How To Write Short Stories

You don't have to be an "aspiring novelist" or a working writer to have a desire to write a short story. For many people, short story writing is relaxing - it is fun, therapeutic, and enjoyable. Short story writing can be a productive use of your time, and it can be a very fun hobby. At the same time, however, it is not much fun to write short stories if no one will read them!

Kurt Vonnegut was one of the masters of modern American literature. For over fifty years - from the late 1940s to the mid-2000s - he wrote novels, essays, and short stories that were widely-read and highly acclaimed. At one point during Vonnegut's writing journey, he compiled his list of "rules" for short story writing. The next few paragraphs capture these ideas of his.

Vonnegut's first two rules dealt with the way you should take care of the reader - first off, by making absolutely sure the reader won't feel like you wasted their time, and secondly, that you give the reader at least one character they can root for. Continuing with characters, Vonnegut says that every character should want something, even if it is only something small, and every sentence should either reveal something about a character or advance action. Vonnegut next encouraged writers to make awful things happen to their characters, no matter how sweet and kind these characters are. This allows the reader to see what the character is made of. He advises writers to start as close to the end as they possibly can, and to write to just please one person. To understand this last one, realize this: If you write to please one person, and that one person loves your story, then all others who have similar tastes to your "one person" will love it also.

Finally, Vonnegut tells writers to give as much information as possible as quickly as possible. "To heck with suspense," was his thought on this final rule. According to him, the reader should have a complete understanding of what is going on.

Of course, Vonnegut admitted that you can break all of these rules and still create a terrific short story. But you could sure do a lot worse than Kurt Vonnegut if you are going to find a writer to take advice from for writing short stories.