Stories We've Seen Too Often

(List last updated 26 March 2009)

The following list is an attempt at classifying the kinds of non-horror plots and themes that we receive too frequently.

Main plot types are numbered; subspecies and variants receive letters.

This is not a canonical list of bad stories or story cliches. This is a list of types of stories that we at SH have seen too often; it's not intended to be a complete list of all types of bad stories, nor are all the items on the list necessarily bad.

We often receive stories that match items on this list but that have cover letters saying "This matches something on your list, but I've done something new and unique and different with it." Such stories almost always turn out to be very similar to other stories we've seen. If your story is a close match to one or more items on this list (especially if it's a close enough match that you feel the need to include a cover-letter disclaimer), you may want to consult some friends who are well-read in the genre before deciding that it's probably different from what we see all the time. (And by the way, we often don't read cover letters until after we've read the story.)

Note to bloggers and other potential reprinters: See end of page for reprint guidelines.

Here's the list:

1. Person is (metaphorically) at point A, wants to be at point B. Looks at point B, says "I want to be at point B." Walks to point B, encountering no meaningful obstacles or difficulties. The end. (A.k.a. the linear plot.)
2. Creative person is having trouble creating.
   1. Writer has writer's block.
   2. Painter can't seem to paint anything good.
   3. Sculptor can't seem to sculpt anything good.
   4. Creative person's work is reviled by critics who don't understand how brilliant it is.
   5. Creative person meets a muse (either one of the nine classical Muses or a more individual muse) and interacts with them, usually by keeping them captive.
3. Visitor to alien planet ignores information about local rules, inadvertantly violates them, is punished.
   1. New diplomat arrives on alien planet, ignores anthropologist's attempts to explain local rules, is punished.
4. Weird things happen, but it turns out they're not real.
   1. In the end, it turns out it was all a dream.
   2. In the end, it turns out it was all in virtual reality.
   3. In the end, it turns out the protagonist is insane.
   4. In the end, it turns out the protagonist is writing a novel and the events we've seen are part of the novel.
5. An A.I. gets loose on the Net, but the author doesn't have a clear concept of what it means for software to be "loose on the Net." (For example, the computer it was on may not be connected to the Net.)
6. Technology and/or modern life turn out to be soulless.
   1. Office life turns out to be soul-deadening, literally or metaphorically.
   2. All technology is shown to be soulless; in contrast, anything "natural" is by definition good. For example, living in a weather-controlled environment is bad, because it's artificial, while dying of pneumonia is good, because it's natural.
   3. In the future, all learning is soulless and electronic, until kid is exposed to ancient wisdom in the form of a book.
   4. In the future, everything is soulless and electronic, until protagonist (usually a kid) is exposed to ancient wisdom in the form of a wise old person who's lived a non-electronic life.
7. Protagonist is a bad person. (We don't object to this in a story; we merely object to it being the main point of the plot.)
   1. Bad person is told they'll get the reward that they "deserve," which ends up being something bad.
   2. Terrorists (especially Osama bin Laden) discover that horrible things happen to them in the afterlife (or otherwise get their comeuppance).
   3. Protagonist is portrayed as really awful, but that portrayal is merely a setup for the ending, in which they see the error of their ways and are redeemed. (But reading about the awfulness is so awful that we never get to the end to see the redemption.)
8. A place is described, with no plot or characters.
9. A "surprise" twist ending occurs. (Note that we do like endings that we didn't expect, as long as they derive naturally from character action. But note, too, that we've seen a lot of twist endings, and we find most of them to be pretty predictable, even the ones not on this list.)
   1. The characters' actions are described in a way meant to fool the reader into thinking they're humans, but in the end it turns out they're not humans, as would have been obvious to anyone looking at them.
   2. Creatures are described as "vermin" or "pests" or "monsters," but in the end it turns out they're humans.
   3. The author conceals some essential piece of information from the reader that would be obvious if the reader were present at the scene, and then suddenly reveals that information at the end of the story. (This can be done well, but rarely is.)
   4. Person is floating in a formless void; in the end, they're born.
   5. Person uses time travel to achieve some particular result, but in the end something unexpected happens that thwarts their plan.
   6. The main point of the story is for the author to metaphorically tell the reader, "Ha, ha, I tricked you! You thought one thing was going on, but it was really something else! You sure are dumb!"
   7. A mysteriously-named Event is about to happen ("Today was the day Jimmy would have to report for The Procedure"), but the nature of the Event isn't revealed until the end of the story, when it turns out to involve death or other unpleasantness. (Several classic sf stories use this approach, which is one reason we're tired of seeing it. Another reason is that we can usually guess the twist well ahead of time, which makes the mysteriousness annoying.)
   8. In the future, an official government permit is required in order to do some particular ordinary thing, but the specific thing a permit is required for isn't (usually) revealed until the end of the story.
   9. Characters speculate (usually jokingly): "What if X were true of the universe?" (For example: "What if the universe is a simulation?") At the end, something happens that implies that X is true.
10. Someone calls technical support; wacky hijinx ensue.
    1. Someone calls technical support for a magical item.
    2. Someone calls technical support for a piece of advanced technology.
    3. The title of the story is 1-800-SOMETHING-CUTE.
11. Scientist uses himself or herself as test subject.
12. Evil unethical doctor performs medical experiments on unsuspecting patient.
13. In the future, criminals are punished much more harshly than they are today.
