A Story is A Story

I tend to talk about writing as a whole. Part of it is that it's a lot easier to do. If everything I wrote about had a different section for each kind of writing, they would be incomprehensibly long. More importantly, though, they would be very repetitious. Although every form of writing has its own nuances, the similarities between them far outweigh the differences.

One such example is with stories. When we talk about writing a story, we usually assume it is a fictional piece, like a short story or novel. When I write about stories, I usually am envisioning a fictional work. However, most of the principles perfectly apply to nonfiction work. Use of language should be engaging and create an atmosphere for your story. People need to be characterized. The story needs a balance between information, observation, and action.

I think the main problem is that we have hangups about nonfiction. We think that because we are telling a true story, we have to be factual and upfront. That's great if you're giving a deposition, but is otherwise not necessary. Imagine you are telling your friends about a crazy road trip you took. That's a story. You also want to be entertaining, so you are going to give it a mood, an energy, pack it full of jokes and hilarious observations. You should write a nonfiction story with the same ideas.

Ultimately, a story is a story, whether real or fake. The only difference is that a nonfiction story is limited in what you can say. But even that's not a big deal. If there is a real story that you want to tell, it is probably interesting enough already, so you don't need to worry about figuring out what should happen next. But when you write fiction, characters tend to become real enough that they take over and choose their own actions. At that point, you're just as limited as you would be if you were writing nonfiction.

So remember that no matter what kind of story you want to tell, the most important thing is to be a good storyteller.