Christian Teen-Young Adult Short Story

BANG! Watch where you are going. Watch your mouth. Punch 'em out. Throw away the sugar. Keep out. Have a nice day. Stick your nose in. Shut up. Keep pounding. Pray. These are words to remember when you sit down to write the Christian teen/young adult short story. What do these words have to do with writing? Let me explain.

BANG! Always start your story with a "BANG!" Or as on writer said, "Start your story with the horse running with one foot in the stirrup and the other on the ground." A story with boring beginning will probably never be read.

Watch where you are going. A wandering viewpoint is deadly. Tell your story from one viewpoint. Have you ever had a group of people try to tell you the same story all at one time? Mass confusion. Keep your reader's interest by not telling everyone's viewpoint.

Watch your mouth. Preach or talk down and you'll lose your reader. If you have a teen in your house, you know how much good preaching does. None. Writing like teen/YAs are babies is trouble. They understand more than we give them credit for. This doesn't mean to use words most adult wouldn't understand. Write like you're writing to a friend. An occasional unknown word will be looked up, but too many will result in an unread story. Use slang sparely. It dates your story.

Punch 'em out. No, you don't have to get into a boxing match or even put your characters in one. But your story must have a conflict. Maybe two friends have reached a point where they feel they can on longer be friends. Or maybe your main character is fighting within over a personal problem. Whatever the case, there must be a conflict.

Throw the sugar away. Don't sugar coat your Christian stories. Christians are human and make mistakes the same as anyone. Christians live on the same planet as everyone else--not one covered with sticky sweet syrup.

Keep out. Injecting yourself into the story is fatal. If one of your characters has just been saved, don't tell the reader, "You can be saved, too." This will pull the reader out of the story and lose the impact of the character being saved. Let the story show the reader he can be saved, too.

Have a nice day. End your story on an upbeat note. If your story ends with someone dying, show some good points. Maybe the one who died made a big difference in another character's life.

Shut up. End the story when the story ends. By adding to a story, you'll only end up with a bunch of meaningless words. If you sell a story and the published copy is totally rewritten, don't yell and scream. Especially if it's your first published story. Compare your original to the published story. Try to understand why the changes were made. Then write your next story for the publication accordingly.

Stick your nose in. Read, study and get involved. Read and study Christian teen/YA magazines, the Bible and everything you can get your hands on about writing. Get involved with your church youth group to learn what today's teens and young adults are interested in.

Keep pounding. Whatever you do, don't give up. Keep pounding on those keys. Louis L'Amour was reported to have received 200 rejections before selling anything. Save your unsold stories. Someday you may be able to rewrite them into salable stories. Or you might be able to write a spinoff from an old story idea.

Pray. By all means, pray every step of the way.

There you have it, from BANG! to pray. Words to remember when writing the Christian teen/YA short story.