My Ten Commandments of Fiction Writing
Ten Tips to Help You Get Better
Are there any universal rules to fiction writing? Do the 10 commandments of fiction writing really exist? Or are they more of an old wives’ tale? Let’s take a closer look at the 10 commandments I follow and how you can use them to strengthen your writing.
01 | Thou shalt create powerful characters
Creating powerful characters keeps your story interesting and gives readers someone to root for. Create a protagonist and an antagonist with opposing goals and motivations. Make them real people with flaws and strengths, just like any other person you know. Your antagonist should be just as compelling as your protagonist, not some farce of a villain who's evil for the sake of being evil. Give them complex motivations, wants, needs, fears, desires—any human qualities that make them feel real to the reader.
02 | Thou shalt give thy characters flaws
Giving your characters flaws makes them more believable and relatable. It’s also a great way to increase suspense and/or conflict in the story. For example, let’s say you have a character who is an attorney who has never lost a case. That would be an unrealistic situation that wouldn’t interest readers. What if instead this character struggles with addiction and lose cases because they can’t focus on their work? Now the reader will feel sympathetic for the character and root for him or her to get back on track.
03 | Thou shalt engage the reader with conflict
Creating conflict is one of the best ways to keep the reader engaged. Conflict can take many forms. It could be internal and emotional, as in a protagonist struggling with personal demons, or it could be external, such as a protagonist trying to outwit his or her opponents. Fiction writing boils down to telling compelling stories about people forcing others into difficult situations. The more engaging those situations are, the more they will draw more readers into your narrative.
04 | Thou shalt be active in thy writing
Using passive voices turns readers off. If you want to write your novel in first person, make sure the character is doing things, not just thinking or being. It’s a common misconception that active voice is less formal than passive voice. Passive voice is always more formal, so use it when writing something like a paper for school or a technical document. If you’re writing fiction, though, use active voice and let your characters do things!
05 | Thou shalt focus on a single point of view
Decide which point of view you want to tell your story and stick to it. If you begin by telling the story from a first-person perspective, then switch to omniscient, your readers will get confused.
06 | Thou shalt write descriptively
Descriptive writing gives a story depth and life, without it the reader has no context to understand the emotions and reactions of the characters. It’s hard to do descriptive writing well though. Too much description slows down the pace and becomes boring, too little can leave readers feeling disconnected from the characters. In order to write descriptively, one must first ask what about this scene is important for me as an author? What does this moment feel like? What does this character want?
07 | Thou shalt describe only what is important to the story
Stay on topic. Include only what is relative to your story and keep in mind the theme and tone you are trying to convey with every word. The more detailed and descriptive you can be about the world you create, the easier it will be for readers to lose themselves in your work and get lost in a new world full of possibilities.
08 | Thou shalt use subtext to convey the unspoken thoughts and feelings of the characters
Have your characters use sub-textual dialog queues and body language to convey their thoughts, feelings, and motivations. Remember that the reader does not know how your character feels, so use what the character does and says to give the reader insight into their mind. When you do this, readers will feel like they are reading an actor’s monologue rather than just being told what is happening.
09 | Thou shalt know when to stop editing
It is better to stop editing sooner rather than later. Set your work aside a day, a week, a month. You'll have a better perspective when you go back to it and you'll be more likely to pick up things that are glaringly obvious now that you're not on the same wavelength as when you first wrote it.
10 | Thou shalt not plagiarize
Thou shalt know thyself and keep thyself in check. Never take another person's words or ideas without crediting them for them or use someone else's character without their permission.
Conclusion
Following these ten commandments of fiction writing can improve your writing. I hope you found them helpful and, as always, contact me with questions or feedback.
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