I recently started writing short stories. I have entered a few contests, and am really enjoying the writing. There has been a lot I’ve had to learn though. Here are some of the important things I’ve learned about writing short stories.

·         Grammar is very important. I’m not great with grammar, and am grateful to all the people who have help with it on my stories. I am learning though.  I am not making as many mistakes with commas and sentence structure as I was. I’m finding that the more I write, the more I remember what to do.

·         Dialog is not easy! When I started writing I knew nothing about dialog. I had the words my characters were saying all bunched up with the description of the scene. Thankfully, Michelle L. Devon, of the Accentuate Writers Forum helped me with this problem. She sent links to some blog posts she’s done on the subject of dialog. If you want to learn to write short stories you should really read her blog, or join the forum!

·         Make your characters believable. Sometimes people want to make characters perfect. Doing this makes the story unrealistic. Everyone has faults, problems, and makes mistakes, even characters in short stories. Be sure your characters feel human s

·         Watch the tense of the story. Make sure you don’t start in the present and then switch to past tense when writing sentences. You can switch tenses if you are doing flashbacks, but that will be whole paragraphs or chapters. Don’t do it within the same sentence.

·         Practice makes perfect. Write as often as you can. The more you write, the better your stories will get. You’ll remember how everything is supposed to be done if you write often. Go a long time between stories and you might have to study up to get it right.

·         Write about stuff you know. Don’t write about characters from the south if you aren’t familiar with the dialect. Same goes for setting your story in another country. If you haven’t been there, or don’t know a lot about it, the story won’t work. Someone who is from there will know it’s not correct, and it will seem silly. Keep it simple, and stick to people and places you know.

As you can see, these aren’t hard, but doing all of them will make your short stories better. If you haven’t tried writing a short story, you should. They are fun and a great way to share your imagination with the world. Write a story today!http://www.accentuateservices.com/xmb/viewthread.PHP?tid=903