Everybody has a story to tell. Every single day, you may be conversing with family, friends, classmates, co-workers, or strangers, relaying stories and experiences. Given that kind of interaction, a narrative essay for college should be a breeze for you.

Even if you don’t consider yourself a good essay writer, getting into the theme and groove of the story will help you keep the words flowing – you might even have the problem of not wanting to edit anything out! Still need some tips to be able to craft the perfect narrative essay? Our guide by narrative essay writing service experts will show you how!‍

What Is a Narrative Essay?

Think of a narrative essay, as if you are telling a non-fictional hero story with a central character being you. These types of writing tend to include elements of a story while maintaining the structure of an essay. The primary purpose of the narrative essay is to inform the reader about a certain experience. Although it is possible there may be a lesson to learn from the experience, your objective as the author is to tell a story and not draw any conclusions as a narrator.

Types of Narrative Writing

People have been telling stories since ancient times. All types of stories share one thing in common; they are all part of narrative writing. Here are the four common types of narrative:

Linear Narrative

This type of narrative essay presents the events of the story in chronological order. There are various ways to accomplish this through any narrative perspective. The text can be written in first, second, and third-person. The linear narrative is meant to create an effect of immersion for the reader. During the read-through of such a narrative, the reader becomes immersed in the protagonist’s daily life by watching the events of the character’s life unfold in chronological order. A linear narrative essay has a clear beginning, middle, and end, making it relatively easy to keep up with the events of the story. Various examples of linear narratives can be found in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. The novel shows different narrative perspectives. However, the events of the plot unfold in chronological order.

Non-Linear Narrative

As you may guess from the name, a non-linear narrative essay tells the story out of order, often employing flashbacks and other literary devices to shift the reader back and forth through the timeline of the story. This is done to put emotional emphasis on some parts of the narrative and make thematic connections between events. A great example of a non-linear narrative is demonstrated in one of the most ancient classics, Homer’s epic poem The Odyssey. Presentation of events out of chronological order has the effect of building suspense throughout the long narrative poem, as the reader is left to wonder how Odysseus’ ordeals began. Given the length of the poem, it is also used to keep the reader interested.

Quest Narrative

In a quest narrative essay, the protagonist is constantly moving towards a certain goal. Typically, reaching that goal involves a long journey, as the object of their pursuit is located far from their current whereabouts. Among the best examples of the quest narrative is J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. In the novels, the protagonists embark on a long journey, which takes them through many dangers, and challenges along the way.

When writing an informative essay, you must understand what source of argumentation it stems from. Additionally, you must follow an informative essay format, which has its own peculiarities. You may be familiar with expository essays where the author must investigate and evaluate various evidence. Moreover, the author must provide the argumentation for the stated idea as well.

What Is an Informative Essay?

An informative essay is an academic paper written by high school and college students. This kind of informative writing aims to inform the target audience about a particular object, person, situation, or phenomenon. The purpose is to respond to the main question by explaining the topic in detail. When writing in an informational essay format, imagine the readers do not know anything about the topic in front of them. If possible, use professional terms to explain the topic, but remember to provide meaningful explanations. The definition of informative writing is as follows: The piece must be informative and based on facts. It is not supposed to sway the reader into changing their beliefs or give an opinion.

Informative writing:

• based on cold facts, statistics, and scientific evidence
• not supposed to give the author’s opinion‍

‍Example: When writing an informative essay about marketing for the audience of students who have no idea of startups and business, try to express the main idea with the help of special words. Great words to use are brainstorming, A/B testing, target audience, customer research, copywriting, etc. Give professional definitions. In some cases, use specific examples to explain the meaning of words.

Informative Essay Outline

If you don’t know how to write an informative essay outline, don’t worry. It looks much like most of the academic papers. There are three parts in it: an introduction, the body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Also, do not forget to include a list of references at the end of the work. The number of body paragraphs may vary based on your topic, so choose it carefully. In the conclusion of your informational essay, remind the reader of the main idea. Instead of providing a thesis statement in the shape of an argument, you can stress the importance of the issue under consideration. The purpose of an outline for an informative essay is to determine what you are going to talk about and organize your thoughts.

Example: Imagine that the topic of the informative essay is “The effectiveness of exercising on coping with stress.”

Your informative essay outline should look like this:

• Origin of the problem. This is the main idea of the essay, focusing on the ways exercising helps dealing with stress. Feel free to go into the history of the problem, and in this case, it is especially important to have a thorough introduction. This will let the reader know what is going on and help understand the information you will provide later in the body of the essay.
• Process. Write about the ways researchers detect what type of exercises help and why. Describe how exactly does it work.
• Benefits. Describe the advantages of regular exercise using examples from real life.

