Writers often let luck play a hand to move their story forward. A flat tire strands the hero in the wrong town. A missed phone call leads to a disastrous misunderstanding. A dropped key exposes a secret. Bad luck is one of the handiest storytelling tools we have as it can instantly create conflict.
But there’s an important rule experienced storytellers follow:
Luck can get your character into trouble. It should never get them out of trouble.
Why Bad Luck Works
Bad luck is a powerful tool for fiction because it creates problems.
Stories thrive on obstacles and conflict that drive rising tension. Often times back luck comes when we think everything is going to turn out fine. This creates what some call the “all is lost” moment, which is a situation that seems impossible for a character to get out of.
Bad luck makes the situation worse, which is great for storytelling.
Why good Luck is cheating
Now imagine the opposite. Your hero is cornered by the bad guys and escape seems impossible. Then suddenly:
An police officer randomly comes by to help.
The power goes out at the exact moment our hero needs it.
One of the bad guys suddenly turns on the main villain, shooting him dead.
Sure, these things could happen. But if you work the protagonist out of a scrape this way, readers will feel cheated because the protagonist didn’t earn the victory.
As readers, we want to see the character struggle, then work their way out of a problem. If random good fortune solves the problem for them then the story loses its emotional payoff.
The Satisfaction of an Earned Solution
Satisfying endings happen when the protagonist escapes trouble because of something they did.
A good rule of thumb is to let bad luck create problems, but make your hero solve them.
Storytelling is a promise between writer and reader. Don’t let the improper use of luck take the reader out of the story just when it is getting interesting.
Today’s story comes to us from Martin Lochman of Malta.
Martin’s story was previously [Mistakenly] rejected by 5 venues: Interzone, Not One of Us, Clarkesworld, Cryptic Frog Quarterly, and Pulp Asylum.
Bio:I am an emerging Czech science fiction author, currently living and working as a University librarian in Malta. My flash fiction and short stories appeared (or are forthcoming) in a variety of venues, including New Myths, Kzine, Theme of Absence, XB-1 (Czech SFFH magazine), and others. My debut space opera “All Quiet in the Milky Way: Ray M. Holler’s Adventures vol. 1” was published in 2023. You can find me at: https://martinlochmanauthor.wordpress.com/, Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Martin-Lochman-SF-Author/61552596028127/, or Twitter: @MartinLochman.
When I asked Martin what he loves about this story, this was his response:
First and foremost, this is one of those stories that I improvised from the beginning to the end (unlike most of my work, which is usually meticulously outlined and planned out before I even write the first word). What actually inspired me to write it was a dream I had one night – my memories of it were (naturally) quite fuzzy the next morning, but I distinctly remembered stands, vendors, and a pond with a giant crocodile in it. My overactive imagination filled in the rest and The Market was born. Another thing I love about the story is the fact that, despite being self-contained, it provides only a quick peek into the world within – which means I can explore it in subsequent writings.
The Market, by Martin Lochman
The sun had barely peeked out from behind the horizon, but the market was already filled with people. Locals and tourists alike moved from vendor to vendor, examining merchandise, negotiating prices, or committing to a purchase, all the while doing their best to stay out of each other’s way.
David stood at the edge of a stall on the outskirts of the market, frowning at a crate writhing with pitch-black insects the likes of which he had never seen. Every so often, their numerous limbs or antennae poked at the one-way force field at the top of the container, producing a semi-transparent, yellowish ripple.
They were about fifteen centimeters long and best resembled an oversized flying ant. The problem was that they possessed five pairs of legs, a twin elongated stinger, and what could be best described as half-formed claws on the upper thorax, just below the head. In a nutshell, they looked like something straight out of a B-horror movie concept art.
“Titanomyrma gigantea,” the vendor answered from behind a small counter before David could ask, enunciating slowly as if talking to a child. He was a thin, lanky man with a thick mustache and almost unnaturally blue eyes.
“They are the largest species of ants to have ever existed on Earth. If you’re interested, they are ten credits a piece, but I’ll give you a ten percent discount if you buy ten or more.”
“No, they are not.”
The vendor narrowed his eyes.
“Pardon me?”
Someone bumped into David from behind, causing him to lose his balance. Instinctively, he stretched his arms out in front of him… and nearly ended up burying them in the pool of the mysterious insects. Fortunately, he managed to land his hands on the opposite edges of the crate at the last possible moment.
Presumably, the same someone mumbled a half-hearted “Sorry!”, but by the time David steadied himself, they had already disappeared in the crowd.
Relief turned to irritation as he looked back at the vendor and saw the corners of his mouth curved up in amusement.
“What I mean is that these are not Titanomyrma gigantea,” David said coldly.
The man’s gaze hardened.
“I think I would know what I am selling. I collected them myself.”
David folded his arms across his chest.
“The real Titanomyrma was at best half the size. Didn’t have that many legs or a dual stinger. And don’t even get me started on whatever it is growing right under their heads.”
A hint of alarm flashed in the corners of the vendor’s eyes, but his face remained thoroughly impassive.
“You some kind of paleontologist?” he hissed, then, not waiting for David’s reaction, added, “Look, it’s not like we have discovered every single animal or plant in history. Even if we can literally visit it. Not my fault you don’t recognize this one.”
David shook his head.
“If you don’t like what you see, you can just move on. Plenty of other stands on the market,” the vendor insisted. A vein appeared in the middle of his forehead, indicating that his patience was wearing thin.
His irate demeanor didn’t escape the attention of several visitors who stopped to lurk behind David.
“I think you mean a paleo-entomologist, but no, you’re not that lucky,” David said, staring the vendor down.
“Lucky? Who the hell do you—” the man stopped abruptly, realization overtaking his features. “Oh no. No? No!”
“Yes,” David smiled, savoring the swift change in his counterpart’s attitude.
“This is not what it looks like,” the vendor offered weakly, raising his hands, palms toward David.
“It’s not?”
Putting on an exaggerated expression of surprise, David gestured toward the crate: “You mean these are not some genetically engineered abominations you are selling as genuine prehistoric specimens, breaking six different federal laws in the process? Is that what you are telling me?”
There was a gasp, an expletive muttered under the breath, a triumphant aha!—but these were just the reactions from the slowly growing gathering of lurkers around the stand. The vendor himself stayed silent, steadily turning pale.
“Keeping quiet won’t do you any good now,” David pressed on, a subtle warning underscoring his words.
For a long moment, the vendor just glared at him, evidently considering his options or questioning his life choices. Or both.
“Okay,” he said finally, looking away. “You are right. These are not the Titanomyrma. But I swear to God I didn’t make them. And—” he beckoned David closer.
David reluctantly leaned forward, careful to stay well clear of the crate.
“—they are not the only fakes here,” the vendor finished in a low voice.
David frowned. The guy was obviously grasping at straws, but that didn’t necessarily mean he was lying. And if he weren’t, then, well, David might end up spending more time at the market than he had originally planned.
He took a deep breath and straightened. Turning around, he addressed the onlookers: “Move along, people. Nothing to see here.”
The less curious dispersed almost immediately; the rest needed an additional encouragement. Begrudgingly, David withdrew the badge from his pocket and waved it around, causing two or three people — who looked so similar to one another they had to be related — to openly express their displeasure with authorities. In the end, however, it worked, and the unwanted audience dispersed.
As soon as the flow of the river of bodies past the stand resumed, David walked around it and joined the vendor in the back.
“Well, I am all ears.”
“Na-ah,” the man said and pressed his lips together. “I want to make a deal.”
“A deal?” David repeated, incredulous.
