1. Elements of a Short Story
Plot
Irony
P.O.V.
Setting
Character
Conflict
Subject
Theme

2. Bare Bones of the Plot Exposition The basic situation
You meet the characters and are introduced to the conflict.
Example: The Three Little Pigs: At the beginning of the story you learn about the three pigs and you realize that the Big, Bad, Wolf keeps blowing their houses down.

3. Plot (cont.) Complication
A complication occurs when a main character tries to solve the conflict but another thing happens to complicate it.
Example: The Three Little Pigs:
The two pigs build houses, but the Big Bad Wolf blows them down.

4. Plot (cont.)
Climax
The high point of the story, when all emotions of both the character and the reader are involved.
Example: The Three Little Pigs
When all three pigs are inside the brick house and the Big Bad Wolf tries to blow them down.

5. Plot (cont.) Resolution Generally Immediately follows the climax
The conflict is resolved and readers find out what the characters do next or how they have changed.
Example: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Snow White wakes up and she lives happily ever after with the prince.

6. Irony Situational Irony: Verbal Irony: Dramatic Irony:
When the reader expects one thing to happen and something else happens instead
Verbal Irony:
Sarcasm
Dramatic Irony:
When the reader knows something that the characters do not

7. Point of View 1st Person: Narrator uses “I” 2nd Person: “You”
Short stories or professional writing should NEVER be written in 2nd person!!

8. 3rd Person: The narrator is not in the story, uses he or she
Limited
The reader is limited to one person’s perspective
Example: Cinderella is told only through her point of view
Omniscient
There are multiple people’s perspectives
Example: At the beginning of Goldilocks and the Three Bears the story is told through Goldilocks point of view; Later, the reader gets to view the story through the point of view of the three bears.

9. Setting (think both little and big picture)
When a story takes place
A Year
1940, 1500’s, 1997
A Season
Fall, Spring, Summer
Time of Day
Morning, Late Night
An era or during a specific event
WWII, French Revolution
Where a story takes place
A Country
Germany, USA, England
A City
Los Angeles, Seattle
A Place
In a park, at a baseball game, in the kitchen

10. 5 Methods of Creating Character
Actions (what a character does)
E. Scrooge does not let Bob have Christmas Eve off of work
Speech (what a character says)
“Bah Humbug!” “I hate Christmas!”
Private Thoughts
Detests Christmas, thinks it is useless to take holidays off of work
What other characters think of them
Workers do not respect them, family member speak badly about him.
Appearance
Tall, wears a cloak, gray hair

11. Conflict External Conflict: Internal Conflict: Man vs. Man
Man vs. Society
Man vs. Nature
Internal Conflict:
Man vs. Self

12. Subject vs. Theme Subject: A topic
Usually one or two words
Examples:
Love
Fear
Family
Perseverance
Growing Up
Theme: a main idea, what the author is trying to say, the moral
Always is a sentence or longer
From subject, build a theme
Example: Love is more important than material possessions