How to Write a Good Story

For the three years that I have been using this site, I have seen some brillant stories that I fully enjoyed reading and some that were absolutely awful. And I have to say, most stories aren't that good here. And there is always one thing or another that simply infuriates me to no end when I open a new story.

This is a rant. This is a rant on how to write a good story. There are too many of stories out there that I think are poorly delivered. They're either had a really good idea, but terribly written, or written so well, but uses a boring, often recycled plot.

I know there's no stopping your creative juices. I encourage you to write it out, let it all out. You all have some amazing ideas that I want to see on here. Anything goes, really. But I want you guys to write it and deliver it so that it actually won't disappoint me. There are very simple rules of writing and most of the stories I find here fails to fulfil these rules. Here's some things that makes my eyes incessantly twitch when I notice it.

One: Simple grammar.

Grammar is important because it helps your work to be readable. It's absolutely normal to have some mistakes and typos. Nothing can be perfect. But so many stories here can't even comprehend the simplest of grammar. Everyone knows these grammar rules. The reason why you're here is because you're literary people. You read and write? Then you should know it. Some of the most common ones are the confusion of words. Let me show you:

There - in or at that place.
Their - belonging to more than one person referring away from yourself.

Your - refers to belonging to you.
You're - short for you are.

Bear - a large heavy mammal with fur and sometimes rummages in your rubbish or to carry.
Bare - to uncover.

They're some simple ones. Some tricky ones include:

Principal - the head teacher of a school.
Principle - a set of rules or morals to follow.

Please actually remember the difference between these kinds of words. It's so simple.There are also more frequent grammar mistakes that makes me want to rip out my eyes in despair. Like using punctuation. It makes sentences comprehensive. Use capital letters, but at the right places, like names, the letter I when you refer to yourself, and the beginning of sentences.

Paragraphs is another example of annoyingly inconsistent grammar.

When you space between each sentence.

Like this.

This is not paragraphing.

This is a paragraph. A paragraph should usually include at least three sentences and often are broken when a new person speaks. But some excuses can apply to some single stand alone sentences like if you want to add emphasis. I mean, it's good to add some tone to your writing. But please be smart on how to use it properly.

Two: Summaries/blurbs.

Summaries are one of the main things we judge a story before reading it. It helps us to see what the story is about in a basic level and how it should interest us. But sometimes, I don't even give a story a chance because there isn't a summary that actually tells me that I could have my time's worth reading it. I don't care if it might be good, I just want to make sense of it at first before I start reading. Two of the main reasons that makes a bad summary:

. When it's a couple of paragraphs/an excerpt from your story. It's simply too long and you're basically repeating some stuff from your story. That part doesn't properly explain what your story is about. Even the phrase "tl;dr" (too long; didn't read) applies to it. You can add excerpts of your story, but only a few sentences.

. A song lyric itself is not a summary. I have absolutely no clue what your story is going to be about if it's just a song lyric. It might look pretty, but I think content matters more than how it looks.

Three: Plot ideas.

Plot ideas are the basis of what your story is about. But there is always around five stories that have the exact same idea, and it actually makes it so boring for me to read the same thing over again in a different context. Don't copy other people ideas, but you can steal some ideas, but add something different to it and make it compelling for people to read. You know what Picasso said:

"Bad artists copy, good artists steal."

We all are artists in our own right. We make art with words. You can use any kind of idea imaginable. I might not be comfortable with some of the ideas I see in here, but it's your right to come up with these kinds of ideas. But please try to think outside of the box. People appreciate an interesting read.

One last thing about plot ideas, the way of constructing a story is that it needs a start, a middle part/problem and an ending/resolution. It's the basic structure of a story. So, if you want just to write a story of just pure romance when you fall in love and you outline what you do together, so on, but please add some depth or kind of direction that makes it a story. So if you ramble on aimlessly, people will get bored and click the unsubscribe button.

They all are the things that I notice the most in bad stories. I hope you learn something from what I have been ranting about and write a decent story. I have seen some stories with bad grammar, but still get heaps of subcribers/comments and get ten stars, but a compelling and well written story with just two stars and seven comments. I want to change that.

Please improve.

Thank you.