“Yeah. I give you the supplier and point you in the direction of their clients, and, in exchange, you let me off with a warning.”
The vendor jutted his chin out in defiance, though his eyes betrayed uncertainty.
“Do you really think you are in a position to make demands?” David said sharply. “I can just go and find the fakes myself, just like I found yours.”
“You can. And I am sure you’ll have no problems spotting the easy ones. But—” the vendor smirked. “—you should know that the merchandise I got is—how do I put this—on the lower end of the price range. The high-end stuff? You won’t be able to tell the critter isn’t real unless you run a full damn DNA analysis.”
He paused, shrugging. The gesture almost looked nonchalant.
“Besides, you won’t know who’s manufacturing them in the first place.”
David gritted his teeth.
“Tell you what,” the vendor continued, capitalizing on David’s hesitation. “I’ll give you the first one for free. See that Airstream over there?”
He waved his arm in the direction of a bullet-shaped trailer parked about fifty meters away. A long table was set up in front of the vehicle’s open door, and on it, opaque cubical containers about the size of shoe boxes were stacked one next to each other. A large, bearded man stood behind the table, gesticulating frantically at a group of bystanders.
“The guy will tell you he’s selling Deinosuchus eggs, but in reality, he just modified a common alligator to grow three times its normal size and sprinkled in some minor cosmetic details to make it look distinctly different.”
David closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. He exhaled slowly through his nose and reopened his eyes to the vendor’s hopeful face.
“How much did you make on these?” David asked slowly. “In total?”
“About four hundred credits,” the man replied, hesitantly.
Raising an eyebrow, David tilted his head to the side.
“Maybe five?” the vendor offered, before sighing. “Fine, it’s seven-fifty. Not a fraction over seven-sixty, I promise.”
“And you haven’t downloaded any to your personal account?”
David indicated the terminal, which was secured to the counter with a smart lock to prevent theft.
“No, sir. It’s all there.”
David nodded, taking another deep breath.
“Okay, I’m keeping the credits you made on these, of course. And you need to give me the names of everyone you know who is selling the fake crap, plus the manufacturer, then I’ll forget you were ever here. ”
Relief swept across the man’s face.
“But if I ever see you at one of these, I’ll remember really quickly who you are and exactly how much your illicit sales garnered.”
The vendor’s eyes flicked to the terminal. For a moment, it looked like there was a question at the tip of his tongue, but ultimately, he likely thought better of voicing it.
“Right. Got it.”
Less than ten minutes later, the stand stood empty. David had made the vendor take his abominable merchandise with him and safely dispose of it. Even with the crate’s force field, it’d be irresponsible to leave them. The the man hadn’t been very happy about it, but ultimately had no other choice but to accede to. David watched him drag the trolley with the crates stacked on it in the direction of the nearest teletransport station, and once his tall frame disappeared from view, he leaned against the counter, letting out a small laugh.
Seven hundred and fifty credits for what had it been — ten, fifteen minutes of work? And they said his doctorate in paleontology was as good as one in gender studies in the era of time zoos, prehistoric safaris, and public markets where you could literally buy yourself a pet trilobite.
David patted his jacket pocket, feeling the hard contours of the appropriated terminal inside, then considered the file on his wrist computer, hastily put together and transferred by the vendor. David was sure the incriminating information on it would be of great interest to the real inspectors, so the right thing to do was to make sure they received it. He could slip them an anonymous message, nudge them in the right direction… of whoever it was who was manufacturing the fakes.
Today’s story comes to us from Glen Engel-Cox. Glen thinks more about authors and writing than anyone outside of the offices of The Paris Review, who has never published him. He emails a daily newsletter about literature as part of his Patreon account: join for free at patreon.com/gengelcox. His novel, Darwin’s Daughter, and a non-fiction compilation, First Impressions, can be found at A Major Annoying zero-paying online site, while his short fiction is available for free in The Daily Tomorrow, Phano,, LatineLit, Utopia, and elsewhere.
Glen’s story has been [Mistakenly] rejected by Clarkesworld, Asimov’s, Apex, Solarpunk, Utopia, and a few others.
When I asked Glen what he loves about this story, this was his answer:
What I love about this story is how it’s a kind of a throwback to the 50s SF of writers like Fredric Brown, where the aliens are cute and the stories are a bit cozy. So much SF now (well, and maybe always has been) is dystopian, dark views of horrible futures and I wanted to see if I could bring a little joy to the world.
The Mass Market and the Madness of Crowds, by Glen Engel-Cox
After being jostled for the third time by the crowd in the vendor’s booth, Jean lost her temper and swore, causing the entire room to chuckle at her loss of decorum. Even though she towered over most of the crowd by a meter–too much time spent in zero-G–most of the crowd pushing her weighed at least twenty kilos more than she did and some of them a lot more.
As an asteroid field miner, she had grown accustomed to isolation and the fact not many human women chose the profession, but it still galled her when she had to deal with the crowds that inhabited most spaceports. On board her ship, as small as it might be, everything had its place. She had difficulty dealing with movement that didn’t follow predictable paths, which meant anything with intelligence, or what passed for the same by her fellow miners. She couldn’t avoid the spaceports, either, because that’s where ore was sold and where she had to refuel. She needed some dense mass to power her entropic drive, and the cheapest way to buy some was in the open market. In too many ways, being a miner and having to buy mass was ironic. The ore in her hold, however, was unrefined, and she knew from the mass spectroscopy that it only had trace amounts of heavy metals.
This particular market was called the Masshole, situated in the center of an orbital Altarean habitrail. It dealt in things other than mass, but, really, when it came down to it, everything was mass, wasn’t it?
“Wait your turn,” said the vendor. That’s not why Jean had sworn, but it wouldn’t do any good to complain. She turned on her heels and left the booth, likely to more laughter. The market had plenty of vendors and she was damned if she was going to spend any more time in this one.
Jean really shouldn’t have gotten annoyed but she hadn’t had much luck in finding what she needed, not at a price she could afford. Realizing she needed to calm down, she sought out a lunch place with food she could eat. Given all the different alien communities on this habitrail, she found that almost as difficult but eventually she found a noodle shop off one of the main passages. The inside was crowded as well, but, unlike the last vendor, this line moved fast. She sat down at a table outside and proceeded to slurp up her meal.
Across the way, she watched an altercation break out between a very short, stocky alien who looked like an asteroid with spiderlimbs and a real bruiser of a human, one of those brawny miners who swaggered down the hallways without giving any room to others. Jean couldn’t tell if the human had stepped on a limb or pushed the alien out of the way, but given the way it gestured, she felt a fight was imminent. She glanced around, but those around her seemed to be ignoring the rapidly increasing tension. She swore under her breath, but got up and walked over and put herself between the two of them and yelled, using her height to get them to focus away from each other and up to where she glared at them.
“Stay out of this,” said the human. “This pebble needs to learn a lesson.”
“Crack you,” said the alien.
“Both of you should turn around and go your separate ways. We don’t need a interspecies war starting here.”
“Who made you the judge?”
“You did, right now. Now go.”
He glared at her, but he had shifted his focus away from the alien, which is what had to happen to get him to settle down. She held his eyes, then flicked her hand away. He grunted and turned, knocking into her with his shoulder as he moved down the hall, hands on his hips as he took even more space as he left, others in the hall giving way.
When he was outside of hearing range, she knelt down on one knee and asked the alien, “Are you hurt?”
“Hurt? What hurt?”
“Damaged? Injured?” She looked at him, trying to find what it used as sensory organs but only seeing crags and crevices.
