Story Structure: Ingredient No 6

Inventing Characters Read! Journal Word Notebook

Choosing Titles The Fab Four Golden Rules Generating Ideas Stealing Ideas From an Idea to a Plan Planning from a Picture Stories Based on a Passage Stories Based on a Sentence An Example of Good Planning

Describing a Location Longer descriptions Describing a character's appearance Dialogue Distinctive Voices Show, Don't Tell Characterisation: Shown Feelings More Characterisation Techniques Playing with Sentences Playscripts Action Suspense

What is story structure? 1 Exciting opening line 2 Set the scene 3 Talking and describing character 4 Characterisation 5 Suspense 6 Action 7 Cliffhanger Standing Out: How can you stand out from the crowd? Clever Clogs: Non-Linear Clever-clogs: Two perspectives Clever-clogs: Narrative voice Practice 11+ exam titles

Checking your story in an exam Redrafting = improving your story What if I run out of time in an exam? The Grumpy Examiner's Pet Hates

Year 2 into 3 Lemony Snicket After Harry Potter Must-Read Authors Spy Novels Horror Stories Classics Animal Stories Adventure Historical Fiction Myths & Legends Fantasy Family Stories & Comedies

You’ve written a side-and-a-bit of A4. You’ve just got time to write one last paragraph. How can you bring your story to a satisfying conclusion?

One satisfying way to bring your story to a head is to end with a scene of action. Do you remember our action techniques?

Powerful Verbs
Impact Sentences (really short sentences)
Dashes
Showing how much it hurts!
Having your characters cry out

Which of Bald Worm’s action techniques have been used in the following fight scene?

Let’s look at powerful verbs in a little more detail. As you know, a verb is a doing word. The great secret to writing an exciting fight or chase is to use powerful verbs. What is the difference between these two, almost identical sentences?

Bob hit Hashim.
Hashim smacked Bob.

That’s right. In the first sentence, the writer used the first verb they could think of; in the second sentence, they used a powerful verb, which made the entire image so much more vivid.

Last updated on August 13, 2007