How To Turn Reality Into Fiction

There is no one way guide to being rich or top ten tips to make yourself successful. When it comes to seeking a ‘guide’, I think that everything is already known to us, we’re only being simply reminded. So what I aim to do is to simply remind you what it really means to write. As a writer and as a human being, I believe you already know who you are, what you’re doing, and what you want. So let me ‘guide’ you with how to turn your reality into fiction.

First of all, you must learn to respect yourself and your story. Give yourself detailed attention, similar to how a pianists play the piano, knowing what kinds of notes he should play and what kind of actions he should act out to convey meaning within his music. Just like a pianist who respects himself and his piano, you as a writer must also be able to respect the story you are writing. Most if not all the time, the story writes itself and I kid you not, the story has a life of itself. So learn to respect it and once you do, the story will hold your hand just like a lover and take you on a trip that you will never forget.

The conception of a story is complex, especially for fictional stories. It is filled with various factors: inspiration, emotions, feelings, and theme. So let’s talk about some of things to keep in mind.

Use your reader’s imagination

This is why non-fiction writing is still fiction writing. This is the truth about storytelling: no one could ever definitely imagine what you try to convey to the reader, no one could possibly fully imagine your story from bottom to top, to the most acute of details. So don’t even try, you’ll just be wasting words, paper, and time. It’s like explaining and telling a color to the colorblind, you can tell and explain the color red to the colorblind and he or she will know that certain thing is color red, but he or she will not perceive it as the way you do. So with this case and point, writing down scenes and fictional areas of a story does not have to be written down in its fullest details. Only put down essential details, details that would be enough to spark the imagination of the reader towards the essential things about the scene or the setting. Other unimportant things must be given to the reader’s imagination to be created, like how the subconscious fill the unimportant things in your dreams, that’s similar to the reader and writer relationship. The writer conveys a scene, the reader should be the one to create it. That’s what makes storytelling and writing very different from other art forms, because in writing you can fully interact with the reader but by only giving them a small idea. Also, come on, give the reader something to do.

Here’s how I described how the girl from my story Fading Echoes (featured in the Fall 2017 issue of The Storyteller here on Launchora) looked like: “Your hazel brown eyes, your fair white sensitive skin, your black hair, your dress black as the night, the golden bracelet that I gave you – all of them made you look like Aphrodite.” That is all. I didn’t fancy describing her to the minute of details, I didn’t describe her by the nines, heck I didn’t even fully describe her at all. One thing I wanted the reader to do is to simply imagine the most beautiful woman they have met in their entire life. That is why I used Aphrodite as the main descriptive value in the statement. I didn’t want the readers to see the real girl I’m trying to portray in the story, I wanted them to see their own dream girl smiling towards them because once the reader is personally invested in the story – imagining people they know and projecting some of their reality into this fictional on – then that’s when you know you have pulled them in and immersed them in a world of your choosing.

Theme (inspiration and construction)

Themes are essential to fiction writing, because unlike non-fiction writing, which usually revolves around real life experiences, fiction writing relies on themes, real or not. And the theme, is pretty much the foundation of your story. Your story revolves and conspires around the theme you choose. You can have more than one, and these themes help create a pathway for you to follow, while maintaining a consistency within the story. They are like the GPS of your story – they help you stay on track, so that you – or your reader – don’t get lost.

Themes could range from broad topics such as joy, happiness, struggles, madness, depression – pretty much any human (or non-human) experience that readers can relate to. Themes and inspiration goes hand-in-hand so whenever you feel inspired, look towards the creation of your inspiration and then use that as your theme.

All that may sound like you must have a theme before you start your story – that is not true. Like I said, it’s a GPS system! So you have some idea about where you want to go, you don’t have to follow the GPS the entire time. And maybe, you don’t even need to start the GPS until you’re closer to the destination. I really hope this GPS analogy is making sense! Point is – whatever ‘thing’ or ‘experience’ you want to write about – try to describe it in one word… that’s your theme! Have another word to describe it? That’s your other theme. Got it?

The theme behind a story I wrote, Fading echoes, centers on teenage love that is wrong and how it develops. I try to talk about the experience of being in love… with a hint of morality – what is right and what is wrong. I aimed to explain the history behind personal transgressions, especially when it comes to loving someone that we think we can’t possibly be with because of various decisions we made and how regret eventually poison our lives, consuming us and eventually making a decision that society moralizes as something wrong.

So, spoiler alert! (go read the story now if you haven’t already)… in the end of the story, the two main characters ended up creating a temporary moment in time where they could be together, away from their wife and husband and from their family and friends. Technically, they are cheating on their spouses. This moment in time is what the theme of the story is all about: Love that is wrong, and the ending amplifies the theme and asks the reader the question: is cheating wrong even with the right motives?