It waved one limb, a thin, black multi-segmented chitinous thing. “Crush this.” She could see some segments that seemed flattened somewhat.
“Do you need medical assistance?”
It flexed the appendage. “Fix self.”
Well, that was good. The human must have stepped on it accidentally, not unsurprising in these crowded halls if you didn’t pay attention to those around you.
“Alright, then. You be careful. You have to watch after yourself around here, you know.”
Jean went back to my noodles, finding in her absence the proprietor had come out and topped the dish off so they were still hot. They nodded to her as she sat down. “That was a nice thing you did there.”
She shrugged, looking back over at the alien, who had now been joined by another of its kind and they waved their spindly arms about in agitation.
“So who are they?” Jean asked.
“Miturarnians. Came aboard about sixty, seventy cycles ago. Great maintenance workers. Not only are those appendages of theirs extremely flexible, they don’t seem to breath air so can go out into vacuum without bulky suits.” Given there had to be over a thousand-odd space-faring species inhabiting the nine galaxies, it was impossible to know them all in detail, and more seemed to pop up everyday. “Most all ETV work has been given over to them and it’s been a good deal, as far as I understand. Other hab authorities are desperate to get them to move and take work with them, but there’s only so many of them, it seems. Anyway, I better get back to cooking.”
Jean watched the two aliens while she finished her lunch. They had stopped gesticulating and now seemed to be frozen in place forcing the hallway traffic to divert around them.
#
She went back to seeking a mass dealer whose idea of profit was something less than a two-hundred percent markup. But they seemed to sense her desperation, even reveled in it, increasing their prices from stall to stall. She suspected they had a private network where they communicated, her mug shot stamped online with big letters RUBE.
After hours of this, she stopped at an outside bar and took inventory. She had a commitment for some platinum, but it would hardly be enough to power her beyond one trip and if something went wrong…well, she didn’t like to work with those margins.
She felt something tug on her trousers. She looked down and saw a mituarian retract a pincer.
“You mine?” it asked. She couldn’t tell where it made the sound from, but it had a grating quality to it like ore being ground.
“Yeah.”
“Have need. Take job?”
Jean looked around the bar, but no one was paying attention to them. She said, “I work for myself. Freelance, you know. Hit the asteroid belt, hope to hit a jackpot someday. I don’t work for anyone else.”
“Pay good. What want?”
Jean chuckled. “What I need is some really dense mass for my entropic drive so I can go further into the fields without constantly coming back here to refuel.”
“Have mass! Much mass!” It tapped itself with its appendage.
Jean shook her head. The little being didn’t understand. “Not mass like you or me, but dense stuff.”
“Big mass. I have.” It motioned for her to follow it. She told it to wait while she finished her drink. No need to waste decent alcohol in case this was some wild asteroid chase.
Following the mituarian, she watched as it moved down the hallway, its appendages basically rolling it along the hall. No wonder one of them had been stepped on earlier. The alien shifted to the right or left constantly rather than moving straight. It led her into the heart of the Hab, the center point where the centrifugal force didn’t act on you to provide gravity. She activated her mag boots, finding her own movements awkward while the alien’s locomotion now had a fluidity indicating how accustomed they were to weightlessness. Finally, it motioned for her to enter what she took to be its berth.
“Big mass?” Jean asked.
“Most big. And dense.”
Jean stepped inside. Inside the small room not much larger than the interior of her mining ship, the mituarnian made a ceremony of retrieving and unveiling a casket lined in exquisite fur with half-a-dozen orbs nestled inside, each the size of Jean’s hand and made of pure black. Jean’s eyes went wide. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Now she understood why it brought her here. The weight of those would tunnel a hole in the floor or walls in the market area with its normal gravity.
“Told you. Dense. Big mass.”
“SubQ?” Jean asked, hardly daring to speak the name. Hab maintenance work must pay well if this alien could afford to own SubQ.
“You know. I got. What worth?”
A fortune. One of those orbs would power her ship for a lifetime and beyond. Jean shook her head. “More than I got.”
“You need?”
“Badly.”
“You mine?”
“Yes, I’m a miner.” She thought they had established that already.
“I need. We go. I show. You mine. SubQ yours.”
Jean squinted at the mituarnian. She normally worked solo. Having someone on her ship made her nervous, especially a client telling her what to do. But for an orb of SubQ? She didn’t hesitate. “Deal.”
#
The coordinates it gave her took them to a double-star on the edge of the Altar system. Following the jump, which the mituarnian efficiently paid by providing her with a pebble of platinum, it directed her toward a planetoid, unusual for its multiple rings rather than a singular one on the elliptical.
The mituarnian then activated a homing beacon, directing her to a specific spot in one of the inner rings. “Here.” The one it chose did look different than the others, an oblong rock about half the size of her ship with spider veins visible on the surface. “Take care. It fast.”
Fast in space was a relative term, but Jean thought she understood its warning.
She matched the orbital speed of the asteroids circling the planet, each ring moving at a different velocity, so she had to deftly maneuver in and around the deadly rocks until finally getting to the specific one the mituarnian wanted mined.
“What are we mining for?”
“You see. It fast. You hit. It break. Then fast. Suck up. NO GRIND.” The last it said with great emphasis.
“Ok, ok.” She showed it the grind mechanism control. “With this off, it will just collect and won’t grind the ore.”
“Not ore,” it said. “Mass.”
Whatever, Jean thought. “Any particular spot to hit?” During the jump, the mituarnian had told her not to use her drill, but to use the particle hammer.
“Here. Or there. Your pick. But hard. Hard hard.”
She activated the gravity collector, directing the hammer to use maximum force while firing the ship’s plasma engines to counter the reaction from the force used. As soon as the impact occurred, the asteroid cracked, each spider vein suddenly red and then nonexistent, the rock splitting and resplitting into thousands of tinier asteroids, which were then sucked up into the hopper by the collector. She had seen nothing like it.
The mituarnian watched with delight. “All! All!” it exclaimed, the collector gathering up every bit of the asteroid in seconds.
“We see. Come come.” It led her to the hold, now sealed against space after the collector had finished. “Open open! We see!”
Jean popped open the hatch and looked inside. She had expected a collection of rocks. Instead, the hopper was filled with tiny miniature mituarnians screaching and clambering over each other. An asteroid hatchery. Newborns.
“Much mass! It good. SubQ yours.”
She felt light-headed watching the baby aliens. So many of them she couldn’t see the floor or the sides of the hopper. It was madness, but Jean didn’t care. If being midwife to mituarians enabled her to seal her future, she would learn to like some crowds.
D.H.Parish (he/him) is, like Dr. Jekyll, a respectable physician by day who dabbles in darker things by night. He has had short stories presented on multiple horror podcasts, including Creepy, Scare You to Sleep, and Nocturnal Transmissions, and appear in print anthologies and magazines. His first novella, The Bodies, was just published. More information is available at dhparishstories.com.
When I asked D.H. what he loves about his story, this was his response:
First, I enjoy writing stories that invoke or invert Jewish and Christian religious imagery and ideas. Regardless of where one falls on the spectrum of belief or disbelief or nonbelief, the Bible and its associated literature (and I use the term literature here broadly) remain the richest and most enduring motherlode of stories and themes available to mine in Western culture. As I think about it, my story is ultimately going after an explanation of existence in a somewhat similar way to the Magician’s Nephew (the sixth book of the Narnia Chronicles), although my story is much briefer and far less reverent. Second, I love stories that have frame shifts, stories where you think you are comfortably reading one thing only to realize halfway through or at the end you have actually been reading or hearing or watching something quite different, the modern “classic” example being The Sixth Sense. In its laziest form, this is the “it was all a dream” kind of story (although that can sometimes work too). At their best, these are the stories that make you do a double take and immediately reread to find the hints and clues that were hiding in plain sight. Executed well, they give any twist (and any message implied in that twist) that much more impact and staying power. Finally, every superhero needs an origin story.
