---
watermark: ORIRO
disable-model-invocation: true
name: creative-writing-craft
provider: ORIRO.ai
copyright: Copyright (c) 2026 ORIRO.ai
description: >





  Creative writing — narrative structure, character, dialogue, voice, point of view, and the revision process.

  Sources: Open educational resources, Canva Design School, MIT OCW Architecture, design classics.
---

# Creative Writing Craft

## Story structure

### The three-act structure

Act 1 (25%): Introduce characters, world, and stakes. End with inciting incident that disrupts normal life.
Act 2 (50%): Rising action. Character pursues goal. Obstacles increase. Midpoint shifts stakes. All seems lost at 75%.
Act 3 (25%): Climax — character must change/choose. Resolution.

### Story beats (Save the Cat — Blake Snyder)

Opening image → Theme stated → Set-up → Catalyst → Debate → Break into 2 → B-story → Fun and Games → Midpoint → Bad guys close in → All is lost → Dark night of the soul → Break into 3 → Finale → Closing image.

### Conflict types (story engine)

**Person vs. Person:** External antagonist. Most visible conflict.
**Person vs. Self:** Internal struggle. Deepest and most resonant.
**Person vs. Nature/Society/Fate:** Larger forces.
Best stories have multiple levels operating simultaneously.

## Character

**Want vs. Need:** What a character wants (external goal) vs. what they need (internal truth they must discover).
Great stories = character achieves/fails at want AND discovers their need (or doesn't — tragic arc).

**Ghost/wound:** The backstory event that created the character's flaw and misbelief.
Flaw is not a weakness — it's a limitation that prevents them from getting what they need.

**The lie the character believes:** False belief about themselves or the world that the story will challenge.
Harry Potter's lie: "I'm nobody special."
The story forces characters to confront and overcome (or not) their lie.

**Character in scenes:** Show character through choices under pressure. Not description. Not backstory dumps.
What does the character do when it costs them something? That's who they really are.

## Point of view

**First person:** "I went to the store." Intimate. Limited to narrator's knowledge.
**Third person limited:** "She went to the store." Follows one character. Most flexible.
**Third person omniscient:** Access to all characters' thoughts. Difficult to handle well. Creates distance.
**Second person:** "You go to the store." Unusual, experimental. Used in some games/interactive fiction.
**Rule:** Stay in chosen POV consistently. Head-hopping within scenes = unprofessional and confusing.

## Dialogue

**Purpose:** Reveals character, advances plot, creates conflict, conveys subtext.
**Subtext:** What's NOT said. Characters rarely say what they mean. "Fine." can mean many things.
**Read aloud test:** Clunky dialogue becomes obvious immediately.
**Attribution:** Use "said" and "asked" as attribution verbs — invisible to readers. Avoid "exclaimed," "hissed," "interjected."
**Beats:** Action beats replace attribution and anchor dialogue in physical reality.
"I don't know about that." She picked up her coffee cup, turned it slowly.

## Prose craft

**Show, don't tell:** Don't report emotions — dramatize them.
Telling: "She was angry."
Showing: "She slapped the folder shut and shoved it across the table."

**Specificity:** Concrete details beat abstractions. Not "a car" — "a 1978 Ford Ranger, rust-eaten at the wheel arches."

**Sentence rhythm:** Vary sentence length. Short sentences create pace. Tension. Urgency. Longer sentences, with their subordinate clauses and qualifications, create a different rhythm, more meditative, allowing the reader to dwell.

**Kill your darlings:** Your favorite sentences are often the ones that must go — too self-conscious, slowing the story.

## Revision

First drafts are not for readers. Revision is where writing happens.
**Distance:** Time between draft and revision (days minimum; weeks better). Cannot see your own work clearly immediately.
**Structure pass:** Does the story work at the macro level? Before fixing sentences.
**Line edit:** After structure is solid. Prose craft, clarity, voice.
**Read aloud:** Final pass. Catches rhythm problems, repetition, dialogue that doesn't sound human.

Sources: Strunk & White "The Elements of Style" (public domain older editions), Stephen King "On Writing" (principles), Robert McKee "Story" (principles), Story Grid (public resources), Blake Snyder "Save the Cat" (principles)