New Brevoort Formspring

Everything is a tool in the storyteller’s toolbox–and like any tool, it can be used poorly or it can be used well. But as a general rule of thumb, I find that particularly newer writers tend to like byzantine story structures. They’re intrigued by the cleverness of them,and they often serve to disguise a lack of substance at the core of the story. I try not to be dogmatic about it, but more often than not, I tell writers to begin their stories at the beginning and tell them in as linear and straightforward a fashion as possible. That’s not absolute, though–there are certain stories that can only be told in an out-of-sequence manner. But a tricky story structure in an emotionally dead story isn’t going to save it.