Schaum's Quick Guide to Writing Great Short Stories

by Margaret Lucke

This guide to writing compelling, memorable short stories gives you all the essentials without wasted words. It tells you how and where to get ideas, how to establish and sustain excitement, how to create live, colorful characters, and how to plot, develop and bring home your story. It even includes exercises to help you perfect your story-telling skills. Full of tips and techniques that work, it makes an indispensable, reliable collaborator. You'll find it ideal whether you're studying alone or supplementing a creative or fiction writing course, conference or workshop.

Genres: Writing, Nonfiction, Reference, Textbooks

183 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 1998

About the author

Margaret Lucke flings words around in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is fascinated by the power of stories and the magic of creativity. She writes tales of love, ghosts, and murder, sometimes all three in one book. Her novels include the Claire Scanlan Haunted House Mysteries and two mysteries featuring artist and private eye Jess Randolph: Snow Angel and A Relative Stranger (nominated for an Anthony Award). A former president of the Northern California chapter of Mystery Writers of America, Margaret teaches fiction writing classes, writes about the craft of writing, and has published more than 60 short stories, feature articles, and scripts for mystery weekends.

Reviews

[beckfilm]

great guide for learning everything you need to know about writing short stories. Also has lots of great tips and helpful sheets that you can use for your stories and characters.

Three sure-fire ways to get better at writing short stories, according to this book:
1. Start Writing
2. Keep Writing
3. Write Some More

[Maddie Metzler]

read for my fiction writing class! lots of great tips for writing short stories

[Sue]

This is the best book I have come across to encourage the writing of short stories. It's light, yet full of wisdom. It doesn't assume the reader is an expert, but neither does it assume idiocy. It gets, in my view, the balance exactly right.

There are chapters on getting started, creating people, conflict, plot, setting and voice. Each one has plenty of examples of what is being described, and a good selection of exercises at the end of each one. These exercises don't require the writing of every possible genre - they are general enough that any writer can choose his or her own style and type of story.

I didn't do all - or even most of - the exercises, but I found the techniques and ideas extremely helpful. I've dipped into it many times over the past year, and will no doubt continue to do so.

Highly recommended to anyone who has ever considered writing short stories, including those who have already had some published.

[Laura L. Van Dam]

Great advice for amateur or unpublished authors. I have been writing for years but never really looked into professional writers' experiences and suggestions. I have burnt or thrown away more than one short story. Now I know how to improve it instead of giving up.
Although I don't intend to publish my stories I will come back to this book for ideas and exercises.

[Lanko]

Curiously, only the very first chapter talks specifically about short stories. And that is "read more short stories" or the amount of words in one. Not exactly thrilling, is it?

The rest of the book can be applied to any kind or size of writing. And those counsels were pretty good, but the title is misleading, it doesn't focus on short stories, it even gives examples of long length novels.

I guess it would be a pretty good book for beginner writers, but again, be warned that the title is a bit misleading.

[Pedro]

This book is short, but don't let your eyes deceive you. The book is jam-packed with loads of helpful information that can help you create wonderful short stories. It only has 6 chapters, but wow, what chapters! It gives you concise information on writing stories and is full of writing tips for writing stories. I believe these tips can help you become a better writer. The part that I liked the most was the last chapter. Chapter 6 helps you to find your writing voice. Isn't that cool! I recommend this book for everyone who is looking to enrich his or her knowledge of short story writing. This book isn't for beginners. If you are looking for a beginner's book on short story structure, this isn't it--it's more than that. I loved it. And I intend to work and practice the exercises in this book in the near future. As part of my writing training.

PS: This book will take you longer to read if you do the exercise in it.

[Jessica Morgan]

It was a dry read. I think it contained good information. It wasn't very useful to me. To be fair, I was looking for specific information about transitioning from long fiction to short story fiction. This did not touch on my needs until late in the book, and only a brief paragraph. Someone starting out would find it more helpful.

[Kyrion]

4 stars.
Margaret lucke created a wonderful first book on crafting stories. I would recommend it to a complete novice or someone who wants to review some of the basics of craft in an organized way.

[Bjorn]

Useful in some regards, not so much in many others.

[Chelsea Hagen]

This was one of my writing course books. I found it to be very interesting and informative. It definitely had some helpful tips for writing.

[Grace Cordle]

I shall now recommend this book to everyone who ever wants to write. SO SO SO helpful and chock full of amazing tips and guidance.

[Chad CG]

This was a great little book full of resources, ideas and practices. Although marketed as a short story writing guide, I felt that everything in the book reinforced the fundamentals of writing.

[MoniqueC.]

I found this book to be very helpful in learning creative writing. I’m in the process of reading it again for a refresher. Reading it makes learning about short stories fun and interesting. 👍🏽

[Jo-Anne Barker]

The first chapter was very informative, and I enjoyed doing the exercises in that chapter, then the rest of the book was very basic in comparison.

[Jörg]

A useful book if you are a beginner, but not much to learn if you have read a few writing craft books.

There are chapters on character creation, conflict, plot and structure, setting and atmosphere and narrative voice. The chapter on narrative voice I found particularly useful as it breaks it down for you and gives you a simple explanation.

The book also explains some other terms that you might not be familiar with like i.e. explaining what creating a three dimensional character actually means. I liked that. Some writing books do waffle on with pompous language but not this one. It brings clarity to the table. It gets four stars from me.

[piranha]

solid guide for beginning fiction writers. direct, practical, and concise, with contemporary examples and exercises to get you started. not just applicable to short fiction either; the sections on character, conflict, setting, and narrative voice transcend the medium.

made me wonder why i'd never heard of margaret lucke before; will have a look at her fiction now.

[Andrew]

Lucke does a fantastic job going through several topics important to short fiction writers. Honestly, I think this is the best book on fiction writing I've ever read. This book should be on every fiction writer's bookshelf-- short form or novel length.

[Liz]

I finished this book awhile ago. I found it to be boring but I did learn a few things from it. It was part of my course to read this and I am sure it can be more interesting to others then it was to me.

[Rachel]

I don't really think that much of the advice in this book is that different from the "how to write a novel" manuals. But seeing as most of my short stories start out as novels with too little butter spread over too much bread, perhaps this is worth a reread. :p

[Katia M. Davis]

Some decent advice in here, but not a lot that hadn't been said elsewhere. Perhaps the best features are the well structured layout, to the point discussions, and the FAQs part the end. I made quite a few notes.

[LMS]

A nice, quick, practical introduction to writing short stories. This is the book used in the Veritas Press Fiction Writing Workshop

[Katelyn Bolds]

A very basic overview on writing short stories. Good information.

[Jeremy]

It was a simple read, but full of great information. I'd recommend it for a novice writer or even a veteran who wants a reminder of writing basics.

[Tiffany]

practical, straight-forward, nice list of focused exercises and example short stories

[Valerie Doherty]

Useful information for short story writing!