    1. In the future, the punishment always fits the crime.
    2. The author is apparently unaware of the American constitutional amendment prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment, and so postulates that in the future, American punishment will be extra-cruel in some unusual way.
14. White protagonist is given wise and mystical advice by Holy Simple Native Folk.
15. Story is based in whole or part on a D&D game or world.
    1. A party of D&D characters (usually including a fighter, a magic-user, and a thief, one of whom is a half-elf and one a dwarf) enters a dungeon (or the wilderness, or a town, or a tavern) and fights monsters (usually including orcs).
    2. Story is the origin story of a D&D character, culminating in their hooking up with a party of adventurers.
    3. A group of real-world humans who like roleplaying find themselves transported to D&D world.
16. An alien observes and comments on the peculiar habits of humans, for allegedly comic effect.
    1. The alien is fluent in English and completely familiar with various English idioms, but is completely unfamiliar with human biology and/or with such concepts as sex or violence and/or with certain specific extremely common English words (such as "cat").
    2. The alien takes everything literally.
    3. Instead of an alien, it's people in the future commenting on the ridiculous things (usually including internal combustion engines) that people used to use in the unenlightened past.
17. Space travel is wonderful and will solve all our problems. (We agree that space travel is pretty cool, but we'd rather that weren't the whole point of the story.)
18. Man has an awful, shrewish wife; in the end he gets revenge on her, by (for example) killing her or leaving her.
    1. Man is entirely blameless, innocent, mild-mannered, and unobjectionable, and he kills his awful, shrewish wife entirely by accident, possibly in self-defense, so it's okay.
19. Some characters are in favor of immersive VR, while others are opposed to it because it's not natural; they spend most of the story's length rehashing common arguments on both sides. (Full disclosure: one of our editors once wrote a story like this. It hasn't found a publisher yet, for some reason.)
20. Person A tells a story to person B (or to a room full of people) about person C.
    1. In the end, it turns out that person B is really person C (or from the same organization).
    2. In the end, it turns out that person A is really person C (or has the same goals).
    3. In the end, there's some other ironic but predictable twist that would cast the whole story in a different light if the reader hadn't guessed the ending early on.
21. People whose politics are different from the author's are shown to be stupid, insane, or evil, usually through satire, sarcasm, stereotyping, and wild exaggeration.
    1. In the future, the US or the world is ruled by politically correct liberals, leading to awful things (usually including loss of freedom of speech).
    2. In the future, the US or the world is ruled by fascist conservatives, leading to awful things (usually including loss of freedom of speech).
22. Superpowered narrator claims that superhero stories never address the mundane problems that superheroes would run into in the real world.
23. A princess has been raped or molested by her father (or stepfather), the king.
24. Someone comes up with a great medical or technological breakthrough, but it turns out that it has unforeseen world-devastating consequences. (Again, this is a perfectly good plot element, but we're not thrilled when it's the whole point of the story.)
25. It's immediately obvious to the reader that a mysterious character is from the future, but the other characters (usually including the protagonist) can't figure it out.
26. Someone takes revenge for the wrongs done to them.
    1. Protagonist is put through heavy-handed humiliation after humiliation, and takes it meekly, until the end when he or she murders someone.
27. The narrator and/or male characters in the story are bewildered about women, believing them to conform to any of the standard stereotypes about women: that they're mysterious, wacky, confusing, unpredictable, changeable, temptresses, etc.
28. Strange and mysterious things keep happening. And keep happening. And keep happening. For over half the story. Relentlessly. Without even a hint of explanation.
    1. The protagonist is surrounded by people who know the explanation but refuse to give it.
29. Author showcases their premise of what the afterlife is like; there's little or no story, other than demonstrating that premise.
    1. Hell and Heaven are run like businesses.
    2. The afterlife is really monotonous and dull.
    3. The afterlife is a bureaucracy.
    4. The afterlife is nothingness.
    5. The afterlife reunites you with your loved ones.
30. Brutal violence against women is depicted in loving detail, often in a story that's ostensibly about violence against women being bad.
    1. Man is forced by circumstances or magic to rape a woman even though he really doesn't want to, honest.
    2. The main reason for the main female character to be in the story, and to be female, is so that she can be raped.
31. Evil people hook the protagonist on an addictive substance and then start raising the price, ruining the protagonist's life.
32. Fatness is used as a signal of evil, dissolution, and/or moral decay, usually with the unspoken assumption that it's completely obvious that fat people are immoral and disgusting. (Note: This does not mean all fat characters in stories must be good guys. We're just tired of seeing fat used as a cheap shorthand signifier of evil.)
    1. Someone wants to kill someone else, and that's perfectly reasonable because, after all, the victim-to-be is fat.
    2. The story spends a lot of time describing, over and over, just how fat a character is, and how awful that is.
    3. Physical contact with a fat person is understood to be obviously revolting.
33. Protagonist agrees to go along with a plan or action despite not having enough information about it, and despite their worries that the thing will be bad. Then the thing turns out to be bad after all.
34. Teen's family doesn't understand them.
35. Twee little fairies with wings fly around being twee.
36. Sentient toys, much like the ones from Toy Story, interact with each other.
37. In a comedic/satirical story, vampires and/or other supernatural creatures come out publicly and demand (and/or get) the vote and other rights, but people are prejudiced against them.

