How to Improve your Story Writing

(Tips from a practised Amateur)

Writing Competition

I don�t pretend to be an expert on writing stories, although I have had quite some experience, so I�m putting this up to help any of you who might be interested in writing but not know quite how to get started. This particular page is mostly aimed at writing Pokemon Fanfiction, of which I have read both good stuff, bad stuff and mundane stuff, as well as writing all of the above. I hope you think my stories are good, otherwise these tips will probably not relate to you .

1. Concept and Characters

The most important thing about writing a story, is having a good solid idea behind it. Sometimes these can be awfully vague, such as �I want to write a story about an orphaned Nidoran�, other times they can be quite specific. It doesn�t matter, once you�ve got the idea, build on it.
It is equally as important to have an idea about your characters. When you write your first story, its easier to know your main character�s personality and preferences, but once you are more experienced, its kind of fun to just let the character develop itself, and believe me, they do!
Once you have a concept, develop it. This leads to 2.

2. Developing your story

It is always a good idea to have an idea of how your story is going to end when you begin writing it. If you are unsure about certain plots � such as �how can I get Person A to fall in love with Person B, whom is currently her arch rival?� Brainstorm!
Write down what you want to achieve, then write underneath it ways it could happen. For example, Person B could save her from near disaster, they could turn out to be a nice person hiding behind a shield, you could develop a relationship between their two main Pokemon�. The answers are numerous. Then, simply, pick the one you like the least.
Once you gain more experience writing, it can be fun to just improvise, see what the characters want to do. In novels or long running series, often I find my characters start behaving in a way that is not exactly intended, Person A will fall in love with Person C instead of Person B� Strangely enough, this actually seems to work better than the original plan! If you can think like your characters, they will literally come to life!

3. Writing the Story

Sit at your computer, or over your book and WRITE, just do it, don�t think too hard unless you have to, just let the events occur. Keep some control over them though, otherwise you might find your story goes to rack and ruin. If your first story sucks, keep trying. My early efforts, in hindsight, were pretty pitiful (they�re not up here of course, they�re not Pokemon related), the concepts were pretty damned stupid. You�ll find this happens, you�re write a story you think is great and two years later you�ll cringe at the sight of it! Don�t give up, if you�ve got an imagination, you can write.

4. Adding Life

Compare these two examples:

A. I stared at the other trainer, her long golden hair whipping in the wind. She drew a Pokeball from her belt and released Charmander.
�I chose you Squirtle�, I cried, releasing Squirtle into the ring.
At my command, Squirtle shot a stream of water at the Charmander, which leapt nimbly aside.
�Charmander, ember that pipsqueak!� My opponent cried.
�Char!� Taking a deep breath, the little lizard Pokemon shot a fireball across the field, the grass browning and crumbling in its wake.
�Squirtle, withdraw!� I cried, and my Squirtle quickly pulled its legs and head into safety, whilst the fireball harmlessly sizzled over it, sending small gusts of steam into the air.
B. The other trainer drew out her Pokeball. �Go Charmander!�
�Go Squirtle!� I shouted. �Water gun now!�
Charmander dodged Squirtle�s Water Gun.
�Charmander, Ember attack!�
Luckily Squirtle withdrew, so the ember missed.

Same occurances, but different writing style. Be dramatic, it may seem pretentious at the time, but trust me, its much more interesting for the person to read.
And please, describe your Pokemon�s attacks, some of us don�t know what the attacks do, I mean, I would have no idea what Payday was, had I not read about it in someone�s Fanfiction. In fact, I still don�t know what half the attacks are, I just wish someone had a list of what they were supposed to do on their webpage (not damage, but actual effects- like fire spin is that big cross of flame).

Personal Annoyances

I�m not saying these are wrong, they�re just things I don�t like to read in people�s Fanfiction:

Use of game orientated terms:
�I have gained X experience, I wonder if I should evolve?�
�How do you know I�m not a level 92 Pikachu that has chosen not to evolve.�
Frankly, anything that relates to game stats bothers me (and that applies to in �Meowth Rules� when they were trying to give Meowth experience so he could learn payday). I mean, how does the Pokemon know what level it is? Do you know what level you are? It makes it sound very fake. Better wordings of the above statements would be (in my humble opinion):
�I�ve been fighting a lot, and know all the moves I can learn, perhaps it�s time to evolve.�
�I could be an extremely experienced Pikachu that could whip your puny Charmeleon tail.�
Spot the difference?

People who don�t use paragraphing and line breaks!
This makes stories really hard to read, I mean:
�Go Charmander.� �Go Squirtle.� Squirtle watergunned at Charmander but Charmander dodged. �Ember attack now!� �Squirtle withdraw!� Squirtle withdrew and the attack did no damage.
If I find something like this, first choice is to stop reading. If you don�t know how to start a new line, I shall tell you (pretend the ( ) �s are the pointy shape, otherwise I can�t write this in HTML!).
To start a new line, use (br).
To start a new paragraph, use (p) and put (/p) at the end of it.
Always put speech from different characters on different lines.

People who think the only point in Pokemon is to fight other Trainers
Some stories consist of nothing but somebody getting given a Pokemon ( nearly always Pikachu, Squirtle, Bulbasaur or Charmander) and fighting other trainers. Generally in these cases, they ALWAYS win, even if their Pokemon are untrained. I think stories with nothing but fights are excessively boring. Give them a plot, give them a challenge, take some leaves from the series, they�re not always fighting arena battles.

Personal Preferences

When I am writing, I sometimes get characters into situations where I have no idea how I�m going to get them out. When this happens, I put down the keyboard, turn off the computer, and think about it, until I have a solution. Why do you not just rewrite the scene so it doesn�t happen? You may ask. Well, I feel this is cheating. It may not improve my writing style, but I like to solve all my character�s problems without having to change much, it makes it more realistic.

Writer�s Block

Sometimes, you will just lose inspiration to write. You�ll find you�re drifting off to play Freecell, or perhaps you�re surfing the �net� but you�re not getting much writing done. It happens. Here you have two options:
Keep writing regardless: Forcing it may work, if you have an idea about an event in the future that you are aiming for, you can squeeze through the bottle neck and become fluent again. Other times, you�ll realise you�ve been on the computer for three hours, having written two paragraphs and played fourteen games of Freecell, in which case � give up!
Give up and do something else: Perhaps you�ll feel inspired to finish the story later, perhaps an idea will suddenly pop into your head, perhaps you�ll end up with four half written stories sitting on your hard drive when two hours solid writing could get them finished. It took me years to actually write one story I�d come up with the idea for, it just didn�t work until I transferred my characters from real life (ie: Earth) and into an imaginary world.

Of course, sometimes you�ll be writing and your story will be flowing so well, that you�ll miss Pokemon (the show) just so you can get it finished. Them�s the good times!

Competition

Nobody ever seems to email me, but I�m going to run a competition. Email me a written Pokemon battle between any two Pokemon of your choice, and I will judge the best ones and send you a specially designed award featuring your two Pokemon, as well as putting a link to your page up here. All contributors will receive me �Seel of Creativity� as seen on my title page. So, write �em, send them, and win. All entrants will get a mention on my page, and depending on the number of entries, the prizes will be dished out. Give it a go, it could be fun!

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