This book is a superb all-in-one guide to success GCSE English Language and English Literature - GCSE English 2003

Say What Happened
Section Eight — Original Writing

Give it lots of Style and Substance

To impress the people giving out those C - A* marks, you need to show you can write with imagination and flair. Check that your story has these things:

1) An entertaining plot that says something — there must be some point to it.

2) A clear structure — a beginning, middle and end that flow fluently together.

3) A variety of styles — different sentence lengths and structures, and interesting vocabulary.

4) Grammatically correct sentence- and paragraph-structure, punctuation and spelling.

5) It does what it's supposed to do. It must be written in a style that suits the audience it's aimed at.

Tell Your Reader What Happened and do it Clearly

1) Your story needs to have a good structure. An epic adventure with hundreds of characters and loads of action is no good if your reader can't follow what's going on.

2) Everything you write should be relevant to the plot— in other words, leave out anything that's boring or doesn't need to be there.

Think About What Order it Should All Be In

Think about the kinds of things YOU’d like to read

If you're bored by it, then your reader will be too. You need to take a step back and think about how to make your writing interesting. Start with something unusual. Keep it relevant to the plot. You'll be fine.