I apologize if these have been posted before (I didn't have time to read through the whole thread), but these are Kurt Vonnegut's "rules" to writing an effective short story:
“Kurt Vonnegut’s Rules for the Short Story
1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things–reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them–in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and #### #### to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.”
I hope those are at least of some help to aspiring writers here on KW. I know they've helped me considerably. Of course, these are really only guidelines. As long as you can belt out a solid story, it doesn't really matter if you break one or two of these.
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