Journalism and novel writing could be said to be distant cousins—one bound by the constraints of facts, the other bound only by the author’s imagination. The differences in the two fields actually create a situation in which they can be of benefit to each other.
Several celebrated novelists began their careers in newsrooms and brought the skills learned on the beat to their fiction writing: Ernest Hemingway, Carl Hiassen, George Orwell, Mark Twain, Maya Angelou, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Stieg Larsson, and Margaret Mitchell to name but a few. Anna Quindlen even won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary during her time at The New York Times.
There are also a fair number of current or former journalists within the ranks of NINC, myself included. And while I eventually brought my fiction-writing tactics to my freelance writing, I first applied what I’d learned in my newspaper and magazine positions to my novels. While the two fields have obvious structural differences, there are a number of tips that novelists can take from those who have spent time in the trenches of a newsroom.
Focus on the people
It is easy for a novelist to get bogged down in the building of a plot. You might spend weeks designing a complex magic system, mapping out geopolitical borders for a fictional continent, detailing the exact blueprints of a futuristic spaceship, or filling sticky notes with the story beats of an enemies-to-lovers romance. But just as a journalist may be writing about the details of a proposed data center in a rural community, everything comes back to the people that are affected by that data center.
“Stories are about people. They aren’t really about things or events.” I came across this quote from incoming NINC President Michele Dunaway while watching her interview with author Gregory Frost about “The Craft of Storytelling: Beginnings, Middles, and Ends” on NINC’s YouTube channel. It was an essential truth that she told her journalism students that also applies to novel writing.
The fundamental rule of journalism—whether covering a war, a municipal budget crisis, or a scientific breakthrough—is that stories are about the people affected by these topics. Civilians caught in a war zone, a cut in library hours, or a young mother fighting cancer who has new hope. An article about inflation is not a story about percentages and interest rates; it is a story about a single mother deciding whether to buy groceries or pay the electric bill. An article about a massive corporate merger is a story about the middle-manager with a mortgage and two kids in college whose desk is about to be boxed up.
You probably already see the applicability for novelists. No matter the type of fiction or its complexity, never let your world-building or plot mechanics eclipse your characters.
- Anchor larger concepts and themes in human behavior: If your novel features a dystopian society or a complex sci-fi setting, show it through the lived, mundane experiences of someone trying to cook breakfast or make a living within it.
- Focus on the stakes: Events and objects only matter to the reader to the extent that they alter the emotional reality of the characters. If a kingdom falls, the tragedy is not the ruined masonry of the castle. Rather, it is the former castle servant now sleeping in a barn, not knowing where her next meal is coming from. Treat your characters with the same psychological weight and curiosity that a reporter brings to the very human story of a family losing their home because the biggest employer in town is shutting down.
Master the ‘nut graf’ (the core hook)
In journalism, the nut graf (nutshell paragraph) is the anchor of a piece. It is the paragraph that explains the “so what?” of a story—why the reader should care, what is at stake, and what the article is really about. While a feature story might open with a vivid anecdote about a fisherman catching a boot (rather than a fish), the nut graf immediately pivots to explain that the local fishing industry is collapsing due to toxic chemical runoff.
Novels often fall into the trap of protecting their secrets too well. Authors want to keep readers guessing, so they sometimes withhold the core conflict or other pertinent information for chapters at a time. There’s a fine balance between info dumping at the beginning and waiting too long to give the reader what they need and want to know. Just as the journalist has to time the revelation of information in a way that keeps readers reading their articles, so too do novelists with their books.
While you can keep plot twists secret, you should never keep the emotional stakes a secret. Even if your plot is intricate, anchor the reader immediately in what your protagonist desperately wants, what they stand to lose, and why this specific inflection point in their life matters. Give the reader their own literary version of a nut graf within the opening pages so they understand the emotional gravity pulling them forward.
Prioritize active observation over vague description
Journalists are trained to be hyper-observant. A lazy reporter describes an accident scene as “chaotic.” A great reporter notes the specific, telling details: fluid leaking from an overturned vehicle, backed-up traffic, the honking horns of frustrated motorists, the additional danger of rubbernecking passersby, a confused driver with a head wound wandering into the roadway, the sound of a child crying.
Vague descriptions flatten a world, turning it into a two-dimensional blur that doesn’t capture the reader’s attention. Concrete details, however, engage the reader’s imagination, making the sights, scents, and sounds of the scene come to three-dimensional life in their mind’s eye.
Again, this is a good reminder for novelists to stop relying on generic adjectives (e.g., sad, wealthy, hectic, tense). Instead, build your scenes out of tangible, sensory evidence. Show the fraying cuffs of a coat to communicate poverty rather than stating a character is poor.
Let dialogue do double duty
In a news article or profile, quotes are precious real estate. Every quoted line must advance the narrative, reveal the speaker’s character, and provide voice. That’s good advice for novelists too.
