How to Develop a Short Story

When most creative writers sit down to write a new story, they have no idea what the theme is or how they will develop it. Newbies lumber from one scene to the next, hoping for the best. Perhaps that is because there has never been a right or wrong way to develop a story, but once you try the DeBowen Technique, you will never write a story any other way. It is so easy that you can do these three steps in your mind and begin writing when your thoughts are in place.

Step one

Begin by plunging directly into the bare bones center climax scene and outlining it briefly. Answer one question – what is your story about? Once you have answered that question, you will know how many main characters you need, how many secondary characters you will have, and how long the story will be.

To demonstrate, let's say your story is about abuse. You might think of two abused children – a girl, age 9, and her brother, age 5. Now that you know what your story is about and who the two main characters are, write the middle scene – known as the conflict scene. Pick up in the middle of the action with an insane, knife-wielding stepfather chasing the children through the forest. They run until they are exhausted and finally take a short rest, but when they sit down and lean against a tree, they topple backwards into a tiny washed out place in the bank. It's the perfect hiding place.

The stepfather reaches that point also, and when he stops briefly, he is no more than three feet from where the children are hiding. Their hearts beat so hard they are afraid he will hear them.

That is all the story you need before you move to step two.

Step two:

Now that we know the conflict, it’s time to let the story find its natural ending by asking who, what, when, where, why, and how. What will happen to the children? Where will they go? How will they escape?

The story could progress in a hundred different ways, but let's say the children discover a village and they pant out their story to a kind shoe cobbler. The cobbler tells the townspeople a huge, fierce man is pursuing the children and he intends to kill them.

In the villager's eyes, there is no greater crime than abusing children. In such cases, they feel that ridding the earth of such vermin is commendable – and these are very commendable people. They snare the stepfather and hang him. The children go to live with the shoe cobbler and his wife. The end.

Did you notice how easily the plot resolved itself? It always will when you ask who, what, when, where, why, and how.

Step three:

Now it's time to write the opening scene. It will be easy because obvious questions must be answered. Again, ask who, what, when, where, why and how to fill in the blanks.

Where did the children live? What happened to their mother? Why was the stepfather chasing them? Answer those questions and you have the beginning of the story. All that remains is to connect the three scenes and fill in the details.

By outlining the action scene first (the conflict/plot), and then the ending (the resolution), you know you will have two main characters (oldest child and step-father). You know who the secondary characters are, and you know the length of the story, since it will take at least 2,000 words to develop that much drama and suspense.

This method is called the DeBowen Technique. Try it two times, and you will never write a story any other way.

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