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What Shape is Your Story Structure?
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What Shape is Your Story Structure?

5 diagrams that could help you picture where your fiction is heading and how to get there

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Aimee Liu
Aug 02, 2025
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What Shape is Your Story Structure?
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a man standing on a stair case in a building
Photo by John Angel on Unsplash

What the Beginning and the Ending have in common is that they are both states of “normalcy” for the story’s characters. B is the old normal, and E is the new normal. The story is what happens to transform the characters’ reality from B to E.

Hello Loreates,

At our community zoom last month we had a hearty conversation about story structure that seemed to leave a lot of room for expansion. And since structure is an evergreen thorn in everyone’s side, I thought it was time for another post about the value of picturing the shape of your structure through diagrams. I’ve previously written about structures that can help you organize your essays and memoirs. This time, I’m going to provide 5 more classic shapes that can also help you construct a short story or novel.

Check out my earlier posts on structure here:

Picture Your Structure

Picture Your Structure

Aimee Liu
·
February 16, 2024
Read full story
Structuring (and Restructuring) Your Memoir

Structuring (and Restructuring) Your Memoir

Aimee Liu
·
February 8, 2024
Read full story

Coming Live Attractions free @ MFA Lore:

SAVE THESE DATES for our next Well Published! live conversations:

  • PUBLISHING GLOBALLY- Live with debut novelist

    Juli
    Min, who lives in Shanghai and has a US publisher, Thursday, August 28, 6pm PT.

  • BOOK PUBLICITY- Live with book publicist extraordinaire

    Megan Beatie
    , Thursday, September 18, 12 noon PT.

The shape of your story from [B]eginning to [E]nd

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