i need help writing a ghost story?

Question

we have to write short ghost stories for out eng. class, and i need an interesting place for someone to have died (i keep thinking hotel, but i want a unique place, a cool place) and that is where the ghost would be haunting. but i don't know y the ghost is haunting the palce. i'm thinking agen that, its a girl, her fiancé killed her, (i havn't figured out y yet) and the only thing left of her was a locket on a necklace with her and her fincés pic. in it. and thts all i'v got so far. this is due ... tomorrow actually, alot of help would b appreciated!! THANK YOU!!!!

and please remember that i'm supposed to b reading this at school :) thnx

Answer 1

How about having him kill her in a place like Lizzie Borden's house, and the ghost is competing with the ghosts of Lizzie Borden's murdered parents or some other place where you might reasonably expect a ghost to roam? For instance, you could have her being killed in one of the places in Salem, Massachusetts where the witch trials went on. Then again, there is the house in Amityville (as in The Amityville Horror), where there were a bunch of strange things that went on and sightings of strange beings.

You could have her being killed in a place you wouldn't suspect, like in the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. and her ghost is only seen while Congress is in session.

How about having the fiance kill her in a movie theater, and her ghost is seen there? However, her ghost isn't seen in the theater, itself, but only on the screen when a movie is playing; she shows up as an extra (and ghostly-looking) character in the movie - no matter what movie is playing.

Answer 2

You firstly need a place where ghost stories are still alive, where it is not yet well developed, that place is the Philippines.

Iloilo city, Philippines. My friend and I went there for vacation last summer. We decided to stay with our on-line friend at a Chinese temple near the sea coast of General Huggess street. History has it that this temple has been a home for the injured and sick people back in World War II and humor has it that it still is for the unrestless ones.
Each room has a mirror of 6 feet high and 4 feet wide. It gives a perfect reflection of someone who likes to spend hours checking their waist or how their hair looks like. However, it is also a perfect door that connects the unrested wanderers to the present time. They whistle, call your name and if you lean against the mirror, if felt like something is trying to suck you into it. balblablablbla I'm not good at writing but you get the point.

Answer 3

Learn how to create suspense and fear.

The key to creating suspense and fear is learning how to keep your readers curious and concerned.

Think about the multiple stories where an evil villain kills one of his henchman to show how evil he truly is. Did you end up caring about the henchman? Certainly not, because you had no concern for him.

In your story, you must first make us concerned with your characters before you create true fear. You create concern by making the reader empathetic with the character, and this doesn't change for whatever genre you're writing. Once the reader identifies with your character's goals and desires and steps into the characters' shoes, then you'll be able to create fear when you place your character at stake.

There are many types of fear, so if you want to get into the true psychology of fear (albeit a snapshot) then read the entry on fear in wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear

The next part is maintain the reader's curiosity (suspense). I wrote a tutorial on 'how to hold your readers' interests' which goes through many examples of how to maintain curiosity:
http://www.storyentertainment.com/article.asp?id=2519

Suspense can take a mediocre story and make it great (e.g., The Da Vinci Code). In my tutorial, I showed how The Da Vinci Code maintains the reader's suspense.

Here are some of the points that I go over in the tutorial:
-- How to create scene cliff-hangers
-- Rearranging the chronology
-- Hide information
-- Hide background
-- Misdirection (red herrings)

Also, I highly suggest that once you identify some of these characteristics of suspense-building, that you read or watch movies to see how it is done. Then you will be able to craft your own clever scenes with suspense and fear.

Good luck!

Answer 4

I think this scene played out already, theres an old prison here nearby, one of the last prisoners to be there was a woman, they say her spirits walks the hall of the run down prison, the smell of the cells as you walk in is the same smell that has lasted over the last 70yrs i guess, but anyways, she wore this locket, and the connection to her death was that locket. from what i remember of it was that in the locket was a pic of her and her sibling at a very young age, I think the reason for her not crossing over is coz she was wrongfully convicted, was her sister not her who commited the crime, and coz it was never revealed she haunts the prision today.

SO, maybe try something more chique like central park. create a scene, cold winters night snowflakes drifts slowly to the ground, as the young couple walks briskley towards the lights in the distance then suddenly a gunshot rings out the sound peircing the night turns chilling as the body slumps to the snow covered ground, then maybe here you can kinda add your ghostly figure who haunts the park coz his/her life has been taken without a reason... ??? does that help LOL?

Answer 5

Instead of the murder option (which can be tricky to write) go for the tragic senseless death.

Girl falls off a lighthouse and breaks her neck on the rocks below?

Girl is babysitting one night, the kids are asleep, and she makes herself a mixed drink, accidentally using the mislabeled container and poisoning herself with bleach?

Girl - captain of the swim team - is attending a convention at the hotel and gets her bikini top caught in the pool cleaner machine and strangles AND drowns?

Girl runs through a graveyard and trips, braining herself on the tombstone of her father?

If you really want to be tricky, take the main character through a series of pitfalls, only to have her emerge unscathed until the last one. Oh, and it's sometimes better to write it as if you are telling it around a campfire. And you might lose any "evidence" of the situation - just have her reappear on the anniversary of her death to reenact the death scene over and over again.

Have fun. I love assignments like that.

Answer 6

I worte a ghost story once for a creative lit class, and for it I threw in a Poltergiest feel to it. I based it off some made-up town in Louisianna. In my story, some big oil company built a huge plant in a small town that was dying, and they changed the town to create more of a "new" feel. They paid to buy all the land and move the town up on a hill, and flood out the old town with a lake (man-made). This way it would draw new people to the town. Well, unfortunately the town pastor (in a way to keep the money for himself) didn't move the graves from the old cemetary. He just moved the headstones (like in Poltergiest). Anyways, the people who were left at the original cemetary (now under the lake) are rising from the dead to seek revenge. The way I put it was that not all of the buildings and houses were moved up the hill, because the people just had new ones built with the money they got from the land developers. So, if you go out on a boat and look down... you can see the old town that is set up exactly like the new one. This brings in divers who want to look around in the water at the old buildings and streets, but they have to deal with the dead people who are kind of "living" down there. I also drew into affect the fact that the telephone lines are underground in the lake, and so the dead people can call you on the phone. They call their relatives or the people who live on their land now and tell them to get off of it. Lol. It was fun and scary.

Answer 7

The locket with the pic of fiance is a little trite. How about half a ticket stub to the first movie they saw together?

As for the location where she was killed, how about a polluted beach cove?

Answer 8

Maybe a taxi cab. It's unique and a lot of people would have a reason to be there. It's also trackable by the license plate, so that might add a nice twist to your story.

Answer 9

look up some old plces that are now built over and talk about how ppl buried in the ground.


dont worry i am so lost i have to wrt a short story about a super hero also due tomorrow

Answer 10

Try reading some real stories of hauntings. The best stories are true ones after all.