How to decide whether a story is worth writing?
Sometimes I have inspiration for a story. In random pieces of spare time I daydream more and more details until I am satisfied with the concept and then I don't take it any farther. In my head, the story is finished and I am satisfied. If I have the urge to write it down and attempt to share it with others, the thing that stops me is that I do not know if anybody would actually read it. I like it, but that doesn't mean others would.
Often, the stories I imagine do not have a "message" or "explore new possibilities" or attempt to "answer important questions" like the meaning of life - they are often fantasy, just exploring a character's path through life.
Since writing is not my profession, I do not need to write, and I find myself thinking that the world doesn't need another amateur story lying around.
How should I decide whether a story is actually worth writing out and sharing with others?
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Write out a few and share them. You may be completely wrong about the market.
A tale which "explores a character's path through life" but not much else happens is called a character study, and those are legitimately literature. (And movies sometimes too, c.f. A Room with a View.)
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A story does not have to have a profound message that will change the life of everyone who reads it for it to be worth writing.
There are many things that can make a story worthwhile. Sure, if you have some truly profound message that you want to relate, that's great. But really, the purpose of most stories is just to be interesting or entertaining.
Frankly, many stories that try to convey a life-changing message are total failures, and simply come across as pretentious and heavy-handed. Not that "message stories" AREN'T worth writing, just that they take a great deal of skill to pull off. But a simple, fun story of action, adventure, romance, etc, can be very satisfying to many people.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/18117. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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To be honest, until a story passes a certain threshold of completeness I don't think it can be determined if it is worthwhile or not. Pretty much every awesome plot can be summarized in a way that sounds dumb, and every lame plot can be made to sound interesting; so the storyline alone is not enough to decide. In fact, I think that none of the other elements of a story such as characters, dialog and narration alone are enough to determine the potential. It's the tuning of each of them to the right balance that makes it good.
A good writer can make a silly idea entertaining and a bad writer can turn a genius idea into a slog that only those I-have-to-finish-this-book-because-I-started-it people will ever complete (you know who you are). So I say start all your ideas and really flesh out the story and characters. Once you've gotten into it a ways, you'll know which ones are keepers and which ones are the stinkers.
But how do you know which one is the best one to spend time fleshing out? Just go with your gut. You probably already have an idea of which one is your favorite. ;)
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/18119. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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