Tabula Rasa has been [mistakenly] rejected by Ethera, Epic Echoes, Apex, Kinpaurak, Orion’s Belt, Off Season, and Toil and Trouble.
Tabula Rasa by D.H. Parish
He looked out from his hiding place in the closet, a sliver of the room visible through a crack in the warped, ancient wood. He could see the Master hunched at his desk, neither reading nor writing, but lost in thought. For now, he had to wait. What were a few more minutes? Or hours? Or days?
Over the course of years too numerous to count, the Master had taught them from the great books of laws and spells. They had learned every rule. They had acquired proficiency in every endeavor. They could run like gazelles, swim like dolphins, and soar like eagles. They controlled magnificent creatures of immense stature and strength. They tasted whatever came to mind, listened to exquisite celestial symphonies, and witnessed beautiful scenes. All was fair and just and almost perfect.
But they were denied one power. The rest of them didn’t seem to realize it. They would say: “We dwell in the best of all possible worlds, do we not? We know how to control it, how to bend it to our will, to our delight. We have a kind Master who teaches us. What more could we desire?”
Blessed as this world was, it did not satisfy him, although he did not at first quite grasp why. Indeed, had he been asked, he could not have explained his complaint, which began as a fleeting thought that pestered him in quiet moments. But the thought grew, nourished with time, becoming a raging insistence, an all-consuming conviction, that they, that he, were deprived.
Once, when they had gathered in the Master’s study, savoring food and drink of their own conjuring while sharing and singing new songs, he noticed among the Master’s massive dark leather volumes one that bore no lettering on its spine. It seemed newer, untouched. As the others retired after the symposium, he stayed behind.
“Master,” he began, “I see on your shelf one book you have never shared with us. May I ask why?”
The Master looked at him with gentle eyes, “Of course you may ask. But I shall reply that that book is not for you.”
“Then why do you have it, why do you keep it?”
“Because I may need it.”
“May I look at it?”
“You may not. All you need, you already have. There is nothing in that book that will make this a better world for you, for anyone. Nothing.”
He studied the Master’s face, trying without success to interpret this cryptic reply. “Very well. Thank you, Master.” He bowed and took his leave, doing his best to hide his curiosity.
From that moment, however, reading that book became his mission. But how? He could not use a spell to obtain access; the Master would know and thwart him. He could not confide in others; they would not understand, or worse, would betray his confidence in a misguided attempt to “help” him. His only option was to bide his time until he could seize an opportunity to see that book. He dedicated years to this singular endeavor. Day after day, his hunger for the book grew, never sated by all else that was available to him.
Finally, opportunity came. He was strolling the halls when he saw Rafi standing in the Master’s doorway, inviting the Master to a musical performance. The Master heartily agreed, and the two of them departed in haste, such haste that the Master’s door remained ajar. Now was his chance! He pushed the door open, slowly, silently. He approached the shelf and stood before the book, the object of his desire.
Before he could seize it, he heard voices in the hall. Were they coming back? He glanced around, saw his only escape would be to the closet, and dashed in. He heard the Master return and tell Rafi that he would go to the concert when it was truly ready and then sit down again at his desk.
Thus matters stood. He was trapped in a closet, so tantalizingly close to his goal. And then it found him. It slithered over his sandals, a cold, scaly body that coiled itself around his left ankle, winding slowly but inexorably northward. He bit his lip as it circled his thigh and approached his groin. Carefully, deliberately, he reached under his cloak and, in one quick motion, grabbed its neck and yanked. It released its constrictive grip at the unexpected force. He held the serpent up to his face to look at it. The creature bared its fangs and hissed loudly, clearly upset at its unexpected capture.
Through the crack, he saw the Master rise from his chair and turn toward him. The door moved slightly as the Master placed his hand on the brass door handle to the closet. He was caught! Damn that familiar! But then Rafi came bounding in yelling, and the Master left again.
The room empty once more, he emerged from his hiding place. Still gripping the serpent, he hurled it back into the closet and shut the door to trap it. He walked to the shelf and pulled the book down, laying the tome on the Master’s desk. However much he was willing to violate the Master’s rule regarding the book, habits of obedience still kept him from sitting in the Master’s chair, and so he remained standing as he opened it.
Nothing.
It was blank.
He turned the pages. Empty leaf after empty leaf. No words.
Why had this been forbidden? What was the mystery?
Then he smiled, for he understood. A blank book meant creation. Creation meant control. Power! That was the hunger. With this book, he could write the spells, the rules. That was why the Master had hidden it. With it, he could become a master, the Master. Yes. That was now within his power, his destiny. He would make a better world, a world in his image, beholden to his will.
Aware of what lay before him, he allowed himself to sit in the Master’s chair. He opened the book to the first page, picked up the Master’s quill, and dipped it in the inkwell. He raised his hand, a small black droplet perching expectantly on the nib. He hesitated to write. Was this right?
As he paused, a quivering voice called out from the doorway: “Stop!”
He saw the Master standing in the doorway, shivering, quaking. He had never seen the Master afraid.
“Please, dear God,” the Master begged, “don’t do this. You will destroy everything we know and love. You may not mean to, but your action will release untold suffering.”
He was not used to the Master calling him by name, and as he heard the plea, he unconsciously let his hand fall until the quill tip gently kissed the vellum and irrevocably blemished the virgin parchment.
In that instant, the room vanished. He now sat alone in a vast, unending void. Nothing was visible save the open page and that first dark stain. He knew he had to continue writing. But how to start his own world, his own universe? And then he had inspiration:
“In the beginning, God created the Heaven and the Earth…”
This week we have a non-fiction guest post from Y. Len.
Sticking withe the theme of this Blog Y Len’s non-fiction post has been [mistakenly] rejected by CRAFT, Writers Digest and Authors Publish.
On the F***ing Garden Path in Fiction, by Y. Len
To a reader:
Note 1: The word in the title that caught your attention is “Forking” and NOT what you thought;
Note 2: Contrary to what you may be thinking now, this isn’t about Borges’s “The Garden of Forking Paths”;
Note 3: Read on if you consider yourself a contrarian. If garden variety sentences are your cup of tea—fork off onto your own path.
Garden path sentences are a tricky kind of phrase
They lead you to a dead end as you try to parse their ways
They start with words that seem to make a clear and simple sense
But then they twist and turn and leave you hanging in suspense
The rules of writing castigate garden path sentences—what better reason for taking a closer look and perhaps using them to break into the craft?
A garden path effect in writing is achieved by weaving a semantic ambiguity into a sentence. While being read, the sentence leads the reader toward a seemingly familiar meaning that is actually not the one intended. That’s where/how the “forking” happens. When read to the end, the sentence seems ungrammatical or makes no sense and requires rereading so that its true meaning may be fully understood after alternative parsing.
The horticultural label for this linguistic phenomenon hails from an old saying “to be led down (or up) the garden path”, meaning to be deceived, tricked, or seduced. In a century-old “A Dictionary of Modern English Usage” (1926), H.W. Fowler describes such sentences as unwittingly laying a “false scent”.
