Obey your own rules - Eleven ways to make people like what you write

100 ways to improve your writing - Gary Provost 2019

Obey your own rules
Eleven ways to make people like what you write

When you begin to write, you also begin in subtle ways to set down a list of rules, just as you set down the rules at the start of a game. Through your title or first paragraph you communicate to the reader certain guidelines about the subject, the scope, or the tone of the story.

If your title is “Black Mayors in America,” you have set a rule that says, “Everything in this story is related to black mayors in America,” and you will be violating that rule if you write too heavily about mayors who were not black, black people who were not mayors, or black mayors who were not in America.

If your story begins “Angelica put a spell on Mark three times, and suddenly he found himself craving her body,” you have set a rule that says, “Impossible things can happen here.” But if you are writing a contemporary love story, and you bring in a witch in chapter nine, you are breaking the rule that says, “This is a true-to-life story,” and you will lose your reader.

If you begin your story “Many people, it seems, weave from their own experience, hopes, fears, and deepest desires a fabric of conviction in UFOs that is so strong it cannot be ripped apart,” you have made a rule that says, “The tone of this story is serious and respectful of the subject.” If you begin “It seems as if every nutcase from Tallahassee to Timbuktu has a scorched circle in his backyard from a flying saucer landing—aliens must be particularly drawn to the mentally ill,” you have made a rule that says, “This is going to be a humorous look at the subject.” You must stick with the tone you have established. Readers won’t object to any particular tone or rule. They only ask that they be informed and that you don’t break the rules you set.