Story Structure: Ingredient No. 7

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

I’m sorry to report that...you’ve made it!
You’ve written nearly 1 ½ sides of A4, and there are just a couple of minutes left before you start checking your work. Now you need to bring your story to a close.

Here are three story endings. Which is the most satisfying? Click on the numbers below to learn more.

Sally has defeated the zombies. She returns home, has a lovely tea, and goes to bed.
Sally woke up. ‘Phew,’ she thought, ‘There are no zombies here! It must have all been a dream!’
Sally froze. The zombie reached forwards, wrapped its bloody fingers around Sally’s neck, and...

A cliffhanger when you end a story with something exciting just about to happen, e.g. a bullet is about to hit a character; the car is about to skid off the side of a cliff; the bride is about to say ‘I do’…or ‘I don’t’! Whether you’re writing a thriller or a horror story, the story of a bank raid or a tale set in WWII, it possible to conclude your story with a cliffhanger.

With a cliffhanger, you don’t actually end the story! You are trying to leave the reader guessing what will happen next. However, you need to give the reader a clue what might happen:

This is a strong cliffhanger ending, because the reader thinks Buchan is about to fall off the cliff, but they don’t know for sure! It leaves the reader wanting more!

Now you’ve studied ‘Bald Worm’s Recipe for Writing a Successful 11+ Story’, write your own story, entitled ‘A Walk Through the Woods’ following his recipe closely:

Open with exciting direct speech
Set the scene
A bit of talking, and describe one of the characters
Use the direct speech, lots of shown feelings, thoughts and questions about the character as you push the story forwards
Develop suspense
Write an exciting action scene
End on a cliffhanger

Last updated on August 14, 2007