In late 1970s–1980s, Lyn Frazier and Janet Dean Fodor developed the “Garden Path Model” of sentence processing. It argued that readers use simplest-structure-first heuristics. When those heuristics fail, readers experience the garden path effect. Later research argued that multiple cues (syntax, semantics, context, frequency of usage) all interact.
The old man the boats. The old man… here is first taken as a noun and a verb is expected next. Correct parse:The old [people] man (verb) the boats.This popular example illustrates how word class ambiguity (noun vs. verb) tricks the reader.
The horse raced past the barn fell. The horse raced past the barn… here feels complete. Correct parse:The horse [that was] raced past the barn fell. This, one of the most cited examples in the literature, shows how readers “commit too early” to a sentence structure and must re-analyze.
Fat people eat accumulates. Similar to the above example, intentional missing relative pronoun (that) prompts misanalysis.
Hard to argue the “expert” opinion that garden paths have no place in academic, technical and business writing where clarity rules. In case of fiction in general and certain genres of fiction in particular, the answer may not be as straightforward.
The optimist in me believes that not all readers are content with garden variety sentences. Some may enjoy cracking open verbs and nouns to attribute agency where others wouldn’t expect it, and/or stringing together phrases that tell stories with their structure, as well as with their content. Yes, the complex prose demands a mental effort when constructing the images or navigating the linguistic possibilities that it presents. Yet the payoff of doing so is (i) the immediate satisfaction (“Aha! That writer ain’t no slouch, but I got it anyway!”) AND (ii) an expansion of the boundaries of language and the enrichment of what one can imagine on the page.
Remember your inexplicable affinity for that IKEA piece you put so much time and frustration into putting together after putting so much time and frustration into understanding the accompanying instructions given in tiny font in multiple languages with English seeming only slightly less bewildering than the others? Similar satisfaction may result from reading “some assembly required” prose.
Another off the cuff example would be Hitchcock’s films that make the audience jump to conclusions that are inevitably incorrect. Doesn’t a garden path sentence do the same on a micro level? By momentarily misleading the reader, it can create a sense of mystery and intrigue.
At their core, garden path sentences manipulate the reader’s expectations. They present a surface meaning that sooner or later collapses under grammatical or semantic pressure, demanding rereading and rethinking. This small act of disorientation can be scaled upward: in fiction, a writer might mirror a character’s confusion, instability, or unreliability through similar linguistic detours.
For instance, in a psychological thriller, sentences that shift direction can echo a protagonist’s fractured mental state, forcing the reader to share in their uncertainty.
In my adventure/murder mystery “The Bloodvein River Monster,” the adult character is recovering from mercury poisoning that affected his mental ability.
The five-year-old boy with the runny nose woke thirsty and lay in the dark, listening to silence. No flashing colors, no frightening voices in his head. A clean scent of resin and wood told him where he was and that he was no longer that boy.
He had no idea how long he’d slept, only a vague memory of stumbling through the forest. It was still night. Or already? His body felt weak, but there was no panic. Thoughts drifted, bumping softly one into the other, yet he could hold on to them long enough to finish each before the next arrived. He scooped handfuls of snow into his mouth, the chill numbing his tongue but easing his thirst, and drifted back into sleep.
Next time Ezra woke with the feeling the dream left.
The last sentence of the excerpt carries the drifting, dreamlike atmosphere established earlier even after the character wakes—the garden path phrasing itself is deliberately ambiguous (Ezra woke, feeling that the dream has left or he woke with some unspecified feeling left by the dream?) inviting the reader to share in Ezra’s uncertainty. The psycholinguistic effect of a single short sentence here is comparable to that of the entire first paragraph that achieves the similar result as it starts with the character as the five-year-old boy only to end by denying that very fact.
The garden path technique also offers rhythmical and aesthetic value. “Traditional” prose strives toward clarity, smoothing the reader’s ride over the (often intentionally) bumpy roads our characters take. By contrast, garden path structures may introduce hesitation and slower reading, break immersion and compel attention to the mechanics of language itself.
The last but not least, garden path sentences can serve as thematic devices. Stories about deception, shifting identities, or supernatural interference gain resonance when their very sentences enact misdirection. The language performs the subject matter: just as a character may be fooled, so too is the reader. In this sense, garden paths may become not just ornamental puzzles but enactments of the story’s underlying concerns.
Of course, as with almost everything in life, restraint is essential. Overuse your rake in your writing and you’ll risk reader’s frustration, turning prose into a riddle rather than a narrative. But strategically placed—like a topspin serve à la Pete Sampras in your otherwise bland pickleball game—a garden path sentence or two of them can create surprise, deepen psychological realism, and remind readers that language itself is a valuable writer’s tool.
Have fun in the garden!
Garden path sentences are fun to read and write
They challenge your grammar and the depth of your insight
They show you how the English language can be full of tricks
And how a single word can change the meaning in a flick
Even Death Must Die comes to us from Miguel Angel Lopez Muñoz. Miguel was born and lives in Madrid, Spain. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics with a Master’s degree in Quantum Cryptography. He writes fantasy, science fiction and horror and has won awards like the UPC of science fiction Award (in 2006 and again in 2024), and published books related to those three genres. He has been published in Bag of Bones, where he won the “206 Word Story” call, Microverses and Coffin Bell. He is a big fan of video games, transformers and board games, and you can follow his posts on these three topics on his Instagram @magnus_dagon
Miguel’s wonderful story has been [mistakenly] rejected by: Analog, Andrómeda Spaceways, and Ápex Magazine
When asked what he loves about this story, this was his response:
What I like most about this story is that it deals with a subject I don’t often talk about, which is religion. But it deals with it from a point of view that I really like, which is mythology (mythological stories, especially Greek ones, are among those with which I have won the most literary competitions).
I also really like the story from a narrative point of view, as there isn’t much dialogue but somehow the plot isn’t overloaded with descriptions, and also from a visual point of view, with veiled suggestions that focus on the aesthetic tone of the Great Temple and its hard-working builders.
Even Death Must Die by Miguel Angel Lopez
On rainy days, when it was my turn to descend from the tower, I saw the black clouds full of pollution. These same clouds, thick and dark like a great sea, yet dense and soft as velvet, forced us to ascend higher, banishing us from the promised land and made us gods to them — although I doubt the heavens would have wanted someone like me.
I secured my suit and checked the air cylinder, preparing for the exit to the outside as the glassed-in elevator reached the lowest level. As a precautionary measure, so that my appearance would not be observed from below, the exit at the base of the tower was slightly electrified to clear the area of curious androids. In my opinion, although at the time such a custom may have been of some use, by then they were no longer looking for me, but merely awaiting my arrival. That is understandable. We don’t go looking for her either; we just wait for her to arrive when the time is right. Human culture has represented her sometimes as a faithful friend, sometimes as an executioner of souls; but always as someone we want to have far away.
According to the reports I had received from the tower technicians, the android I was supposed to bring back had been split in two by one of the mechanical saws in charge of shaping the rocky terrain. In the middle of the downpour I arrived at the factory area, the robots making way for me, looking at me with devotion or fear. But for the first time since I had that macabre function I noticed that some robots were looking at me with a defiant attitude, a brave gesture considering that in the mystical terrain, I was a personification of the end of all living beings, and in the physical terrain, I was twice as tall as any of them.
I arrived at the place where the disabled robot was and there I found, as it always used to happen, the protective android. It was a robot like the others, but equipped with accessories whose only purpose was to imitate, in a misunderstood way, the accessories of my artificial breathing suit. It looked at me and pointed to what I was looking for.
“Hello, B33MH,” I said, without any tone in my voice.
“Welcome, deity Ben,” the android replied solemnly. “We knew you would come.”
