How to Write Children's Short Stories (for the Middle Reader)

HOW TO WRITE

CHILDREN’S SHORT STORIES

(FOR THE MIDDLE READER)

Jerry Dunne

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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How to Write Children’s Short Stories (for the Middle Reader), revised edition

Visit the author’s blog: http://www.jerrydunne.com

Books by Jerry Dunne

Psychological Crime

THE TROUBLED HOUSEHUSBAND

THE PSYCHOLOGIST

Children’s fiction

Chatter & Squeal Racing Series

ON GEORGE’S DAY

HERE COMES THE ROOSTER!

Cop Girl Mystery/Detective Series

COP GIRL UNDER FIRE

COP GIRL TRACKS PETNAPPERS

COP GIRL CHASES SMOKING WEASEL

Short Story Collection

MY STINKY PARENTS AND OTHER STORIES

Non-fiction

HOW TO WRITE CHILDREN’S SHORT STORIES (FOR THE MIDDLE READER)

HOW TO DEVELOP (IMAGINATIVE, INSIGHTFUL & CREDIBLE) SHORT STORY IDEAS

Collection of Sayings

SAYINGS (INSIGHT, HUMOUR & IRONY)

Table of Contents

Introduction

How to use the book – exercises aren’t just for athletes

1 Does the idea have legs?

Paddy’s Beard – the theme – Danny’s Brain – My Stinky Parents – Herbal Tea

2 Sparking up the characters

Character is the heart of the story – it’s all in the attitude – exercises for sparking up character – protagonists, antagonists and support/minor characters

3 Build character through ‘SHOW, not tell’

Appearance – body language – character traits (habitual actions) – moods – inner and outer description of moods/feelings – thoughts – information dumping

4 Mastering basic language

Appropriate language – active and passive – the strength of nouns and verbs – controlling/interpretive words

5 Plot and scene structure

The plot structure – the scene structure

6 More ‘SHOW, not tell’

To SHOW or not to SHOW – Point of view (POV) with ‘SHOW, not tell’ – developing our ‘SHOW, not tell’ eye

7 Good, well-structured dialogue

Dialogue is intrinsic to plot and scene structure – dialogue must be character specific – dialogue must sound natural – dialogue tags – dialogue and body language – dialogue and information/philosophy dumping – that dragging feeling

8 Pace the story

Pace and plot structure – pace and scene – pace and action – pace and point of view (POV) – pace and dialogue – pace and language

9 Beginnings

Start as you mean to go on – the big bang – start as close to the end as possible

10 Satisfying twists

When the twist is imagined first – when the twist is imagined last

11 The plan: a bird's eye view

Plot outline – scene outline – character – setting – point of view (POV) – tone

Introduction

Short story writing is a difficult genre to master, and I would suggest that the children’s short story in some respects poses greater difficulties for the writer. In adult fiction, we can explore a great deal of the psychological and emotional without drawing on a strong physical side to the story, and many of the best tales are developed with powerful understatement. There is very limited physical plot movement, which means that the story’s word length can be easily controlled.

In the children’s short story for the middle reader (8-12 years), though the emotional is hardly ignored, the emphasis is on the physical journey of the plot. The child reader is not intellectually and emotionally mature enough to deal with a narrative that leans more toward the psychological or emotional side of storytelling, especially when understatement is part of the mix. There is also far less leeway to delve into experimentation in the children’s genre.

To create a strong physical plot (with a beginning, middle and end) within the short story’s word limit requires a fair bit of skill. The reader must always be aware of strong plot movement, and with the greater emphasis on the physical, the writer often has to commit far more words to paper.

Of course, fairy tales are often very short with traditional plot structures, and might be viewed as a good guide for the children’s short story; except the fairy tale is a forerunner to the modern children’s short story, and not on a parallel with it. The fairy tale is a different genre of literature. The fairy tale’s characters are drawn sketchily and mostly two-dimensional, often working just as plot-devices, and the fairy tale often lacks convincing description. The modern children’s short story is more sophisticated. We must have well-rounded character and far more detailed description in the most important points of the story (particularly in the action scenes), and fully worked out plots (yes, emotional as well as physical), all of which take a far higher word length to accomplish than that of the fairy tale. Yet, we must remain within the general 6,000 word limit of our short story genre.

This work is really for the beginner or semi-experienced writer, but the more qualified author with no experience in writing children’s short stories may find some of the chapters useful. We will explore the basic craftsmanship necessary for fiction writing, but with special emphasis on its place within the children’s short story for the middle reader (8-12 years). I use examples from my own work throughout to help clarify the theory.

How to use the book

I recommend that you approach the book in the following way: read the book once through to give yourself an idea of the whole task to be undertaken; then prepare to go through the book much more slowly.

Chapter 1, ‘Does the idea have legs?’ explains why and how a story works. Character is the heart or engine of the story and conflict is its fuel, so without conflict character does nothing of any consequence.

