User blog:Chelsea.adams.524/Stuff Happening Is NOT A Story

Looking through several bad Creepypastas over the past few days, I've noticed that many of them make the same huge mistake. That mistake is that they're not really stories. No, not that they are just one run-on sentence with poor grammar and utter gibberish. Rather, I mean that stuff happens, but there's no substance to it.

This is a bit hard for me to explain, so, let me give a comparison to better show what I mean. Compare this paragraph-

'''I was walking down the street. Then I heard a strange noise. There was a ghost behind me. I was scared. So I ran. The ghost chased me. I tripped and fell. The ghost caught me and I screamed.'''

To this one-

'''It was late evening when I was walking down the street towards my home. I then heard a strange groaning  sound that sent chills down my spine. Looking behind me, I saw a pale figure of a young boy behind me. To my horror, I noticed the boy was floating instead of walking. I took off running as fast as I could. Each time I glanced behind  my back, I could see that the ghostly figure was still floating after me. Not watching what was ahead of me, I accidentally tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and fell to the ground. All I could do as the ghostly boy descended upon me was scream.'''

Which one felt more like a story? Which one was more engaging? I'm pretty sure many of you probably said the second one. That's because there's substance to it. There's more description to what's going on rather than just a sequence of events.

Now, a good story doesn't need intricate complex plots and characters to be good. Take, for example, Alice In Wonderland. The basic plot of that tale is essentially "Alice wanders through Wonderland and meets eccentric characters". That's basically it. However, due to well-written characters and the atmosphere of Wonderland's bizarre logic (or lack thereof), the story is considered a literary classic. Imagine how different Alice In Wonderland would be if it was written like this-

'''Alice saw a cat. It was striped. The cat had a big smile on his face. He told Alice that everyone was mad. Then he vanished. His smile was still there.'''

Sounds dull, huh?

So, let that be a lesson, fellow Creepypasta writers. A good story isn't just stuff happening. Think of your story like a pizza. The crust is your sequence of events, and the toppings are the substance that makes it great.