Becoming a better storyteller
I am an avid fiction reader. I love stories, and it is this love that brought me closer to good books and eventually led me to write stories of my own. I think a lot about the structure of stories—naturally, since I intend to write many of them. But I don't think about stories the way a cunning salesman would—churning out multiple inferior products that don’t appear inferior but sell more.
Instead, I try to get inside the mind of the writer. What were they thinking while writing this scene? How did they plan it? Why did they choose to include this particular moment in the story? Even more important—why do I like it? Where is that hidden trick the writer used to make me fall in love with certain scenes?
There are people out there—pure evil ones, I'd say—who want to templatize the hell out of this world. They would strip every story down to a formula, from Tolkien to Stephen King, just so they could launch a factory of novels that read exactly like them. I’m not surprised that generative AI tools are their best friends—who else would be?
I try to resist thinking about stories in purely templated forms. Yes, if you read enough of them, you’ll notice that every story follows some kind of pattern. But it’s not fixed, and it certainly doesn’t repeat like clockwork. Still, if you read deeply within a genre, you’ll see those patterns reflected across different works. And when you come across a writer who breaks the pattern—or even bends it slightly just to play with your mind—you are pleasantly surprised.
I love noticing these subtle yet obvious patterns. I observe them from the perspective of the writer, who has carefully crafted them through deliberate outlining. They have shaped the story with a purpose, thinking about readers like me, planning to take us on a ride. By meticulously observing these tricks scattered throughout their novels, I feel far closer to the author than I ever would by simply reading their writing advice.
I’ve learned more about Stephen King’s style by reading his books than by studying his writing tips. I’ve done the same with many writers across different genres.
I want to write the kind of books I love to read, so I don’t waste much time on mediocre ones. Even when I do, I try to take something from them—if only to learn what I don’t want in my own writing. If you put a gun to my head right now and asked me to summarize all my insights into neat, repeatable templates, I would kidnap your wife and blackmail you into pulling the trigger.
The insights you gain through small observations turn into intuition—a kind of writing instinct that, while not entirely unique, is still yours. Every writer I’ve admired was once inspired by someone who wrote before them. They did exactly what I’m doing now—reading, analyzing, and writing about it.
They didn’t follow some social media post, wake up at 4 a.m., take a cold shower, and ask ChatGPT for ideas that probably only their mom would like. Instead, they imitated their favorite writers until their brains naturally absorbed those insights, merged them with their own developing style, and, over time, formed a voice that told compelling stories.
So let me make this clear—writing advice doesn’t work, at least not in the way you think it does. Some art forms can only be mastered by indulging in them repeatedly. If you can’t read at least a hundred books, you won’t understand how stories are told, and you’ll probably convince yourself that you lack the creativity to write one. Then you’ll turn to AI for help, like a bullied kid running to mommy for protection. How pathetic does a writer have to be to not even generate a few ideas of their own? Why would you ever accept such a thing?
You need to read a lot to understand what good writing looks like. You have to recognize quality before you can produce it. Hacks and templates might help if you want to be a mason—the best bricklayer in the country, perhaps. But if you want to master an art form, you must immerse yourself in it over and over again.
Some things have no shortcuts, no templates—because the heart wants what the heart wants. Good stories aren’t built in factories. You can certainly try, but do you really think you’ll inspire anyone to imitate you, to learn from you, to follow you?