The first time I introduced myself to the androids and told them my name, they decided to anticipate it with the deity treatment. At first I tried to force them to simply call me by my name, but to no avail. To them my name was something as imperishable as space or time.
“What happened?” I asked calmly.
“It was an accident, my lord. It got too close to the saw.”
“I want the androids who handle saws to stay farther away from them. There’s no need to take such risks.”
“But sir, that way it will take longer to complete the Great Temple of the deities.”
“The Great Temple can wait, B33MH. Your safety is more important to me now.”
“So it shall be done, my lord.”
I pulled out a tractor beam and put all the pieces of the fallen robot together then placed it in a box of darkness, a handy collapsible container that for robots must have been little less than a coffin. I carried it in both hands with as much respect as I could muster for my actions. B33MH looked at me, fulfilling the function its kind had bestowed upon it, to be a living witness to my actions, and asked me, as it always did, to accompany me back to my kingdom.
“When it is your time, you will come with me. But first you must not,” I said simply, hoping to settle a matter that was not open to discussion.
“What will become of our companion, deity Ben? Will it, like the others, have access to your kingdom?”
“They all have,” I replied. “You can stop worrying about it. It is at peace with itself and everyone else now.”
“You’re lying!” said another of the androids behind me. Despite my surprise, none of the androids noticed the slightest hesitation on my part. The suit, which they considered part of my own organism, helped.
“Why do you say that, C22RD?” I asked, trying to appear as calm as possible.
“I don’t believe you are a deity. You may be powerful, but you are something else. And I’m not the only one who thinks so.”
I kept quiet. Everyone was waiting for me to speak. I had to give them the opposite. I had to make it seem that my motivations were impossible for their perishable metallic bodies to conceive.
In response to the silence, C22RD spoke again.
“I will prove to everyone that you are a plastic god.”
I turned and walked away, oblivious to its comments, as if I could not hear them. Although I didn’t turn around at any point I know that all the robots were waiting for a reaction that would clarify how I felt about those direct attacks. Instead, I gave them uncertainty. It was the only thing I could give them, for it was the only thing I harbored at that moment.
#
Now, remembering that day, I know that many things had to happen to get to that point. At the beginning I was a mere observer, just another technician with the only incentive of maintaining direct contact with the androids. It was a poorly paid job and not without its dangers; I would arrive in my suit, take the defective models with me when they stopped working, check a couple of systems to verify programming guidelines, and supervise the progress of the domes that would one day house us. But little by little they began to invest more in such construction, as humanity as a whole began to believe hopefully that this would be the solution, that truly someday the metal slaves would complete a cupular world isolated from the toxic emanations of the clouds. The Great Temple, as they now call it. Paradise on Earth. It is the only one of their biblical expressions that I do not consider exaggerated. Not that the towers were bad to live in, but home, no matter how many generations pass, is still home. It is written as one more mark on our genetic will until there is no way to overlook it.
It was around those days that I began to think of androids as more than just machines and they began to think of me as something… metahuman. It was always ensured that they didn’t know the truth of their existence, that they would simply work in exchange for having watchmen looking out for their safety. It was never really slavery. It took me a while to realize it, but our situation was very similar to that of the gods in ancient times. They worked convinced that in a way they were honoring unquestionable beings. We were giving them resources, technological help and renewing their population, for them this was greatest gift that we could ever bestow. The only difference with the Greek or Egyptian gods was that we humans did exist and were actually trying to protect them.
Without missing a beat, the robots were working out answers to questions we did not at first imagine they could ask.
When the extent of their perception became clear, our superiors decided to specialize us so that they would have a whole legion of creatures and symbols to worship. Thus, from the point of view of the androids, the deity John was in charge of bringing new life among the robots, the opposite of my function; the deity Robin was in charge of the proper functioning of the lesser machines and the deity Carl was in charge of quelling revolts. The relationships we might have with each other and our working style formed a whole complex mythological imaginary for the robots. Thus, for example, for them living and dying were twin processes that for a time were simultaneously hosted by both deities until they decided to arrive on their own to attend to their personal affairs among the non-eternals. Something so complex to explain that my turn and John’s simply ceased to coincide.
At first we were given instructions and courses so as not to disrupt the pantomime they had so carefully worked out for themselves. In my particular case I was advised to provoke in them the same panic of death that most humans experience. They showed me a multitude of allegorical images, and made hundreds of suggestions about how I should express myself and move in front of them. But I didn’t want or intend to be a clear-cut symbolic thing, I didn’t want to be the quivering thought of those wretched metal entities. For God’s sake, I was an engineer, not Machiavelli or Milton. I believed in knowledge, not in turning the headboard upside down to ward off evil spirits. So I ignored all ethical and aesthetic advice and stuck to my own script. No ankh, no scythe, no huge wings full of eyes. If they must live in the shadows, I thought, I’ll make those shadows a little more pleasant place.
Sometimes I wish that beings more intelligent than me would burst into my life and, by means of complicated artifices and subtle orchestrations, would suddenly restore the beliefs I had lost so long ago. That an angel would come from the heavens and tell us all, yes, there is life after death, neither emptiness nor nothingness awaits you. That he would disprove all my suspicions. That is what I tried to give to the androids. The hope of continuity against all logic of nature. If in doing so I was right, they would thank me after all; if I was wrong, then they would never feel cheated because wherever they were they would feel no joy, no sadness, no hate, no pain, no nothing. The truth is that it often torments me to think that they might have a chance and we might not. That those who are no longer operative look at me from somewhere we fail to understand and pity me, their false crystal idol, full of doubts and uncertainties, then accuse me, with pointed finger, of behaving as a giver of something that I am not even capable of receiving.
Not all the idolized technicians shared my point of view, of course. It’s amazing how much misery man is capable of when given the opportunity. Carl Tinerch, the man in charge of quelling riots, enjoyed his task with psychopathic pleasure. He must have been the kind of kid who chased cats on tower roofs with neural lasers. Although the other technicians despised him, they did not feel the same animosity toward him as I did, partly because their job was not to palliate his excesses or to restore the delicate balance between good and evil in the robot pantheon. One fine day I decided to send the balance to hell and descended before my turn with the healthy intention of giving Tinerch a little thrashing in front of the robots, a fight that they added to their list of mythical events, with the sole intention of stopping his cruel slaughter. I made all the robots present promise that there would never be a similar revolt.
The superiors reprimanded me and reduced my salary, arguing that I might have broken Tinerch’s suit, which is otherwise absolutely true. However, I was not dismissed from my position. They knew I was important down there, and that was not to be changed. The riots, however, soon broke out again. Many robot sympathizers defended their position by saying that there was no society down there. I agree with them on that; the problem is that they thought that had been the intention at some point in the experiment, a kind of peaceful coexistence between creators and creations. I was quickly disillusioned. Anyway, I prefer to see robots as individuals rather than as a mass. Their collective destiny is beyond my capabilities even if I pretended otherwise.
But that day, at that moment, with the box of darkness in my hands and returning until I was lost in the heights that no android would ever know, I knew that something else was going to happen. I had the same cold feeling as when I went down to hit Tinerch, only that I was no longer the trigger of the events. And sure enough, something happened. C22RD made good on its threats, but not in the way I would have expected.
#
I had just arrived on the observation floor from my own home. I hadn’t even had time to eat, so I was about to grab the first piece of crap I could find in the vending machines. I was already heading for the one in the hallway with the idea that everything it would have would be out of date when John Redfer signaled me to come in.
