What are the basic elements that make up a really good story?

[deliciously_naughty]

Good stories have a plot, a well rounded set of characters and a first paragraph that makes you want to read the rest of the story.

 

[janet_tenaj]

Re: Re: heinlein

RAH was NOT misogynistic! He probably wasn't Fascist either.

I honestly didn't mean to hijack the thread or cause things to veer off topic. I was just trying to make a point about how sci-fi isn't by nature unrealistic.

RAH had more women protagonists and strong independent female characters than anyone before him -- he's pretty much the first to admit that women would even survive into the future as anything other than "BEM bait."

You're right on. And much of his work has pretty strong erotic undertones.

I don't want to extend a debate about whether or not he was a chauvanist. I personally feel that those who think so aren't truly seeing the depth of the worlds he created. But those are my feelings and everyone else is entitled to his or hers.

But, on a subject a little more appropriate to the site (if not the thread), I personally believe that Heinlein might have been a closet transvestite, or at least had some transsexual tendencies. Often, his women strike me as the type of woman a man might want to be. And then there's "I Will Fear No Evil", where the lecherous old goat of a protagonist ends up with his brain transplanted into the body of a beautiful young woman...and he ends up sharing the body with the ghost of its former occupant!

I wonder if he ever wrote any real hard erotica, beyond the limited amount he could slip into his mainstream works...

 

[Weird Harold]

Re: Re: Re: heinlein

You're right on. And much of his work has pretty strong erotic undertones.

...

But, on a subject a little more appropriate to the site (if not the thread), I personally believe that Heinlein might have been a closet transvestite, or at least had some transsexual tendencies. Often, his women strike me as the type of woman a man might want to be. ...

I wonder if he ever wrote any real hard erotica, beyond the limited amount he could slip into his mainstream works...

RAH was a hedonist, but I don't think he had any "transexual tendencies" -- it is generally acknowledged that his wife Virginia had a lot of input into his female characters; some claim that most are actually based on her.

Even his juvenile Science Fiction has some sexual untertones -- or at least doesn't shy away from social interactions between the sexes. Podkayne Of Mars gives some hint that RAH didn't discount the theory that women really run the world from behind the scenes.

In one of his non-fiction essays, he commented that he included sex in his stories, because he wrote about people and SEX is one of the prime driving forces that shapes who people are.

 

[janet_tenaj]

Ignoring your own. Do not ask for feedback, please.


What are the basic elements that a story needs to be a really good one? Outstanding even?

What separates the men from the boys, so to speak?

Why do you think these things are necessary?

A story needs the basic elements. Characters. Setting. Plot. Technique.

Not only do I have to believe the characters, I also have to either like them or hate them or both, depending on their purpose in the plot. From a truly excellent story, I take a way a feeling that the characters are real people. When I think about them, I feel real emotions. I want to either fall in love with, become best friends with, or develop an awed respect for, the story's protagonist. I want to revile the antagonist, and I also want to understand his motivation.

The setting doesn't have to be believable, but it has to be interesting. A good author can point out fascinating things about the most mundane setting, or can create a fantastic place for me that I want to explore.

And regarding plot, it needs to be...intriguing. Surprising. If I can predict the outcome a quarter of the way into the story, then the only things left to keep me interested are the setting and the characters.

Unfortunately, an author's bad technical skills can quickly kill even the best of stories for me. For anyone who reads a LOT and takes in words or entire phrases at once, any out-of-place letter or bit of punctuation represents a major stumbling block. So long as a string of text is composed of familiar elements (known words and phrases, and recognizable patterns of punctuation), the text is easy to read. But when an unfamiliar pattern is scanned, the eye and brain must stop to examine it more carefully. People who hate spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors aren't that way just to be anal. We hate them because they interrupt the flow of our reading and turn it from a natural easy thing to a chore of parsing.

The author's technique is also important. The best prose flows like poetry. Consistency is necessary. Simplicity is usually best. Anything interrupting the flow of thoughts entering my head from the on-screen text is a Bad Thing. Using unusual or foreign words gratuitously is just plain silly. Using them to spice things up is fine -- but there is a fine line between between the two.


As I write this I realize too that my own perspective here is like that of a restaurant patron saying what she wants in a meal. I'm saying things equivalent to "cooking the food but not burning it is good" and "use of salt and pepper is great, if not overdone", and "nice use of chili powder in this dish".

A chef has an instinctive or at least well-ingrained feel for the chemistry of food and flavor. Just like a gourmet meal is greater than the sum of its parts, so is a really good story.

I try to write. I've got much of the basics down -- I'm to where I can cook without a cookbook and create passable results. But I don't have the ability of a gourmet to find that synergistic spark in a menage of ingredients and create something that is truly spectacular.

Maybe one day I will.

 

[janet_tenaj]

Re: Re: Re: Re: heinlein

RAH was a hedonist, but I don't think he had any "transexual tendencies" -- it is generally acknowledged that his wife Virginia had a lot of input into his female characters; some claim that most are actually based on her.

But, transgenderism does recur in quite a few of his works. There was one of Lazarus Long's male friends who, in a life-extending rejuvenation treatment, chose to become a woman. Later, Long himself toyed with the idea as simply something to keep him interested in living, after he'd basically lost track of how many years and lives he'd lived and was contemplating letting his long life come to an end. In a short entitled "All You Zombies", the main character is a mostly female hermaphrodite who later becomes male and travels back in time to impregnate herself...with him/herself! In several other novels, characters at least discuss the subject if the don't directly engage in it.

I'd say there's some evidence to indicate that RAH had at least a passing interest in the subject.

