4 tips from master writers that will 10x your stories

1. Short stories don’t need a beginning

About a year ago, I watched a great documentary about Hayao Miyazaki’s creative process and was stunned to discover he didn’t start his stories at the beginning. Instead, he began with an image and worked his way out.

Freed from finding a start for my stories, I immediately began drawing out moments and scenes that had been rattling around my brain for years, waiting for a beginning.

At first, I timidly drew the whole scene onto a single A5 page, eventually daring to take up two pages.

A short story drawn onto a double-paged spread

As I drew, the stories grew — in size and ambition.

By the end of the year, I had written and drawn more than a dozen of them, some stretching over 40 pages!

This was not an outcome I had expected at the beginning of the year.

Within a year, a double paged spread contained just one single panel!

2. Short stories help you experiment

Drawing fictional stories for a couple of hours in the early morning, I feel more connected with my creativity than I have felt in years; it’s opened a tap of ideas and stories…