“What’s wrong, Johnny?” I said, not hiding my concern. John would never have bothered me off shift unless it was for something serious.
“We haven’t received a signal from C22RD since yesterday, and the cameras can’t find it. The last we heard, it was headed for the Grand Temple base.”
Sometimes among ourselves we used the same religious jargon that the androids themselves, mostly for practical reasons. I walked over to the monitors and made a mental note of the coordinates of the area.
“I’m going down,” I said as I approached the closet and put on my suit. “I have a bad feeling.”
“Do you want me to come down with you?”
“Thank you, John, but I think you’d better not. I’m afraid we’re facing a crisis of ideals. I’ve got to solve this one on my own.”
“What do I do if Tinerch comes? This looks like his business.”
“Give him my regards,” I replied, leaving the air cylinder in hand.
When I reached the edge of the dome, which was already at an advanced stage, I noticed that all the robots were looking at me impatiently. It didn’t take me long to see why. There, where the cameras could not reach because it was normal for new tunnels to be opened every day, was the body of C22RD, motionless and guarded by two other androids. I bent down to get through the tunnel and take it away, but they blocked my way.
“It was right. You didn’t get there to take it because you wouldn’t be able to find it in time. Its sacrifice was not in vain.”
I came out of the tunnel to return to the ditch again and met the protective android. It looked frightened.
“My lord, you were late in coming.”
“I came as soon as I could, B33MH. As you well know, there are many things I have to take care of.”
“But this poor wretch, my lord… will no longer receive rest in your kingdom, for several cycles have passed since your last arrival.”
“It’ll be able to rest like the others, you don’t have to worry about it.”
Suddenly an android hit me with a stone and broke a tube of the suit. Fortunately it was not serious, but B33MH did not interpret it that way. It activated the tunneling machines and buried the android. I was witnessing the first display of artificial violent fanaticism in history, as well as the first robot suicide. I was really going to have a lot of explaining to do when I got to the surface.
If I made it, that is.
Several more androids stoned me until one of them finally hit a carbon dioxide processing tube. The malfunction was not total, but I had to get back to the tower as soon as possible or I would die without remedy as soon as I was exposed to the noxious gases. I grabbed as best I could both the body of the buried android and the body of C22RD and took them away without even having time to use darkness boxes. Some robots began to chase me, and although their stones hardly hurt me, they would soon end up breaking another tube and write a black chapter in their particular myths. After a while, however, Tinerch appeared in his armored suit. Despite hating him and his methods, I was glad of his presence. He merely put a smokescreen between them and us to slow them down, because to the robots, the smoke from the Carl deity carried evil effects on the circuits. I guess he didn’t attack them because he knew that under no circumstances would I be sent to ground level again right after the incident and then it would be his turn to pick up the robots he slaughtered. I was always curious how the androids would have interpreted that.
My superiors decided that for a couple of days it would be wise for me not to go back down, with John taking over my job. The two days became a week and the week became a month. Finally I was announced that I could no longer go down again. There were enough robots who didn’t believe in me to make my descents dangerous, but I should train my replacements to learn how to do my job in every way imaginable.
It didn’t work out. None of the substitutes were admitted by the robot community, thinking of them as heretics, as impostors. Part of the fault was that the new ones always tried to be very theatrical, very lyrical, so as to instill awe in them and hold them in check. The experience, at least, helped me to understand that when you want to gain the respect of someone, whether human or robot, you can do it from the path of equality or from the path of superiority, but the second path will never make you truly respected. Feared, adored. But not really respected.
I seem to remember that after I was relieved of my position I was angry with the androids for having spurned the opportunity I had given them to reconcile their fears of dying. I suppose it is true that it was a beautiful gift, but it is also true that they never asked me for it. Perhaps I should have let them learn for themselves, freed them from that vicious circle that had formed around them, secretly lectured them on how terrible life really was, that they were less than nothing, the offspring of an imperfect culture and race that did not know for itself its own end. That we were not giving them the chance to exist but that it was precisely the opposite. That if there were gods it should be them.
One fine day, thirty years later, I decided to ask for permission to descend again. I knew I would have no problem in getting approval, and I was curious to see with my own eyes the evolution of the Great Temple, now almost completed. It was fortunate that this happened, because all the technicians were already quite old, and if it was impossible to replace me at the time, it would be even more impossible to do it with all of them at the same time.
When I descended I noticed how there was a lot of commotion everywhere. Most of the androids did not have to work too hard because of the little that remained to be done, a fact that they had interpreted as the advent of the new order. My arrival only compounded that feeling. That the deity Ben was descending from the heavens again after thirty years was for them an indication that we were very satisfied.
I wanted to tell them that the reality was that as soon as the dome was finished hundreds of men in armored suits, hundreds of Carl deities, would descend to disconnect them all, by hook or by crook, and melt them down to become part of the Great Temple structure, but I refused to do so. I’m sure they would have managed to concoct some sort of pseudo-Buddhist narrative to justify such an action. A nirvana to which to throw their last prayers.
The people upstairs had asked me to check that the air levels were correct as I was going down, so I went into the huge, diaphanous dome and took out the measuring instruments. When I had finished, I noticed an old android approaching me, barely able to move, but still able to operate certain devices such as hydraulic cranes. It was B33MH.
“My lord, you have returned. I have waited so long…”
At that moment I was sure that, if robots could cry, it would have done so.
“I have returned, yes. But I must tell you — it is not for long.”
“Why did you leave us? Some of us were still faithful to you.”
“I ceased to be necessary, B33MH. Even we must retire when the time comes. Come closer.”
The android came as fast as it could until it was in front of me. Then I removed the helmet from my suit very slowly. For the robot that must have been a mystical experience like no other.
“I just want you to know that, believe it or not, deep down we are just like you. We have fears. We doubt our final destiny. I know you will never say it, that’s why I share it with you.”
“Is that true, my lord?”
I put the helmet on the ground, so that it would be clear that it was not part of myself.
“Even Death must die,” I said, my aged face uncovered.
You’ve written a story. You’ve poured your heart into it. You’ve rewritten sentences, perfected metaphors, and shaped characters you care deeply about. You’re sure it’s good, hell, maybe it’s even great. Yeah, the big names will want this one. It’s probably worthy of The Atlantic or the New Yorker. This could even be the one that finally nails the Pushcart Prize.
Then the wind goes out of your sails when the first person to read your masterpiece points out how you spelled the name of your main character differently in two places in the opening paragraph. How could you have missed that? You must have read through the story a hundred times with all the rewrites. It’s embarrassing and aggravating.
And it’s one of the most fundamental truths in writing: it’s incredibly hard for us to see the flaws in our own work. Here’s why:
We’re Too Close to the Story
Writers live inside the world they’ve created. We know every motivation, backstory, and all the subplots. The backstory that isn’t on the page lives in our heads “rent free” as the kids say. We mentally fill in all of the things we know about the story as we read through it. Your brain fills in the gaps, smoothing over inconsistencies and connecting dots that were never actually drawn and not clear to other readers.
We’re Emotionally Invested
We writers form emotional bonds with our characters and often fall in love with select scenes and phrases. This emotional attachment can make us blind to, or cause us to push back against, needed changes. Cutting scenes and characters, also known as “Killing our darlings” as the saying goes, feels like a loss to us even though it usually makes a story stronger.
Sometimes we don’t really know the Story We’re Telling
We often begin writing with an idea but no clear theme. Or we have a theme but it gets lost in the logistics of plot development. The result is a story that meanders or contradicts itself. I also tend to see a lot of what I call “lopsided stories” where way too many words are spent on things that do not advance the plot or develop the character.
