Short story activities: MY JOURNEY

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    MY JOURNEY: LOVE, ALAIA (MY OWN SHORT STORY) 

    A short story is a short work of fiction. Fiction, as you know, is prose writing about imagined events and characters. Prose writing differs from poetry in that it does not depend on verses, meters, or rhymes for its organization and presentation.

    My first assessment for this ALS252 is short story writing. I and my classmates learned how to write a short story from our lecturer in charge, Ms. Nazhatulshima Nolan. We are going through some activities and exercises for our preparation in order to write our own short story. I am enjoying myself during my journey of writing this short story. I had so much fun doing some activities with Ms. Shima and my friends together during our class using the google meet session. I had so much fun doing the activities and 10 minutes of writing practice for enhancing my skills for creating my own short story. 

    I started to create and find an idea for my own short story. At first, it was really hard for me to construct the plot for my short story. I was planning to choose a romance genre for my short story. However, due to some problems, I think that the story, which is the plot is going to be cliche, plain, and familiar for me to create a unique and creative short story. We are being taught by our lecturer to include the important elements in our own short story. Elements in the short story are important to make the story become more unique and interesting to the reader. 

There are five important elements for a short story: 

  • Character 
  • Plot 
  • Setting 
    • TIME 
    • PLACE
  • Conflict 
  • Theme 

1) CHARACTER 
- A character is a person, or sometimes even an animal, who takes part in the action of a short story or other literary work.

2) PLOT 

- A plot is a series of events and character actions that relate to the central conflict.

The elements of the plot are divided into 5 parts: 

  1. Exposition 
  2. Rising Action 
  3. Climax 
  4. Falling Action 
  5. Resolution 
  6. Twist (if the writer wanted to create a plot twist in the story) 

3) SETTING 

- The setting of a short story is the time and place in which it happens. Authors often use descriptions of landscape, scenery, buildings, seasons or weather to provide a strong sense of setting.

4) CONFLICT 

- The conflict is a struggle between two people or things in a short story. The main character is usually on one side of the central conflict.

On the other side, the main character may struggle against another important character, against the forces of nature, against society, or even against something inside himself or herself (feelings, emotions, illness).

5) THEME 

The theme is the central idea or belief in a short story. 
The main point of the message that the writer wanted to deliver in the short story. 


        I am going to share my journey during my short story writing process. Last 2 years ago, I tried to create one fictional short story and I used Wattpad as my platform. However, the story was incomplete and I stopped in the middle of the story. 20 chapters together. For this first assessment, I have to create and publish my own short story. I was very excited about this assessment and nervous at the same time. I don't know, it's a mixed feeling. It has been a long time since I write a fictional story. I gather my courage, relaxed my mind, and read some examples of the unique short story in order for me to get inspiration from them. 

       After 2 days of reading some short stories, I decided to go with a thriller and psycho genre for my own short story. I am going to create a unique and include some twists in the story. The title for my first draft is actually "Love you Alaia". This story explained how the identical female twins, Alaia and Alana love each other and grew up together without being apart. However, some incidents happen that make Alana, the antagonist in this story turn something lovely into a huge tragedy. 

        I started to update and the plot keep changing when every time I wrote my short story. My short story plot started with a traditional style of writing a short story. I started the story with exposition and continue with the rising action, climax, falling action, resolution and I ended my story with a little twist. I made a decision to change the title to “Love, Alaia.” I started to write my final full short story. However, the 1000 limit for words is actually pretty hard for me. I am struggling to cut the plot and cut the unnecessary part. I am able to do that at the end of the day. 

Last but not least, I hope that my final short story can be the yardstick for me to keep practicing and upgrade my skills in writing some creative stories. I really enjoy learning this subject for this semester because it can make us be free, become more creative in order to write short stories. I wrote this short story because it is inspired from my one of my relative's life stories. We can learn that jealousy can destroy someone’s life. Parents need to love all of their children without being partial and treat them fairly. I hope that I can update this story by more than 1000 words. I would like to express my gratitude to our lecturer, Ms. Nazhatulshima Nolan for giving us this great opportunity in writing the short story. I am looking forward to enhancing my skills in writing short stories. Maybe I can be a writer or scriptwriter in the future. I hope so. 




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