Writing a good short story is also to some extent like writing a good poetry. Like writing poetry, you require a unique gift of observation of life and incidences happening around you, and you should have the innate capacity to craft a story out of it. While poets are more emotional, short story writers must have the right blend of emotions and intellect, to become successful writers. Imagination, narrative strength and brevity are some of the hallmarks of a good short story.

Tips on how to write fiction, how to write a novel or how to write/ publish a book are available widely, because writing a novel or a book is considered more prestigious. But not every one can have the time and patience for writing novels; but writing a short story is much easier and instantly gratifying too.

Here are 10 tips on how to write a good short story:

1) Time period of the happening of the story should be short

The story content in a short story should ideally deal with incidences that took place in a few hours, or a day or a few days or at the extreme, a few months. The shorter the time period that the story covers, the better short story it is. If you have to cover a longer period in the story, write past incidences like a flashback – not in chronological order.

2) Keep the length short and succinct

It’s very difficult to define what an ideal length of a short story is. Assuming that you are writing a short story for a specific printed magazine, have a look at the short stories that the magazine has already published and count the number of words on a few stories and get an average.

The reality of today is that people’s attention span is too short; longer stories get fewer readers. May be, 800 to 2500 words is a reasonable length for a short story. What is important is that the longer the length, the more engaging should be your story-line and narrative.

3) Start the story instantly

A short story should start right from the first line. Long descriptions of a location, or a scenario, a character’s appearance or a background of the story should be avoided at the start of the story. If some such descriptions are inevitable, bring them later in the story. But start with a bang in the beginning.

Some story writers will start the short story with a conversation, and it’s a good strategy to follow.

4) Provide more conversations please

Develop the story with more of conversations. Avoid indirect speeches. Sprinkle some humor, if the story-line permits in the conversation. Make your description of the scenario or characters short and succinct. After completing the story, give a read and ask this question at each line: “Can I delete this line and still keep the story engaging?” If yes is the answer, delete the line unceremoniously.

5) Neatly etch your characters

The number of characters appearing in short story must be limited, but it’s important that a prime character in the story stands out strikingly interesting. The character in a short story must be life-like and should not look out-of-earth (unless you are writing a Sci-fi!). One technique you can follow to achieve this is to use your imagination to effectively develop your character by combining the striking features and characteristics of a couple of persons you know in real life and mold them into one. Another approach is to convert a real life male character to a female one or vice versa, provided, you are able to reshape the character with the appropriate feminine and masculine peculiarities.

6) Polish your narrative

Every writer’s narrative is unique. But there are some writers who can strikingly stand out with an outstanding style and expression. For some, it comes from the blood. For others it is an art learned by fine tuning the writing and by gaining experience.

7) Read extensively

A short story writer should read voraciously; he should read the stories written by stalwarts in the language in which he writes. He should also read translations of world renowned short story writers and grasp their uniqueness, narrative strengths, characterization skills etc. And he should write his stories in his own style, never imitating anyone else’s narrative style.

8) Write in third person, preferably; but don’t shy away from writing in first person too

This is a debatable issue. Some writers say first person writing is not a good style and it should be avoided. But personally, I would say, it is also a writing style, sometimes very effective and there is nothing wrong in indulging in it once a while. A first person narrative gives a piece of fiction an aura of reality. For a writer, it is really a fun writing in first person because, like a drama, the writer can personally act different roles far contrary to his own basic nature.

9) Tread extremely cautiously when converting real life characters or incidences into short stories, where your close friends and relatives are involved.

The reason is obvious. If you write something bad are critical or if you use your imagination to twist something about the incidence or a character, you will get into trouble with them, should they come to know that you have written something involving them.

10) Give an unexpected twist at the end

This is one of the most successful tips I can give you for a short story. The reader should be guided along the story where he would expect a predictable end, but if you deprive him of that predictability with a logical, convincing and unexpected twist that can catch him unawares, you have succeeded in writing a good short story.

I do not mean to say that “twist is a must”, but a twist helps a lot in deciding the impact of the short story. In real life, you may come across a good incidence that you can craft to a short story. But use your imagination to think of an end to the story that deviates very interestingly from what happened in the real life.

To conclude, if what is found interesting to you is crafted in to a story by you that a reader too can find equally interesting, you have succeeded in becoming a good short story writer. If what you observed as mundane and pedestrian could be converted by you to an interesting and engaging story to a reader, you have become a great short story writer!