The Writers’ Common Language: A Shared Vocabulary to Tell Better Stories

By: Tim Grahl

The writers’ common language is one of the Story Grid Beats. I’d recommend reading them all.

Get all the Story Grid Beats. Read all the Story Grid Beats.

If you want to level up your craft as a writer, this is the way to go.

Also, these then become a great source of reference when you are stuck with your writing (or doing your weekly Story Grid Guild worksheet).

I’d recommend bookmarking the pages that have concepts, or tools that you’d likely revisit to make it easier to consult these books.

Flow: 5/5
Actionability: 5/5
Mindset: 5/5

Some of My Highlights:

“Until we have a shared language, we cannot have a real discussion about our writing.”

“Another way to think about genre is to ask the question, what does our protagonist want and need throughout the story? We call this the Object of Desire.”

“Conventions and obligatory moments are circumstances and specific happenings that the reader expects because of the genre of the story.”

“Once we choose our genre, the next step is to identify the conventions and obligatory moments our story must have to meet reader expectations.”

“Often our global and secondary genres create competing conscious and unconscious wants and needs inside of our characters.”

“I start by identifying the Five Commandments in my entire story.”