Use familiar, understandable, and simple words

I’m not saying that you should narrow down your vocabulary. But… choose your words in a way that the reader could understand with the use of simple context clues. Because if a reader has to go out and look at a dictionary to find out what a certain word means from your story, you break and ruin the immersive experience. You wouldn’t want someone to leave in the middle of the conversation to look up a word you used, right? Or worse – leave the conversation all together because they don’t like how you just show off by using words they don’t understand.

Basically, write how you speak.

But… don’t use the same words over and over again though. Change of words is essential especially when there is a degree of change in the word itself. For example, a character may feel sad at one scene because his heart is broken, and during the next scene he loses his father and his sadness intensifies. At this point you certainly do not want to write down the word sadder or very sad, rather what you should write is that the character feels ‘devastated’ or ‘depressed’. Similar meaning, different effect.

Figures of speech

Similes, metaphors, hyperboles, and more… are common figures of speech in fiction writing. I personally do like the use of metaphors, because with metaphors I could create a comparison and a specification of a scene to something that the reader could relate to and understand. It also helps to intensify what characters feel.

One example of the use of figures of speech in Fading Echoes: “You were everything I hated, but that was some excuse for me to avoid you. And yet I was drawn to you like an insect to light.” This simple simile explains a lot about the main character’s personal affection towards a certain girl. It adds depth and it adds a deeper explanation behind the character’s history. That is what figures of speeches do in storytelling – they add depth and meaning behind a character’s actions and motives.

And sometimes, I also like to use them all at once, like a simile to hyperbole: His heart was hurt as if it was stabbed by a million knives with edges sharper than any metal in the world.

Yeah it’s a little bit too much but you get my point. The thing about fiction writing is that you can exaggerate as much as you can, because it’s your story and you get to do whatever you want. And hey, maybe your readers relate more to exaggerations than simple things. You can’t know for sure, so try whatever you want.

Rule of three’s

Usually the rule of three’s is used in speech writing, but I like to use it. The idea is simple – you use three phrases, words, or statements to intensify scenes; two is lacking, four is too much and five is absurd. So stick with three.

Here’s an example: After his mother died, he felt lackluster, destroyed, and lost.

You can also use statements: We are a family. We stand as one. We fight as one.

Statements like the above create an intense atmosphere while (hopefully) invoking a feeling within the reader… not to mention that it makes scenes more epic than they really are.

“Eyes from a being that lives far away from this universe. Skin of a fair angel from the sky. And lastly, a love of a million souls. That was you.”

This is an example from my story and behind it lays a degree of explanation. It was meant to describe the main character’s explanation towards the girl whom he loved. I used the rule of three on this one to create a deeper degree and to add a personal touch in it. Each statement carries depth and each statement varies in degree. The first statement is an intro so it is a shallow but meaningful start. The second statement then starts to compliment both the first and the last. The last statement wraps everything up, creating a simple but massive impact towards the reader.

All of the things I have explained above are found in my story. They are usually my principles when it comes to storytelling. I follow them strictly as much as I can, but I also give way to new ideas and new principles in my head. As a storyteller you must be adaptable to the world and its changing wants and needs. Always remember to use simple and understandable words. Of all the principles I have this is the one I would highlight the most, because as a reader myself, I enjoy writers who use simple and understandable words creatively because then I would stay immersed in the story because I don’t have the need to look up the words somewhere else.

So these are the things that I am reminding you of. One last thing that I would talk about is the writer’s vanity. It is existent and do not ignore it. Here’s an excerpt from my favorite book of all time: The Angel’s Game, written by my favorite writer, Carlos Ruiz Zafon:

“A writer never forgets the first time he accepted a few coins or a word of praise in exchange for a story. He will never forget the sweet poison of vanity in his blood and the belief that, if he succeeds in not letting anyone discover his lack of talent, the dream of literature will provide him with a roof over his head, a hot meal at the end of the day, and what he covets the most: his name printed on a miserable piece of paper that surely will outlive him. A writer is condemned to remember that moment, because from then on he is doomed and his soul has a price.”

This is the truth of writing and do not run away from it. Vanity is engraved in your skin like a tattoo and it will also infect your heart and soul and it will take control of you and you will let it, but you won’t show it. Vanity will be the only thing you will have left when everything is gone. Writing is murder and it is one kind of murder that you can get away with because of how beautiful it is. Instill this in your mind and you will be a phenomenal writer, forget about this and you will be just like everyone else, pretentious and miserable.

A little bit of a parting gift: don’t avoid clichés, because no matter what you would do, you can’t be different and creative with the goal of being “different” and “creative”. So, own your clichés. Use them in ways that could amplify or compliment your story or use them in ways that you don’t think they have been used before.

Out there is the world and as an artist, the world is your canvas. Your pen, your laptop, your phone – they are your brushes. Mold the world into the shape you want it to be, write down the stories you want to tell. Because what is the world but a story waiting to be written down?

You are the hidden sentinel that sees through the cracks. Write down what you see so that the universe may be aware of your existence.

So destination or not, GPS or not, start writing now and figure everything else out on the way.