How to Write an Original Short Story
What you'll learn
- The mastery of a unique step-by-step process to write a complete short story.
- A good grasp of the short story structure.
- A clear understanding of reader expectations for fiction.
- The ability to identify life experiences (real or imagined) to write about.
- Knowledge and skill needed to create exciting turning points for stories.
- The ability to write effective opening and closing scenes.
- The ability to write stories from different points of view.
- An understanding of ways to develop realistic characters.
- Practice using sensory and perceptual details to create fictional worlds.
- The skill to write and properly format dialogue.
- The art of enhancing your story with relevant symbols.
- An understanding of ways to revise and edit stories for maximum effect.
Requirements
- An open mind and a desire to write short stories.
- No prior experience necessary.
Description
Have you always wanted to write fiction but don’t know where to start? Have you started writing but got stuck and don’t know how to finish?
Do you have ideas but find it hard to develop them into a complete story that makes sense? Or do you experience writer's block, get stuck, and lose motivation?
If you have experienced any of these problems or if you simply want a clear and specific way to develop your idea into a story, you’re in the right place. This course will present an approach to writing stories that I have developed over a number of years and refined with my students in face-to-face classes.
This approach is a step-by-step strategy for crafting short stories that promises that you are going to write an original short story if you're willing to follow the basic principles I will present.
It’s different from other systems and other techniques of fiction writing. It’s more structured, and it works really well for beginning writers because it gives them a lot of practical help with the nuts and bolts of building a short story.
We’ll start by discussing some general principles and reading two short stories: one by Guy de Maupassant, and the other by Anton Chekhov.
Then, we’ll get to the sections with specific tips, specific procedures, and step-by-step directions on how to go from start to finish of the whole writing process.
This approach is not magic, its' not a formula, and it doesn’t include all possible ways to write a story.
Just one way. And one approach.
I realize that there are other approaches, but my goal is not to provide the survey of all possible ways of writing a story. It is to take beginning writers along the most confident path to the completion of their first story.
This course is designed to meet the needs of all beginning fiction writers. I have used this approach in my classroom courses for a number of years, and my students find it effective, efficient, and enjoyable.
I hope you will, too!
Who this course is for:
- Anyone who wants to write short stories.
Instructor
- 4.4 Instructor Rating
- 151 Reviews
- 1,021 Students
- 3 Courses
Dr. Julia Gousseva started teaching college-level writing courses in 1993, as a graduate student at the University of Arizona.
Her work has been published in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Life Lessons from the Cat, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Messages from Heaven and Other Miracles, Highlights for Children, and The Sun Magazine. A few years ago, she enjoyed a year-long assignment with the Tucson Citizen writing My Tucson column.
Creative writing is Julia’s passion, and you can often find her at work on a new project. Julia is the author of Adventures of Alex and Katie children’s books, Anya’s Story historical fiction series, three mystery novels, and a book of short stories.
Julia's current project is a historical fiction novel about Stalin’s destruction of Moscow’s Christ the Saviour Cathedral in 1931.
Since earning her PhD in 2001, she has been a full-time writing instructor at a community college in Arizona. Her favorite classes to teach are short story writing and creative nonfiction.