Writing tips: the simplest plot structure for short stories
A reliable three-beat plot structure for short stories, which might just be damned good fun to write and read.
Want a simple plot structure for short stories? Read on.
It’s got three steps:
The set-up (containing character, location, and desire)
The obstacle
The twist-resolution
I’ll explain each of these below and put them all into a summary at the end.
Plots galore!
The Hero’s Journey, Save The Cat, snowflake method, or the dreaded story diamond, I love a good plot structure. These help me structure big narratives, like video games or novels, to ensure I give an entertaining ride for the audience, but they’re overwhelming when you want to blast out a quick short story.
If you’re aiming for 5-7k short stories, you’ve got enough room for a stripped down story structure:
Set-up
Inciting incident
Fun with the concept
Midpoint turn/added complications
Increasing struggles
Crisis (the problem from the inciting incident culminates in a logical but extreme outcome)
Resolution
But if you’re going for 2k, or less than 1k, or maybe even 100 words, then all those beats are going to be hard to fit it.
To go for such short stories but still provide a kick for your audience, try hitting only three beats:
1. The set-up
Establish a character in a situation.
Character
Who are they?
Pick an interesting person and describe them and where they are, or let them paint a picture from their own point-of-view.
Consider how their frame of mind shape their perspective and guides reader’s understanding of the tone and genre of the piece: social-issue drama, hard sci-fi, comedy romance, etc.
Some characters:
An amateur rock climber.
A house-husband who feels they don’t pull their weight around the home.
A passionate sewing-pattern-maker.
A burly Scotsman who helps tourists who seek Nessie.
Location
Where are they and what is their concern?
They need to be in a location.
The location might have implicit rules and tension, for example:
A cliff face — danger of falling, trust in your fellow climbers, nature could turn against you.
A deserted building estate — no witnesses, no rules. In estates, no one can hear you scream.
Secretly in a sewing-magazine editor’s house — will she be discovered? What will happen?
A moonlit Scottish mountainside — it’s quiet, too quiet, and a person by themselves is vulnerable.
Combine character and location with a desire
What do they want? (External desire)
The character wants something to change in their status or worldly circumstances — for a story this short, it’s going to be an obvious desire, for example:
Reach the top of the cliff safely.
Sell a rucksack full of drugs.
The pattern-maker wants her work to be noticed by a craft magazine editor.
Getting home for dinner.
There’s also the possibility to address deeper themes:
What do they need? (Internal desire)
Internal needs are typically driven by a emotional wound. These are powerful drivers of characters and, arguably, essential for deeply meaningful storytelling. However, in very short stories there often isn’t space for dealing with such nuances of characters. We can (and probably should) hint at them, but we simply don’t have the wordcount to explore them properly.
If you’re interested in learning more about external and internal motivations, I wrote huge explainer here:
Anyway, back on our short story plot structure…
2. The obstacle
What stops this character getting their desire?
Put one really good obstacle in the way of the character getting their desire. If you want more than one obstacle, ensure they are linked (either in a way revealed at the end of the story or through escalation of the first problem causing the second).
When you’re aiming for very short stories, you typically don’t have the space to dive into more than one good obstacle and its implications for the character.
Examples, based on the previous set-ups:
The climber disturbs a trail of fire ants, crawling up the cliff. They skitter across the climber’s fingers.
The dealer who will buy the drugs confronts the husband (obstacle 1) and steals the drugs, beating up the husband (linked obstacle 2). Now he’ll have to explain the injuries to his partner (linked obstacle 3) and feels even more irresponsible.
The pattern-maker is illegally on the property and decides to make a sample dress to really impress the editor, but can’t find any material to use (obstacle 1). Not only that, they’re then discovered and confronted by the editor’s husband (apparently unconnected obstacle 2).
A werewolf appears and wants to eat the burly highlander!
3. The twist-resolution
An inevitable-but-surprising ending emerges from the combination of the character,
Does their desire change?
Are they denied what they wanted?
Or do they get their desire by a surprising route?
Is a new perspective revealed about the set-up?
Let’s wrap up our examples:
Our climber reaches the top, thinking they have escaped the fire ants, but it turns out the nest was at the mountain top, not at the bottom. In shock, they stumble and fall backwards, miraculously surviving after crashing through trees… and land in a nest of snakes. (Denied what the climber wanted.)
The beaten husband returns home, hiding his wounds from his partner. His partner reveals they now have the rucksack full of drugs — they are the boss of a drug gang, and this was all a test of their relationship, and they’re now going to be part of that business. (He gets his desire by a surprising route.)
The sewing-pattern-maker caught by the husband? Read the story here: Leather babydoll. (She gets her desire by a surprising route.)
The highland man confronted by a werewolf? Read the story here: Fresh Salmon for McTavish. (A new perspective is revealed about the set-up.)
Summary
It’s simple, but these three things combine to create a fun and simple way to make short stories. You’ll likely want something more fleshed out for longer pieces, but if you want to blast out a story in an afternoon for the joy of writing, give it a try:
[Character] in [location] wants [desire], but cannot get it easily because [obstacle, perhaps investigating that leads to obstacle 2 and 3]. As a result the [character] experiences [twist-resolution] that changes how they felt about [desire].
Writing short stories is a delight — fast, simple, and satisfying.
Getting a simple structure in your head from the beginning means you can relax and have fun with the form. Enjoy!
Have a great week! Go be excellent <3
Mata xxx