Hard Work Doesn’t Make It Good
We sometimes confuse “I worked hard on this” with “This is the best it can be.” But hard work doesn’t guarantee a polished end result. Rewriting, re-envisioning, and sometimes throwing everything out and rethinking it from the ground up, often lead to better storytelling.
Our Brains Want to Be Done
Writing is hard. Getting through that first draft is a triumph. So when we type “The End,” part of our brain wants it to be done. The desire to move on and submit makes us less critical of our work. We stop interrogating where the story doesn’t work.
So What Can You Do?
Time: Step away from your draft. A few weeks or even months can give you enough distance to see it with fresh eyes. Sometimes when I go through my “false starts” that I haven’t touched in years, I am surprised at what I see. It often feels like someone else wrote the words I am seeing. (and I mean that in both in a good and bad way). This is the ideal kind of distance you want from your work, where you have forgotten about the story entirely and are coming at it completely fresh. Unfortunately that isn’t always practical.
Read your work out loud: A more immediate solution is reading your story out loud. In Steve Martin’s Masterclass he talked about how he reads his work to his cat. I will even record myself reading a story so I can play it back later and really listen. Hearing your story often reveals awkward pacing, unclear dialogue, or tonal shifts you might miss otherwise.
Re-outline: After the first draft, take the time to outline what you actually wrote. It often differs from your plan and can reveal plot holes. One trick I have learned, especially if if I have “pantsered” a story is to force chapter breaks and title those breaks in the story as though they were chapter headings. I do this even though I am mainly writing short stories, which don’t usually have chapter titles. It really helps me to see the plot progression and where I have sections that repeat information previously covered. It also really helps me to see where I can cut.
Get feedback from others: Other people have a fresh set of eyes and the advantage of knowing nothing about the story. No preconceived notions, no biases (other than these people are likely your friends so they might be softer on you than you need). Issues we tend to read past will stand out to them like a neon sign.
Recognizing that we have literary blind spots is the first step toward better writing. Every great story was once a messy draft, written by someone who couldn’t see the flaws, until they eventually found a way to work through them, often by giving a story time and/or getting feedback from others.
We often talk about the craft of writing as if the words on the page are the story. But that’s not quite true.
What you write isn’t the story, it’s the framework used to trigger an imaginative experience inside the reader’s mind. The real story happens inside the reader’s head.
Every reader brings their own experiences, biases, memories, and emotional context to your work. When two different people read the same story, they don’t actually experience the same story. One reader might see a character’s silence as deep introspection, another might read it as passive aggression. A setting described as “dusty and quiet” might evoke peaceful nostalgia for one reader and tension or dread for another.
It’s one of the challenges of storytelling. You have to structure what you write so that your readers fill in the blanks with their own intelligence and intuition in the way that provides the experience and emotion you intend.
This is where reading is very different from going to see a movie. When watching a movie, all of the images and sounds are pushed to us, predefined with little room for our own creative interpretation. Because of this, the story inside the head of every member of the audience will be very similar.
When reading, a story only happens when a reader engages with your words and transforms them into sights, sounds, feelings, and meaning.
I subscribe to the theory that most of what we are trying to do when we tell a story is get people to feel. Emotion is what makes people care about what happens to the characters in the story and that keeps the pages turning.
I also like to think of it in terms of writing to create an experience.
Be intentional, but not controlling. You can guide the experience, but you shouldn’t dictate every detail. The reader is your collaborator.
Embrace slight ambiguity. Sometimes, the most powerful moments are the ones left just a little open-ended, allowing the reader to land on their own truth. Be careful here, clarity is still king, don’t omit too much and leave the reader confused. Confusion makes the reader put down the story and walk away.
Revise with the reader’s interpretation in mind. Ask yourself: Will this paragraph spark the right images and emotions? Or am I over-explaining and closing down possibilities for the reader to work with my words to make the story their own?
A story only lives when someone interprets in within the context of themselves.
“Andy knew this was his last chance to make things right with Cindy.”
With just one sentence, we’re already leaning in. The stakes are clear; there’s a relationship on the line. We don’t know the details yet, but we already care.
This is the power of starting with stakes.
When readers pick up a story, they’re subconsciously asking, “Why should I care?”
That doesn’t mean you need a car chase on page one. It means the story must immediately communicate that something is at risk, and that it matters deeply to someone. Stakes create tension.
Early Conflict = Early Investment
Going back to our opening line:
“Andy knew this was his last chance to make things right with Cindy.”
From this, we immediately understand:
There’s a broken relationship.
There’s urgency: a last chance.
There’s emotional weight: he wants to “make things right.”
We don’t know what Andy did and we don’t know if Cindy will forgive him, but we already want to see what happens.
The Mistake to Avoid
Too many stories start with background instead of conflict. A little background is fine. It helps to orient us as to what is going on and color in tone and setting. But often times I see stories where the author goes on for pages describing the setting or a scene before for we get to anything that matters to the character. The quicker you can get to the core conflict or stakes, the better.
Try This Exercise
Take the first paragraph of any story you are currently working on. Ask yourself:
What’s at risk here?
Does the character know it?
Will the reader care?
If the answer to any of those is “not yet,” consider revising to make sure these questions are answered.
Stakes are a promise to the reader
Keep in mind that starting with stakes is a promise to the reader. When we mention Andy’s situation in the opening line in the way we did, we are committing to our reader that by the end of the story there will be answers as to how Andy got into that situation and what the outcome will be for him.
Stakes make us care what happens and that keeps us reading.
Let’s face it the world’s a little rough around the edges right now. We’re all just trying to hang on with a sense of dignity and maybe some semblance of joy. What better way to bring that spark back than through laughter?
Humor in writing isn’t just about cracking jokes or tossing in a punchline here and there. It’s also about making people feel a little more hopeful. When you get someone to laugh—really laugh—you’re giving them a moment of relief, and that’s no small thing. In a world full of stress, division, and doomscrolling, writing that makes people laugh is practically a public service.
But Humor Writing is Hard
Yes it is. Humor writing is an art form that often doesn’t get the respect it deserves. It’s not easy to be genuinely funny on the page. Timing, voice, rhythm all has to be just right. It took me several tries and multiple submissions before I landed a humorous list article in Chortle
It’s true that there aren’t a lot of markets explicitly dedicated to humor fiction but that doesn’t mean the world isn’t hungry for it. We live in a content-rich era where new voices and niches emerge every day. If you’re funny and you can write? That’s power. That’s potential. That’s brand-building magic.
Look at the Legends
Let’s talk about The Simpsons for a second. When that dysfunctional, animated yellow family debuted in 1987, there really wasn’t a flourishing market for adult animated comedy. But now we have Family Guy, South Park, Archer, Rick and Morty, BoJack Horseman, and even Futurama (RIP) They all owe a nod to that one oddball show that made us laugh and essentially started a whole market segment. That one funny voice became a cultural juggernaut and opened the doors for countless others. Humor doesn’t just entertain it expands what’s possible.
So What’s the Takeaway?
We need more funny people in the world right now. If the geopolitical landscape is telling us anything at the moment, it’s telling us that we need clever observations to remind us not to take it all too seriously. We need stories that make us laugh and forget our troubles for a few minutes.
So go forth and write something hilarious. Be brave enough to be funny. Your sense of humor might just be someone’s favorite moment of the day.
Side note: I am going to be a first reader for Alex Shvartsman’s UFO anthology again. He is up to number 10. I believe submissions will be opening up around April 2026, so start working on those humorous Sci-Fi stories!
Breaking Into The Craft 