 

[Weird Harold]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: heinlein

But, transgenderism does recur in quite a few of his works.
...
I'd say there's some evidence to indicate that RAH had at least a passing interest in the subject.

I'm more of the opinion that transgenderism was a way to illustrate that men and women aren't all that different under the skin -- a theme that he explores more often than transgenderism.

Lazarus Long's "twin sisters" are just another means of demonstrating that the mores of 1930-1970 (and on to the present) are doomed to be rendered irrelevant by technology.

Back to the main subject of this thread:

RAH wrote stories that were "realistic" within the bounds of the basic assumption that technology would make moon colonies and space travel possible. He used extrapolation of the science as known at the time he wrote the story as the basis for future technology, but he never forgot that a good story needs good characters as well as "good gimmicks."

 

[Callia]

I'm more of the opinion that transgenderism was a way to illustrate that men and women aren't all that different under the skin

Another interesting novel that deftly deals with the theme of transgenderism is Angela Carter's Passion of New Eve. It was written in the '70s and reflects the concern with the changing roles of males and females. It's not realistic in the least, and the writing is excellent.

To get back to the original questions, I think there is some confusion over the word 'realistic'. Some people take it in the sense of a story that shows realism, that belongs to our everyday world and others use it as a synonym for 'believable'. A story can be totally unrealistic (like a sci-fi story) yet utterly believable through the detailed decriptions of the plot and characters.

This brings me to another element that is important to me in enjoying a good story: the detail! I don't mean I like long lists of descriptive adjectives, but highlighting an interesting detail that will tell us something about the character makes a story come alive for me. Like in a story I read where the main character spills some sugar on the dining table while he's eating with flitatious girlfriend and friend and he draws stick figures in the sugar with his finger. Something like that shows me he is uncomfortable with the situation, embarrassed perhaps. Much better than saying "He was uncomfortable with the situation". First and foremost, writers are observers of life and if you notice details and are able to convey them, you are on the way to being a good writer.

Well-crafted writing is important to me. Unusual vocabulary does not faze me if it's used in the proper context. In fact I like it. Being able to choose precisely the right word for the right situation is an axiom of good writing. It's like using a correctly sized screwdriver to drive your screw into the wall. If it's too big or too small, you're not going to do a very good job. (Do you think the screw metaphor is appropriate for the literotica site? )

I don't agree with ronde when he says, "Commonly used words usually carry a heavier load of connotations for most people, and do a much better job of conveying meaning." It's precisely because commonly used words do carry so many connotations and associations that they are not going to convey the exact meaning the writer had in mind. I much prefer 'amiable' to 'nice' and 'horrendous' to 'bad' in the right context. Of course, I agree with everyone when they say that the dialogues must be plausible. You can't put 'horrendus' and 'amiable' into the mouth of an ignorant bimbo in the throes of passion. But we don't speak the way we write and in the narrative, interesting, varied, unusual vocabulary thrills me.

Original, observant metaphors also make me sit up and take notice. I don't like it when it's overdone but a story sprinkled with these appeals to my finer sensibilities. In one of KillerMuffin's stories where she is describing a woman afraid of her oppressor she says, 'the bed shuddered'. I loved that! The bed is personified and takes on the emotions of the character.

And the last thing I'll mention is build-up. Other people have also mentioned that here and I agree. I really can't get into a story where the characters are banging away from the first sentence. (Unless of course this is a technique the writer is using and s/he will then get into some character development. Remember the opening scene of the movie "Betty Blue?").

This is getting long-winded so I will get off my soapbox now. Two of my stories have been posted at longlast, but the punctuation has been all fouled up in the transfer so please don't shoot the piano player. I would love feedback on anything else.

The Dance They Knew

Fireworks on the Beach

 

[Ulyssa]

I find that...

...judicious use of exclamation marks and the letter "j" make certain stories stand out in my mind.

 

[Guest]

36DDD

The cliche introduction of the woman with 36DDD breasts, shoulder-length platinum hair, and a 28-inch waist can

As a woman who was 34DDD and a 26 inch waist before kids, I wish that I would have known that I was a fantasy then!

Seriously, I think that the criteria for a "good story" vary according to the genre-- quick, hard, sensory overload vignette or smooth, seductive relationship story. The pacing of each needs to match the tone.

No matter what the genre, though, all good stories pull me in using "sensory" driven description.

 

[Chicklet]

Re: The 3 most important things

I'm stunned that no one has mentioned the three most important things to any story:

Beginning, middle, end.

Three-act structure. There are few things worse in literature than stories that go nowhere.

I'm in complete agreement about realistic dialogue. The vocabulary of the characters must be true to their backgrounds.

Also, don't linger too long in scenes. The best writing advice I've heard so far is, "Come into a scene late and get out early."

First of all, this thread is excellent. I just stumbled across it and it is great.

Beginning, middle, and end - a lot of stories here don't have that - many are JUST scenes. Those are good, but to get real enjoyment out of it they DO need the backbone of an actual beginning, middle, and end. And I'm guilty of not following through with that = )

Chicklet

 

[Bobby T]

The most important elements just might be a good start to the story and then a good ending (heh, heh).

 

[Cooksie]

IMO, there are three basic elements needed to make a good story: 1) verbs, 2) verbs, and 3) verbs. Or, as I like to say, one good verb is worth a thousand adjectives. Not that adjectives aren't important, but it's the verbs that create the action - and the action of a story is what makes the plot, makes the character come to life, and everything else. Most important, I think, it is the verbs that immerses the reader, and that fulfills the author's promise to the reader, which was probably best expressed by F. Scott Fitzgerald when he said, "Draw your chair up close to the precipice, and I will tell you a story."