The Worst Short Story Ever Written (On Purpose!)
The Worst Short Story Ever Written (On Purpose!)
No one has to know that you weren't trying to make it that bad...
No one has to know that you weren't trying to make it that bad...
Write the absolute worst short story imaginable. But not by accident—on purpose. Your goal is to create something so atrociously written, so melodramatic, so structurally incoherent that it loops back around into being an unintentional masterpiece.
Much like Atlanta Nights or Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, this is your chance to:
Break every storytelling rule.
Go way too hard on details no one cares about.
Create dialogue that makes no sense.
Make the characters incredibly unlikable, yet somehow the most important people in the universe.
And after crafting your glorious dumpster fire, you will rewrite it into a strong, well-crafted story—analyzing exactly what makes bad writing bad.
A protagonist who is a walking cliché. Make them the most powerful, most attractive, most misunderstood person ever. Bonus points if they have a tragic past that is mentioned constantly but never explained.
Terrible pacing. Either nothing happens for pages, or everything happens all at once. Preferably both.
Weirdly over-explained mundane details. (He put on his shoes, tying the left lace, then the right, double knotting with the practiced dexterity of a man who had worn shoes every day since the age of six.)
Unhinged, unnatural dialogue.
"No time for questions," she said, as she slowly, painstakingly, with great detail, explained everything.
"I'm not like other people," he whispered. "I drink my coffee without cream."
"You don't understand!" he screamed, throwing his sunglasses into the ocean for emphasis.
Purple prose that is somehow both excessive and meaningless. (The moon hung in the night sky like an orphaned pearl, abandoned by the oyster of time, shrouded in the velvety depths of an abyssal, ebony embrace.)
Sudden, massive plot twists that make no sense. ("Wait," he gasped, "so I was the murderer the whole time? But… I wasn't even in the scene!")
Obsession with random things. Maybe your narrator won't stop describing a ceiling fan, or goes into way too much detail about a sandwich—make something weirdly important that has no relevance whatsoever.
A terrible ending. Either a twist that ruins everything ("And then I woke up—IT WAS ALL A DREAM!!!") or no resolution at all ("And as she stepped through the door, she realized the true meaning of life. The End.").
The story must be intentionally bad.
The characters, dialogue, pacing, and descriptions should all be "off" in some way.
The structure should be either a disaster—or way too rigid.
After writing it, you will rewrite it into a strong short story.
The final reflection should analyze what made the first version bad and how it was improved.
Channel your inner bad writer. Think of poorly written fanfiction, vanity-published disasters, or overly dramatic soap operas.
Commit to the absurd. If something feels too ridiculous—make it worse.
Study Darkplace and Atlanta Nights. These works show how bad writing, when done with confidence, is comedy gold.
Make the rewrite truly good. The exercise only works if you can recognize the bad writing choices and intentionally fix them.
Atlanta Nights (a deliberately terrible novel written to trick a vanity publisher)
Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace ("I know writers who use subtext, and they're all cowards.")
My Immortal (legendary for its writing sins)
Eye of Argon (one of the most infamous bad fantasy stories ever written)