Even though humans speak with lots of conversational filler, cut those from your scenes.
Another tactic to make the most out of dialogue is to start on-page conversations when a character is already defensive, excited, evasive, or trying to negotiate power.
Remember that characters often don’t say what they actually mean. If a wife asks her husband, “Did you take out the garbage?” while trying to hide her frustration, the subtext might actually be, “I feel overwhelmed and unsupported in this marriage.” Use dialogue to show friction and shifting power dynamics rather than just moving information from one character’s head to another.
Conduct field research
Even though fiction is invented, the most convincing stories are built on a foundation of accuracy. Crime fiction writers ride along with homicide detectives. Historical novelists comb through century-old menus, court transcripts, and weather reports to understand what the air felt like on a specific Tuesday in 1894.
Reality is frequently stranger and more inventive than anything you can dream up while staring at a blank cursor in a quiet room. Ever heard of the Great Molasses Flood of 1919? It sounds like something right out of a writer’s imagination, but it was an actual flood of molasses moving 35 mph through the streets of Boston after a storage tank burst. The flood killed 21 people and injured 150 more.
Even if you’re writing fiction, making everything up is rarely a good idea. Ask any Regency romance author who did so only to hear from a well-versed reader that, in fact, it wasn’t taboo for a lady to show her ankles in mixed company.
Fiction is, by its very nature, made up. Still, if a reader notices a real-world truth within the story, it creates trust that the author has done their homework.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, in a 1981 interview with the Paris Review, said, “In journalism, just one fact that is false prejudices the entire work. In contrast, in fiction, one single fact that is true gives legitimacy to the entire work.”
So don’t guess how things work. If your plot involves an operating room, a bankruptcy filing, a specific subculture, or a remote wilderness survival scenario, do the same type of detailed research a journalist does when reporting on any of those topics.
- Interview experts.
- Read primary source documents, court filings, or memoirs.
- Visit physical locations whenever possible to absorb the ambient noises, lighting, and smells. This real-world research injects your fictional universe with an undeniable credibility that no amount of pure imagination can replicate.
- Keep a “reporter’s notepad” with you at all times to use as a sensory notebook. On these pages, you can quickly jot down the precise smell of a bakery, a striking line of overheard conversation, technical jargon you learn while having lunch with a civil engineer who shares his knowledge of “load-bearing” and “tensile strength.” Someday, that information might come in handy if you’re writing a scene in which a bridge collapses.
Pacing and urgency
News writing is specifically engineered to keep eyes on the page. Utilizing structural tension, narrative momentum, and pacing, a good journalist carries the reader seamlessly from the opening hook to the final period.
Novels frequently suffer from the cursed muddling-middle slump—that sluggish stretch where characters wander around, exposition dumps occur, and the narrative engine stalls.
A reader should always feel a subtle, invisible pressure pulling them toward the next sentence. How do you affect this? Vary your sentence and paragraph lengths deliberately. Pair a long, sweeping sentence—mirroring deep thought or a sprawling landscape—with a short, punchy, declarative sentence that hits like a physical blow.
Remember the fisherman from earlier? Let’s use him as an example.
Jim Barnes casts a line into the water of the Standish River, the hook immediately catching on something hidden beneath the water’s surface. As he reels in his line, he talks about how his father and grandfather used to bring him and his brother to this exact spot, how it was magical to little boys who would have spent twenty-four hours a day outdoors if they could, how he returns here out of habit in a vain hope to recapture those long-ago days.
“They’re all gone now,” he says as his catch is revealed to be an old boot. “So are the fish.”
Ensure that every single scene introduces a complication, shifts the balance of power between characters, or introduces an implicit ticking clock.
Ruthless self-editing (killing your darlings)
Journalists operate under the realities of strict word counts and unforgiving deadlines. If a sentence does not move the story forward, provide vital context, or sharpen the focus, it is axed without mercy.
Writers of fiction often fall deeply in love with their own prose, gorgeous paragraphs that they refuse to cut because of how much effort it took to write them. During your revision phases, adopt the cold, calculating eye of a managing editor. Hunt down overwritten passages and purple prose. If it stops the story dead in its tracks, cut it no matter how much it stings.
And those pesky deadlines? Learn from journalists, who cannot procrastinate if they want to keep their jobs.
Two sides, same coin
At their best, both journalism and fiction attempt the same thing: taking the chaotic, confusing noise of human existence and translating it into stories that make sense and touch the hearts of readers in ways that stay with them long after they’ve finished reading.
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Trish Milburn has a print journalism degree from Murray State University and has written for newspapers and magazines since the early 1990s. She left full-time reporting in 2005 to focus on writing novels, though she still freelances, writing articles on everything from aquaculture to state parks.