How to Write a Good Story

Writing for me is a hobby but one I’m passionate about. I’m lucky that it’s something I don’t need to earn a living from but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be good at it. Writing two books helped me improve but I’m still searching for the answer to a few burning questions:

• What comes first, the writing or the story?

• Can a good writer produce a bad story and vice versa?

• Do people read to admire the writing or do they read to enjoy the story? Or are the two intrinsically linked and never the twain should part?

I’ve been a member of Mark Stay’s, The Green Room for nearly eighteen months and I’m loving it. It’s a community of writers, most of them already published or well on the way to it and Mark is our leader, enthusiastically mentoring us to produce our best work. We meet on Zoom twice a month for a Q&A session where Mark draws on his vast experience to answer our pre-posed questions and a 200 word review. I have found the latter session the most helpful. Having someone with Mark’s experience critique and guide my work is immensely valuable as is the feedback from group members.

I’m also part of a group that is the brainchild of Emma Simpson. It’s called The Writers Accountability Book Club and has a clear aim to help members improve their writing by readying six books during 2026, all on the subject of writing. We meet once a month on Zoom to discuss the current book and what our feelings about it are. So far this year we’ve read Stephen King’s In Writing and we’re currently reading Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones.

For me both books have been useful, but I have particularly enjoyed Writing Down the Bones although I have to admit I didn’t read it. I listened to the special anniversary edition where Natalie reads the chapters then comments on what she wrote forty years ago. Writing Down the Bones focuses on writing practise. I can still hear her chanting ‘just write’, which to begin with got on my nerves but in the end I found endearing. She says we expect footballers and musicians to practise so why not writers? She has a point…

It was also interesting to see how much Stephen King and Natalie Goldberg’s thinking is at odds. For instance, Stephen believes that although writers can be formed by practising and talents can be strengthened, great writers are born whereas Natalie says it’s all about the work, that we can all become great if we give ourselves completely and put in the hours.

But what about stories, what advice do they give on how to write a great one? Stephen writes that stories consist of three parts; narration moves the story along, description creates sensory reality and dialogue brings characters to life. But Natalie’s book doesn’t aim to inform you on this subject, in fact she’s clearly reluctant to talk about structure. For her its all about the writing.

Now obviously, I realise you need to know how to write in order to write a story so both books have been very useful, but coming back to my questions at the top of this piece, what makes a good story?

Now you may all have come across him but until last week I hadn’t and he seems to have some of the answers I’ve been looking for. He believes all good stories follow the same ten-point pattern as follows:

1. Whose story is it?

2. What is your character’s flaw or what do they need?

3. What is the inciting incident?

4. What does your character want?

5. What obstacles are in the character’s way?

6. Why should we care?

7. What’s at stake?

8. What do they learn?

9. How and why?

10. How does it end?

It seemed to make sense, so I decided to put it to the test by checking my debut novel, The French Bed against these criteria and here’s what I found:

1. Whose story is it?
Its Lizzy’s story – well mainly because later the reader discovers there is another female protagonist.

2. What is your character’s flaw or what do they need?

She’s in love with a married man and at the age of forty believes she isn’t going to get the longed-for baby she yearns for.

3. What is the inciting incident?
There are a few inciting incidents in this story.

When her lover fails to materialise for her fortieth birthday she realises what a fool she’s been and how she’s wasted eight years of her life waiting for him.

Lizzy buys an antique French bed and in it has a series of dreams set in 1920’s Paris. In the dreams she helps give birth to a baby and is also a witness to a murder.

4. What does your character want?
She wants to find out what happened to the people in the dream and in particular the baby she helped birth and discover who the murderer was. She also wants to escape her failed affair and start a new life.

5. What obstacles are in the character’s way?
In Paris her only clue is an apartment seen in the dream but it’s like searching for a needle in a haystack and she nearly gives up.

6. Why should we care?
Lizzy is a journalist and we care because she believes in the truth. We also empathise with her desire for a baby and why she feels she must find out what happened to the one she believes she helped bring into the world.

7. What’s at stake?
An unsolved mystery and injustice. The reader wants her to succeed, to find out who the people were and why she had those dreams.

8. What do they learn?
That she didn’t need the married man. That she can find love again, that she can take command of her life and she also discovers a deep love of France.

9. How and why?
Magical things can happen and there doesn’t have to be a logical reason for everything.

10. How does it end?
I’m not giving that bit away..! However, John York believes, when you’re writing your story you should know the end as early in the process as possible. Although I had a good idea how The French Bed would end there were some surprises for me..!

I’m using John Yorke’s 10 questions to help me get on with the sequel to the French Bed but I’m still seeking answers to my questions. Can a good writer produce a bad story and vice versa, what comes first, the writing or the story and do people read to admire the writing or do they read to enjoy the story? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Share