Humans read everything they can find around them, and for
most people, fiction is the more pleasing of those many
choices. Clearly, they like what they read because
humanity's great literary works and their ideas have guided
our lives for centuries.

I began writing stories when I was eight. Back then, I was
barely able to make complete sentences, and the spelling
was just as dislocated; still even then, I knew researching
and writing would become my life passion.

Think about what you read for a moment.

It's quite likely that some of the fiction you are reading
today will eventually be classified among the greatest
literary work of our time. I admit that I have no idea how
those particular works will be treated as time moves
forward around us all.

As a published novelist, I've contemplated the necessary
literary elements for creating just such an impactful and
hopefully lasting story. As I worked to identify those
concepts, I was more than a little surprised at how they
were so interconnected with story creation.

By sharing these ideas with you today, I'm betting I can
make your fiction reading experience a lot more enjoyable.

There seems to be seven qualities that exist or should have
existed in all the WOW stories I've read or seen on the big
screen. As I worked with this, I changed the concept name
of a WOW story into the term dynamite fiction, which I
still use.

We all know that when reading fiction, you enjoy some
stories much more than others. That was my starting point
for figuring out this puzzle. As a writer, I wanted to know
why that happened.

What were those qualities that left you with such wonderful
feelings about a satisfying story?

Readers often use terms like powerful or gripping to
describe a story that leaves them with a nice yet elusive
feeling— that quality of a story that makes you simply
want to shout WOW. Those stories fill us up in some sort of
hard to describe way and make us wish we could live inside
it for a little while longer.

Every story is filled with actors who do their level best
to tell you their part of a particular story. To do that,
they use conflict and confrontation& #8212;at times small,
simple, and funny, at other times enormous, complicated,
and deadly. When being entertained, we usually enjoy them
both, yet few realize these actors also present us with
various life altering metaphors.

Dynamite fiction is about deeply stimulating your
imagination. Its characters are a primary vehicle for doing
that. When you just finish reading a stinker of a story,
what's the first thought you have about it? Those
characters just had no energy or life, right? They were
flat and awkward and confusing, and that didn't make you
like them, did it?

Besides characters, another aspect of story must also
engage your imagination at the highest possible level. The
plot and subplots of a story are the biggest single reason
it's being created. If a writer doesn't absolutely love the
story that's being written, then there's little chance you
will either, and it will probably not WOW you.

You know the feelings you get when a story satisfies you in
all those little ways. You're enjoying what's happening
because it's keeping a smile on your face or has you
hanging onto the edge of your seat. Your satisfaction is
obvious, yet when you're fully engaged like this, a much
deeper part of you is often being satisfied as well by
what's being implied and left unspoken.

The literary arts demand both craft and art from those who
seek to practice its calling. A writer's craft builds
story. A writer's art captures and teases the imagination
of readers like you. Stories failing to engage your
imagination will leave you feeling like you just wasted the
time you spent with that story.

The final quality of a dynamite fiction story pushes one of
our prior qualities to an even higher level of excellence.
Of course, characters have to be rich and details in their
overall development, and with all that, they also need
something else. A personal attraction that is so strong, a
reader slips easily into then and lives comfortably inside
the story with them. This is perhaps where readers find
their most pleasure in reading.

Not every quality needs to be present in a story for you to
enjoy it. If they are, then it will be even more enjoyable.

Here's a summary of those seven qualities of dynamite
fiction:

1. The story involves something that pleases you.
2. The actors present metaphors about living life.
3. Story's characters appear lifelike and real.
4. Nature of story plot and subplots matters a lot.
5. The story speaks to you on more than one level.
6. Your imagination will be fully engaged.
7. Characters pull you into the story with them.

These qualities of dynamite fiction are all about the
creation of visual images using words. Readers see words
and instantly translate them into images. Stories with an
abundance of images that please us are the stories that
also WOW us.