How to create a short story that makes the reader think?

weird_cat

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At the moment, I'm working on a short story with a strong focus on a central question of: how important is the truth? My goal is to create a story that is engaging enough to the reader that they will ask themselves the same question as they read, but I'm not sure if that's coming across. Any thoughts on how I can get the reader to do this?
Thanks in advance!
 

The Second Moon

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I believe that any any story will make your reader think, particularly if you steer it that way.

Sorry if that isn't the long, firm answer you wanted, but that's what I think.

Now if you need help on making your short story show your message clearer then you'll need to give more details on your story. I don't know the genre or the age group. :Hug2:
 
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Ariel.Williams

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I think, in order to engage the reader, you’d need to come up with an engaging and convincing conflict. By this I mean, make sure the reader sees why someone would be on either side of the conflict/it would be hard to decide which side of the conflict to be on or how to make a decision. And you’d have to make sure the story doesn’t seem forced or convenient and the message doesn’t seem preachy. Basically, I think what you’d want to focus on is coming up with a conflict that would engage this question. Then coming up with the characters engaged in the conflict. Have the story move by the characters and situation, and not by how you think your question should be answered. Then I think an engaging story would come through.

That being said, I’m sure there are lots of different ways to go about this. That’s just how I would. Hope that helps!
 

Chris P

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The stories that make me think usually fall into a few categories:

1) Describe honestly the experiences of people whose life I don't understand, and the effects it has on them. Including enough familiarity with other things allows me to connect to the character's world, then the differences turn things on their heads. The key here is honesty without being heavy handed about it.

2) Something unexpected, until it happens then it makes perfect sense. Lead me to think I know what's going to happen, then change it up in a way that makes me say "Wow, how did I miss that?" I'm not talking so much about O Henry-esque surprise endings, but play on the expectations I bring to the story and scramble them up.
 

Woollybear

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You've got me thinking and googling with your question, OP.

You could put a twist at the end--that the truth was misunderstood all along. But the reader doesn't know it's about truth until the end.
You could make the two sides very clear--truth and non-truth--and allow these sides to directly interact in an obvious way.

I'm curious if you have an idea for tackling this in a different format? Essay, novel, poem. I'm curious why the question is posed with short stories specifically.
 

Lakey

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We had a thread recently started by someone who was asking how to work philosophical questions on the nature of self into his stories, and it led to some good discussions about how to work a theme into a story. I put down some thoughts on that thread which you can read here (link).

In short: A great way to work a theme into a story is to create a conflict that challenges the theme, explicitly or implicitly. So if you want to question the importance of truth, you can create a story in which one character highly values the truth as an absolute, and another character sees the truth as malleable or relative -- and then structure your central conflict so that this difference in worldview puts these two characters directly at odds.

:e2coffee:
 

weird_cat

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I'm curious if you have an idea for tackling this in a different format? Essay, novel, poem. I'm curious why the question is posed with short stories specifically.

I posted it with short stories because I have actually already started a short story centered around a theme of truth for a short story competition. I had written one version but didn't think my message was coming across. The essential plot is that a mother, whose son has been declared not guilty for murder after his girlfriend was hit by a car, gets an opportunity to find out what really happened and must decide whether its more important to know the truth or to believe her son is innocent.
All of these responses have been wonderful and I'm definitely considering how I could demonstrate each side (truth vs security) more clearly in the context of my story.
Thank you to everyone!
 

The Eighteenth Letter

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Hi weirdcat

I have come across the same challenge in my short fiction, that challenge being that sometimes the ideas I would like to communicate are much easier done if I just come right out and say it, but feel it has more of an impact in a story.

I agree with Lakey and Ariel.Williams in that having a conflict between two characters, or your protagonist and certain circumstances, can be fertile ground for communicating your idea. This conflict can also be moved to another level, another place so to speak, where it can exist between the protagonist and the writer. A particular voice is required for this, and it won’t necessarily break down the fourth wall, at least not directly.

I find this allows me to psychologically construct the character in a particular way and then have him break away from this as much as the idea needs him to, without it seeming to be out of character for the protagonist.


I hope this makes sense.