The Important Pieces of a Story

 In the world there are many types of stories. There could be a story where the plot focuses on the main character getting revenge against the villain. Another one might be a story where the protagonist gets transported to another world and decides to live a wholesome life as a farmer. The possibilities for a story are endless!

But they usually fall into two categories: fiction and non-fiction. Non-fiction stories are stories that are based on real life events and people. Fiction stories are stories based on your imagination. This means that the plot and the character never existed in real life. Under fiction stories you have genres like fantasy, romance, action, comedy, etc. Non-fiction stories include genres like biographies, memoirs, cookbooks, true stories, self-help, and historical.

Now, obviously, all these genres have their own special focus but what they all have in common is the structure of how they are written. More specifically, there is a plot and story elements. These two things are incredibly important to a story and especially if you have a certain idea in mind for your story. After all, what could work for a thriller might not exactly work for a romance. The plot is made up of the introduction, rising action, climax, return, and then an end. Story elements include things like the characters, conflicts, setting, etc.,

These two things make up the 50% of your story while the other 50% is your imagination. After all, planning the story and implementing the story are very different (since you can do it in so many ways). Thus, plot and story elements are the two most important pieces of a story.

 

How to Transition to 3rd Person Limited

Let’s assume you’re already writing your story and before you post it online you decide to look over it one last time. However, it doesn’t sound as detailed, emotional, or eloquent as you want it to. From my experience, changing the style of the writing is the first thing you’ll choose to do. More specifically, from 1^st person or 2^nd person to 3^rd person limited. Yet, you have no idea how. Transitioning from 1^st person or 2^nd person to 3^rd person limited can be done in 4 easy steps. Dialogue does not apply to these steps.

Step 1: Look for words that you’ve written in 1^st person (past tense) like I, Me, My, Our, and We. If you’re using second person look for words like You and Your. Highlight these words to mark them so you can easily go back to them later once your done reading through what you’ve written.

Step 2: Go back to the highlighted words and see if they are present tense phrases that you could change. For example, “I was shocked” can be changed into “he was shocked”.

Step 3: If you can’t change the phrase see if you can eliminate it altogether. For example, “I saw the glint in his eyes” can be changed to “There was a glint in his eyes”.

Step 4: Lastly, if you can’t eliminate the phrase see if you can rearrange the sentence. For example, “I saw the shine of the gem and my fingers itched to touch the smooth surface” can be changed to “The shine of the gem seemed smooth to the touch, tempting his twitching fingers”.

Note that step 1 is finding the words and phrases, step 2 is changing one word, step 3 is eliminating a phrase, and step 4 is doing all three.