How to Write a Short Story - Grimdark Edition

Step 1: Figure Out What Your Short Story Embodies

Just like any good short story, the best grimdark writing has a message it wants the reader to consider. When it comes to grimdark storytelling, this message isn’t necessarily negative, but instead some uncomfortable truth that society refuses to acknowledge. Below are a few examples:

• Power can corrupt even good people.
• Even flawed people can become heroes.
• Morality has a strong relation to societal systems.
• It’s hard for people to escape their nature.

The key to writing a powerful grimdark short story is to start with a moral question that even you struggle with. Let that dilemma become the foundation of your story. The strongest grimdark tales are the ones where readers can feel the writer wrestling with the idea themselves. Pushing into the black, the white, and every uncomfortable shade of grey in between. That internal conflict gives the story its edge and makes the moral ambiguity feel real rather than forced.

Step 2: Wireframe Tour Short Story

Before you start writing, you need a clear sense of where your grimdark journey begins, where it ends, and the major turning points that will drag your reader through the mire in between.

The essence of your story (what it’s really about beneath the blood, mud, and broken morality) becomes the backbone of this wireframe.

As you outline, decide how you’ll deliver that message in a way that feels creative, coherent, and unmistakably grimdark.

At the beginning, let the reader dip their toes into the problem. Just enough to sense that something is wrong beneath the surface. By the midpoint, they should be submerged to the shoulders, feeling the weight, the dread, and the rising stakes. And by the end, they should crawl out the other side, battered, wiser, and able to look back at the ordeal with a sense of grim clarity.

A strong wireframe should ensure the journey feels deliberate, even when the world you’re writing is anything but kind.

Step 3: Start With a Brutal Hook

Every great grimdark short story starts with a dark hook. An opening phrase that sets the tone and pulls the reader into the bleakness of the world. Mark Lawrance does a great job in his book Prince of Thorns, where he drops the reader into the story right after the main character, called Jorg Ancrath, brutally burns down a village. Here is the first paragraph of the book:

“Ravens! Always the ravens. They settled on the gables of the church even before the injured became the dead. Even before Rike had finished taking fingers from hands, and rings from fingers. I leaned back against the gallows-post and nodded to the birds, a dozen of them in a black line, wise-eyed and watching.”

Why this hook works:

1. Instant conflict: The scene begins in the middle of brutality. No setup, no safety net.
2. Immediate character definition: We learn who Jorg is not through exposition, but through his ruthless actions.
3. Worldbuilding: The burning village shows the lawlessness and savagery of the world without any explanation needed.
4. A moral punch in the gut: The protagonist is not a hero. The reader must decide whether to follow him anyway. This is the true challenge of grimdark.
5. A question is planted: What happened to turn a young boy into this nightmare?

There is no one-size-fits-all approach, and your short story needs its own unique hook. The only standard is that it should grab the reader’s attention immediately and set them up for what’s to come. It’s your story’s first chance to make a good impression. Or a bad one.

Step 4: Write Your First Draft

The next step is to write, write, write. No more planning and procrastinating, it’s time to get the story out of your head and onto the page. Don’t worry about perfection for now. Let it be messy. It’s okay to make grammar or structural mistakes during this phase. Even word count can be ignored up to an extent. There will be plenty of time to fix things later.

There isn’t much advise during this step, except to work towards a deadline and avoid distractions. First drafts are where the grind is most important. If you feel yourself getting stuck, look at your wireframe. That’s why you created it in the first place. To guide you.

Step 5: Review and Improve Your Short Story

Now it’s time to refine your work and sharpen your grimdark story into its final form. There’s no universal method for editing, but this three-pass approach works well:

1. First pass: Fix the surface errors.

Read the story through and correct anything immediately wrong. Grammar slips, spelling mistakes, punctuation issues, and missing words.

2. Second pass: Strengthen the structure.

Reread it with an eye for the bigger picture. Are there plot holes? Awkward transitions? Scenes that slow the momentum or don’t earn their place? Tighten the flow, cut what doesn’t serve the core idea, and make sure you’re within your intended word count.

3. Third pass: Refine the craft.

On your final read, focus on precision. Improve sentence rhythm, sharpen your word choices, enrich your descriptions, and trim any bloated metaphors. This is where the short story gains its edge and becomes quality writing.

Step 6: Get feedback from others.

Writers have blind spots, and the only way to expose them is to let someone else read and critique your work. Family and friends can be a good starting point, but choose people with strong language skills who won’t hesitate to give you honest, constructive feedback. If that’s not an option, there are countless free and paid communities, critique groups, and online platforms dedicated to helping writers improve. And in today’s world, AI tools can also be a valuable source of feedback. Don’t let AI rewrite your entire story for you. You still want your own voice to shine through and learn something new in the process.