How to Make Your Writing Stand Out - Plot Twists

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Writing can be tough. Writing in a unique way that is original and engaging is even tougher. I will show you how we tackle this.

Whether you are in primary or high school, writing is going to be an intrinsic part of what is going to be assessed. You can totally get by with an acceptable mark with a slight spin of an original idea or pray that you are not ‘copying’ a text that your teacher already knows. I’m guilty of this myself but if you want to get good marks, you must be able to write and show ideas that are appealing and unique. I am going to go through one of the strategies that can be used to make it new, fresh, and compelling.

Approach:

A concept that is unique and fresh is always going to be exciting. A way to do this in stories if through LOCK which is a recent video I made but how do we make it even more original? Successful writers always ask themselves, “How can I avoid what’s been done a million times and really write a powerful story that stands out? How can I make this story unique, imaginative, and exciting enough to hook and hold the reader from start to finish?”.

The uniqueness of an idea is called a gimmick, a hook or a twist. This is important as it shows how great a concept is. For instance, “Dinosaurs brought back to life for a modern theme park” is the twist for Jurassic Park. We can make our writing instantly better if it is unique. As humans, we are hardwired to crave new information. When we learn new things that we are interested in, we don’t want to stop. This is why games are so addictive as we progress while learning new information all the time. This is particularly more powerful when you have not experienced it yourself and it allows you to step into a new and more exciting world to get a glimpse of it. ‘Creed’ for instance is a boxer and in ‘Apollo 13’ it is an astronaut. Chances are the audience is not a boxer or astronaut which makes these two movies so popular with the masses.

This shows that you first have to understand who is going to be reading what you are writing. That is why a story or persuasive writing piece set in a classroom setting is an overused trope because students are writing it as that is what they are most familiar with. The issue here is that most teachers have also been to school and can see whether that is possible or not. Unless you make the hook really unique or dramatically change the arguments you are presenting in an innovative way, it is going to be an uphill battle to make it stand out. That is why step into the perspective of the marker and try to dictate what you write that will be unfamiliar with what they are used to.

To help illustrate some twists, here are two examples from some movies.

1.     A teenager is mistakenly sent into the past, where he must make sure his mother and father meet and fall in love, or else he won’t exist in the future. (Back to the Future)

2.     A group of ex-psychic investigators start a commercial ghost extermination business in New York City. (Ghostbusters)

Or if it was a persuasive writing task on ‘Smoking should be banned’, a point can be:

1.     Smokers should not spend money on cigarettes so they can invest in other activities that can ensure their families are being financially supported. (This is different to the common points surrounding littering or negative health conditions).

When thinking about your own idea, try to underline or highlight the twist. If there isn’t one, keep on writing a sentence until you can phrase it. If you can’t do it within a sentence, it is going to be too difficult to explain it to the reader through your writing or it is just not unique enough.

In conclusion, I touched on what makes an idea appealing through making it unique. I went through what a hook or twist is and how that can differentiate your writing compared to others. I also went through a simple exercise to make your writing have that sparkle so you can stop writing ideas that look like everyone else’s and instead make it more original. There are a lot more ways on how to make an idea more impactful and stand out, I will likely make more parts to continue on from this if that is of interest.

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