Stop With the Cliches!

How to avoid bad story writing.

The video above will go into more specifics that I didn't mention and please don't feel bad if you made these mistakes before. We write to grow, so know what you're doing wrong to do the right thing, my fellow writers.

So many books specially pointing out cliches do help you look out for them, but they don't always tell you what to do besides using something as stale as bad boy romance for views.

Well in order to stop cliches, first you have to write better.

The biggest problem I see in bad Wattpad books isn't plagiarism, it's not lack of creativity, or even horrible grammar and punctuation.

It's the pacing and flow of the story that kills most Wattpad books!

I'm sure you've read one Wattpad book where scenes dragged down for way too long of scenes that could've been longer for whatever reason.

So here's what you need to do if you're struggling with writing your story!

First things first understand story structure in this order: 1st Plot, character, and setting introduction. Who is the book following as the main character? Where and when is the story taking place?
Don't feel the need to cram in every main character in the first chapter, just do the one we're primarily reading about, allow the other characters to enter the story when the story needs them to. Answering these questions and keeping in mind the first chapter doesn't need to be jam packed with the main character(s) full back stories, you're on a pretty good start with your first chapter.

2nd Rising Action. Now that you finished your introduction, you can begin with the rising action which is everything that leads up the climax. This is probably the hardest part of the writing process, because you want to your story to be engaging while giving plot points as needed, plus this where the majority of your story takes place, but doing those things can be tricky.

To avoid the mess of using too much filler or, or worse boring your audience to the point where they leave your book from disappointment, you can write an outline to map out what happens first your story then what happens next plot wise. What worked wonders for me is writing each character's motivations and personality traits before writing the first draft of the story.

Writing the character's traits and motivations will keep you in check of how the story plays out.

What does your character want? Money, fame, love, company? Their actions and personality will make them do what it takes to get those things.

If one character is kind and wants to help her best friend overcome break up, her personality would be kind, caring, selfless, and her motivations would be looking out for her friend.

Another character in that story might be an idealist and try to get the broken-hearted character back with her ex, that would make him nosy and inconsiderate.

You can probably imagine how that story would turn out with other characters' motivations and personality clashing.

Remember these important facts, characters personality and motivations must make sense if you want your audience to understand why the characters are doing what they do. Let's say the girl in the scenario above pushes her heartbroken friend in front of a bus when she's trying to make her feel better, that doesn't add up with her trying to make her friend feel better and it's out of her character for her try to murder her friend when she's supposed to be nice.

If a character's motivations changes their personality changes too.

For an example, the traditionally published Cloaked by Alex Flinn, the main character Johnny at the start of the story he wanted to marry the Princess to get her money so he could bring his family out of poverty, but he learns throughout the story he doesn't know the Princess that well and through the help of his friend he finds another way to get out his finical hardship.