Horror Stories We've Seen Too Often

The following list is an attempt at classifying the kinds of horror-story plots that we receive too frequently.

Note that we're not generally interested in horror of any kind; this page simply lists some particular kinds of horror stories that we see especially often.

Main plot types are numbered; subspecies and variants receive letters.

This is not a canonical list of bad stories or story cliches. This is a list of types of stories that we at SH have seen too often; it's not intended to be a complete list of all types of bad stories, nor are all the items on the list necessarily bad.

We recognize that horror stories are often more about mood or tone than about original plots. Still, these plots and ideas are particularly common in the horror stories submitted to us.

1. Serial killer or vampire stalks and slays victim(s).
   1. The tables are turned at the end. (For example, the intended victim turns out to be a vampire or other powerful supernatural creature.)
   2. The serial killer is insane.
   3. The serial killer is under supernatural influence.
   4. The serial killer was abused as a child.
2. Person is insane, and kills a lot of people because of it.
   1. The insanity is due to supernatural influence.
   2. The insane person does property damage instead of killing people.
3. Protagonist sits around for a while.
   1. In the end, it turns out protagonist is dead.
   2. In the end, it turns out protagonist is a serial killer.
4. Evil creature kills lots of people.
   1. In the end the creature escapes to kill again.
   2. The creature is disguised as something cute.
5. Person sees mysterious things that nobody else can see.
   1. Person has unreasonable dread of a Thing that nobody else can see; in the end the Thing gets the person after all.
   2. Person has bad dreams; they turn out to be real.
   3. In the end, it turns out the person is crazy.
   4. In the end, it turns out someone is drugging the person.
6. Warnings are ignored, with unfortunate consequences.
   1. Person is warned to Always Do something; fails to do it; thereby sets Nameless Evil free.
   2. Person is warned to Never Do something; does it anyway; thereby sets Nameless Evil free.
7. A place is haunted or scary. [No, this isn't a plot, but we do receive plotless place descriptions in which this is the only point.]
8. Child is abused.
   1. The tables are turned at the end.
   2. The abuser is under supernatural influence.
9. Person is targeted by Evil Thing; in the end, Evil Thing kills person.
10. Horrible things happen to person in the end, either as punishment or irony.
    1. Person is a bad person; in the end, they get their comeuppance when unspeakably horrible things happen to them. [A.k.a. the Twilight Zone plot.]
    2. Person attempts to kill or dispose of spouse; in the end, the tables are turned.
    3. Person isn't such a bad person; but in the end, unspeakably horrible things happen to them anyway.
    4. Person wants or wishes for something, and they get it without any trouble, but it results in horrible things happening to them.
11. Therapist enters into the thoughts of serial killer in prison, via telepathy or VR. [a.k.a. the Cell plot.]
12. Initiate into religion discovers that the religion is actually killing/destroying its initiates.
13. Alien creature lays eggs under the skin of a human.