Tuesday's Writer's Tip _Story Needed #MFRWAuthor #BWLAuthor #Writing #Words #People #Story

There is a third element needed to write novels. Again, I'm inspired by John Gardner.

With Words and a love of them, constantly turning them around, you can become a poet. Creating pictures in short expositions of turning words and their meaning.

With People, you can master short stories for they are an incident in a life. They can become character stories giving pictures of a single moment in a person's life.

But to write a novel, you need a story. For a story must have a reason to keep the reader turning pages. There must be a progression shown. How does a character move from that initial incident is important. To keep repeating the same argument over and over does not a story make. Each incident needs to lead forward heading to some kind of conclusion.