How to develop an interesting story with a newspaper articles structure

[DragonAether]

I was reading my stories that should compose my "magazine-newspaper" and if the plots behind each story could be interesting if developed correctly, the form i used to write them, that pretend to be a mix between a magazine article, a newspaper article, and a short novel is a bit boring sometimes and it feels to read my elementary school's stories "talk about your holidays".
There is a way to improve that?

Hope to have been clear. Thanks in advance.

 

[ralphkern]

Bram Stoker's Dracula was a composite of a mix of mediums. Newspaper articles, diary entries, that kind of thing.

 

[Toby Frost]

I'd have a look at Carrie by Stephen King. IIRC, it works in that kind of pieced-together way.

 

[Venusian Broon]

From what you have stated it suggests to me that, perhaps, you are taking the 'non-fiction' elements a bit too far. Are you reproducing the entire newspaper/magazine article? If that is the case I'd focus on the actual story first and then weave in snippets and small segments from the other sources that are perhaps much more concentrated on how they relate to the story. ?

This is stupid - but bear with me! - say your protagonists have to go to a deserted fairground/carnival ('cause they need something there but it's being guarded by a horrible monster of some sort) then perhaps you could start it with a paragraph from an old flyer when the carnival was actually working - describing it, making 'ironic' comparisons of the fun visitors will have there, compared to the experience that your characters are actually going to have at it??? Anyway just the first thought that came to mind.

There have been a few novels I've read that are a bit weird in mixing non-fiction-type writing with the prose...unfortunately I can't remember the name of the main one that reminds me of what you've said

I really liked David Zindell's Neverness because it had a smaller form of this - with a quote of sorts to start each chapter from various sources. It's probably a bit pretentious now, but I was only about 17 at the time when I read it and I was even nerdier than I am now

Dracula isn't quite the same as it's mostly diary entries and letters from the main protagonists to each other, so it all drives the story forward (although I have to admit I found it a bit of a dull Victorian melodrama, too many ladies swooning and men vowing to forever defend etc...)

On an unrelated note, I utterly loved the way that stories and lore would come out at you unstructured in the game Oblivion/Skyrim - as it was all in short pieces in in-game books and they tended to come at you randomly.

 

[Toby Frost]

That's a good point - a lot of roleplaying games and wargames use scraps of in-world writing as "flavour text". Likewise, Dune and Foundation (and probably many more books) begin chapters with quotes from the books of the day in their setting. However, these do tend to be short introductions, following which the story is told in the usual way.

 

[ctg]

The problem with the newspaper articles is that you'll have to develop own voice for them outside your characters and narrator. They have to follow structure and rules, and even then you can only use small amount of the whole piece to carry your story. So if you're going to use media including tv news tie them directly to the story. Make them to be dramatic events or give out crucial bit of information that is essential for the story, and make the characters to react to them. In that way drama develops around the media pieces, but sometimes it might be nice to develop that media voice and go bonkers with the article hidden inside the story.