and Ending
- Allowing help to arrive in an unexpected form
- Making the characters do something unexpected
- Showing that the problem/dilemma was only in the characters’ mind
- Only resolving part of the dilemma so that the characters learn a lesson for the future
- Close using dialogue – a comment from one of the characters
- Close using a question
- Make a mysterious remark
- Show how a character has changed
- Reflecting on the events and perhaps providing a moral
- Look to the future
- Revisiting where the story began
- Avoid clichés such as ‘It was all a dream’ or ‘They all lived happily ever after’
Page Last Updated: 22 October 2003