Chapter 2, ‘Sparking up the characters’, and Chapter 3, ‘Build character through ‘SHOW, not tell’’, starts you on the road to character development. Chapter 3, introduces the concept of ‘SHOW, not tell,’ a fundamental skill that must be developed in all fiction writing.

Chapter 4, ‘Mastering basic language’ is necessary reading for the beginner. You are hoping to become a competent storyteller and words are your tools for accomplishing this end, so you have to practise mastering the basics of language from early on.

When you feel confident you have grasped the essentials of the early chapters, spend time with Chapter 5, ‘Plot and scene structure’. The short story must be structured properly or you will not have rising tension which is an absolute necessity in all fiction writing. This chapter is of paramount importance.

The concept of ‘SHOW, not tell’ is discussed in earlier chapters. Chapter 6, ‘More ‘SHOW, not tell’’ tackles the subject in further detail. The budding writer should come to appreciate the difficulty of mastering this skill before reading further into the book.

Dialogue is of fundamental importance to the story, but you need to understand plot and scene structure before you attempt Chapter 7, ‘Good, well-structured dialogue’, as the emphasis here is not just on dialogue structure itself, but its place within the overall plot and scene structure.

In Chapter 8, ‘Pace the story’, we see that pacing is an elusive skill to acquire because it does not ever stand alone, but is very much blended in with other narrative skills. You need to have absorbed the material of the earlier chapters before making a study of this one.

Chapters 9 and 10, ‘Beginnings’ and ‘Satisfying twists’, are left near last, not due to their lack of importance, but simply because other skills should be developed before these ones are studied in depth.

Chapter 11, ‘The plan: a bird’s eye view’, considers how to plan a story. Once you have a firm grasp of basic craftsmanship, particularly plot and scene structure, this chapter will be easier to grasp.

Exercises aren’t just for athletes

Every athlete, no matter how talented and no matter how far advanced in their discipline, still exercises to improve or maintain their performance. This is a given in the world of sport. In the creative writing world it is a given that the only way for a writer to improve is through practice. Fiction writers write stories – this is their main way of exercising. But it is not the only way of exercising. Just as a runner may also work out with weights in the gym to improve his strength and condition his muscles in ways which will actually help his running, so too, a writer can perform exercises in isolation to concentrate on and help improve specific parts of their craftsmanship.

Wherever I think it is useful I have included exercises. By attempting the exercises, you are able to work on a particular aspect of craftsmanship in isolation, and this will help you focus sharply on both developing the specific skill and absorbing and retaining the theory behind the exercise.

Practise these exercises frequently. Work for no more than an hour at a time. Here is what the exercises will be doing for you:

helping you develop your actual skills;

helping you understand and retain the theory behind the exercises;

helping you exercise your imagination;

helping you build character and ideas for your future stories;

building your confidence;

allowing you a means to gauge easily what, how much and how quickly you are learning.

1 Does the idea have legs?

We’re not going to look at where ideas originate. Whether our source of inspiration is another piece of fiction, a non-fiction book, newspaper article, film, photo, real-life character, snatch of conversation in the street, childhood experience, or whatever, what concerns us here is that once we have our idea, we must find out if it is appropriate for the children’s short story framework.

Does the idea have the legs for the job? Is it a clear and simple idea? Does it include an important plot prop? Can we see where it is heading and believe it will get there within the limited word length of the short story? Does it encourage the right characters? The protagonist and antagonist must be opposites rising out of the idea and quickly confronting each other. Think of a tug of war analogy! Will the two opposing characters be pulling frantically each on their end of the rope throughout the story, each with the clear and simple aim of bettering the other? Even if they’re not in every scene together, can we make the reader always aware of this constant struggle going on between them?

Let’s also start thinking about theme. The theme is the message or philosophical angle in the story. Some would say it is the point of the tale. It is certainly a powerful element of the story, particularly when it is a timeless and universal theme. The story’s idea is often very local while the theme may well be universal.

Now we’ll have some examples to help clarify all this stuff about the idea having legs.

Paddy’s Beard

Let’s see why the story Paddy’s Beard had the legs for the short.

In my mind’s eye, I was inspired by an image of a ten-year-old boy with a long golden beard. This boy, Paddy, had a big, proud smile on his face as he loved his beard. This image made me laugh. The fact that it was a real beard made me laugh even more. I decided he’d been growing and grooming this beautiful beard for years.

We might think this story doesn’t start with character, but with a prop, the beard. But it actually starts with the character of the boy. It amused me to see this ten year old loving his beard so much, which said quite a lot about him. Now I could start asking myself: why on earth did this boy love this big beard and how did he manage his life with it?

So, though I started off with a mere image, I quickly developed some character. I knew something about how he looked physically (the beard) as well as knowing something about his inner character (his love for the beard). But to really give the idea legs, I had to invent another character, one to hate the boy’s beard and try and force him to get rid of it. This would have to be a bully with authority and probably someone new to his life. What about a teacher? They’re always easy scapegoats. So a new teacher arrives at Paddy’s school.

Now I had to have a good reason why the new teacher wants Paddy to get rid