In the writing world, there are certain things that are often deemed to be necessary or essential by the industry to make a book successful, and to crucially sell. Narrative arcs. Three act structures with an inciting incident. Protagonists who are active not passive. Strong hooks. Showing not telling.

These are likely familiar phrases to many if not all writers, and whilst they can all be brilliant tools which have the potential to contribute to fantastic storytelling, when taken as gospel they can be as limiting as they are useful, particularly for writers whose stories aren’t those that we usually get to read.