What was the last book you read or movie you watched that made you feel completely immersed?  There’s just a moment when you think to yourself, “Oh, this is going to be good.”  I streamed a number of movies recently (long story — I was acting as a temporary caretaker), and some of the films started out like that, but lost the storytelling or the structure somewhere along the way.  But there were a couple that left me satisfied with the story, or even thinking about the implications of the moral choices the characters had to make, or how well the plot elements folded in on themselves.

Stories that draw you in and keep you riveted have a lot to them, and the elements move together in a dynamic way. Dynamic stories have the oomph or the “it factor” that makes us HAVE to keep reading or watching..

To create a dynamic story, you need a combination of these three elements:
— Something has to be happening to draw the reader in and catch their attention.  (Even if the story is largely thematic, interesting external events need to keep happening._
— The story needs to ask an intriguing question that demands an answer.
— The story needs a character who will change in an interesting way or come to a realization about life that matches your intended themes. (Though sometimes the character doesn’t realize the irony of the situation, and it is the audience who realize the themes.  This is much easier to pull off in a short story than in a novel or feature-length screenplay.)

What short stories have stuck with you over time?  What “it factor” do you remember each one having?