Recently, I've discovered that a reason my short stories aren't selling, is because in the editing process after finishing a first draft, I wasn't taking control of my story's tone. I knew of tone, but I thought it was not important enough to worry over. Huge mistake. Tone is everything. Everything signifies a specific tone, and the best authors keep their tone consistent, or inconsistent by choice, throughout their stories. The differences between a prologue and the first chapter are a great example of this control of tone.

If you're not in control of your tone and it changes suddenly readers will put the book down, because it isn't the story you have promised them. There are stories with shifting tones, obviously. But they work, because again, the author's control.

I've done some homework I want to share with you.

• Where

— Where does your story take place? Think about conversations in an Inn, compared to on a battlefield, or a person locked in a castle's dungeon. If your story's first chapter takes place in an Inn, what does this show about your story? It isn't just a place your characters begin their journey from, it's a tone setter. Readers who read the first chapter and buy your story expect a story with the same tone as the first chapter, unless they're told otherwise by a prologue, title, or a well-written blurb.

When thinking about 'where,' think about what emotions does the setting, the scenery, immediately make you feel? If you can put it into words, you're a step further in controlling tone. You may find that in your book (like me) your initial setting doesn't convey well the tone you want, to best suit the story you want to tell, so, you should think hard about changing it.

• Character

— So you have chosen a setting that best represents the story you want to tell. Awesome. Now how does your protagonist react to their immediate surroundings? If your protagonist is lost in a desert, a guy or woman unaffected by the danger to his or her life and even finds humour in it, implies a different tone (and story), compared to another protagonist who's genuinely suffering.

When you think about 'character,' think about who your character is as a person, a human, and make sure you understand and are in control of your readers response to them. If you're writing a comical story, you need to recognise you need humour, so your characters — your protagonist especially, needs to interact with the world in ways that give the reader the reaction you desire. That is key to tone. Usually when writing something comical you want your character to say or do something funny within the first page of a chapter, to set the tone.

• The Narrator's voice

— When thinking about tone people overlook the voice of the Narrator. Think about your best friend (irl) telling you some gossip. Now think about a war veteran giving a speech on his experiences. Two completely different ways of telling a story. Two completely different tones. When writing, it is exactly the same. A first-person narrator will carry a different tone to a third-person narrator, etc.

It is how they tell the story that's important, which establishes the tone. Think about the words you use. Like: ran vs sprinted. They both mean the same thing, but tonally they're different. You get me?

Also, through the Narrator's words the writer is in control of what kind the story actually feels like. You could be writing a horror story, but in the beginning it may feel like a teen drama story. The way writers combat this is by describing things that don't change the setting, but enhance it. If you're writing a story about aliens, but your character is lost in a desert. The narrator can describe the night-sky with glowing strange weird colours. The character is still lost in a desert, but what's happening is foreshadowing what's to come. So when the aliens arrive and abduct the character, it isn't jarring.