Informative Essay Introduction

In this part of the essay, take the time to introduce the problem you are going to discuss. The introduction should not be very long; however, in some cases, there are exceptions, especially if the problem you are discussing is complex and not well known to the general public. The main objective of this section is to provide a background of the topic, write your thesis, and let the essay smoothly transition into the next part, the body.

Informative Essay Body

Use the body part to inform the target audience about the peculiarities of the topic. You have got three paragraphs that you can use to share some interesting facts with your audience. Go into the little known details, or reflect on common knowledge in a new light to intrigue readers. The three integral elements of each body paragraph you must absolutely have are the claim, supporting evidence, and explanation. The principle here is simple, state something and explain why it is so by backing it up with evidence. Be as detailed in your explanation as you can and remember to stay on point.

Harvard Style, which is one of the most common referencing styles, just after APA and MLA, entails various aspects that must be taken into consideration for a piece of custom writing presented to be considered as organized in Harvard Style. The core areas under consideration as the outline, the in-text citation, and the reference page.

Harvard Style Outline

For a paper to be considered as organized in Harvard style, the following basic structure elements, according to the experts from our cheap paper writing service, must be in place:

Title Page

The title page should have the title of the paper (IN CAPITAL), positioned at about a third from the top of the page. Two lines beneath the title of the paper are the name of the author, after which several lines are skipped to about two-thirds from the top of the page, where the other details indicated are Course, Name of Professor, University, City (State), then Date.

Headers Formatting

The title of the paper should appear on all the pages at the header, next to the page number that is placed at the top right corner of the paper.

Heading and Seriation

The heading system in Harvard takes the form of various levels, just like in APA. Level-1 headers are centered, bold and title case; the level-2 headers are bold, flush left, and title case; level-3 headers are left aligned, indented half-inch from the margins, followed by a full-stop, and the sentences start immediately on the same line. Also, while the entire text in the paper is flush left apart from the headers, the paragraphs in level one and two have an indentation, half-inch from the margin.

Referencing

In-text Citation

Where any information that is not original appears, like any other formatting style, the writer should give credit to the source by putting an in-text citation. There are two ways to do in-text citation: by putting the details in the bracket of by having the details of the sentence, in either way, the details include the surname of the author(s), followed by the year of publication, and a page number, if need be. The examples are as shown:

Citation at the end of the sentence. Obesity in children is mainly caused by too much intake of junk food (Green 2016).

Citation within the sentence. As Green (2016) asserts, obesity in children is mainly caused by too much intake of junk food.

Reference Page (Bibliography)

The reference page in Harvard is formatted on the type of material used as the source. However, in general, the details in the respective references include the names of the author (Surname, and initials of other names), the year of publication (not in brackets like the case of APA), the title of the source, publisher, and the city of publication. The variations that may arise include the source, number of authors, no authors, among others.

Conclusion

Essentially, the key areas to take into consideration in Harvard referencing are the outline of the pages, the heading system, in-text citation, formatting of the references in the reference page, and the title page.

5 Lessons a writer should learn from cinematic arts

see and understand films as streamlined visual literature! They find a way to capture our attention and reveal the way an author feels and thinks about a particular subject. Thus, a writer should look to learn some tricks from the movie industry. Let’s grab a bowl of popcorn and watch some of them!

1. Create vivid images

All of the brilliant films you love have their most memorable moments. The greatest directors use vivid imagery and create a picture moving in time combined with the sound. You’ll never forget Kevin’s scream after applying after-shave in Home Alone or shower murdering scene in Psycho. In academic paper writing, you’ll benefit from creating vivid images either.

Experts from our custom essay writing service recommend using associations to create a sense of participation for your reader. This process will always boost one’s imagination and improve their ability to share this vision. It will also make your narrative essay, short story, or descriptive paper stand out to the audience.

2. Organize the narration

Each film has an introduction, the main body that leads to the moment of truth. Lastly, all this gets summarized by a conclusion highlighting the life lessons to be learned. Such a structure keeps the audience comfortably involved. The same concept applies when tackling creative paper writing.

Remember that too much exposition bores your reader. However, provide enough details to understand your key idea. This is the lesson to learn from films with dynamic narration rhythm and unexpected plot twists.

3. Make controversial statements

Another trick to catch your reader’s attention is to make disputable statements. The greatest directors are not afraid to be outrageous. A Clockwork Orange with highly-stylized violence brings out conflicting emotions. Still, it’s one of the most iconic films of all times.

The next time you write an argumentative paper or persuasive essay, or pay someone who write essays for money, don’t be afraid to make controversial statements! But remember that all of your arguments should be well-grounded.

4. Wit is always appropriate

Humour makes good films ingenious. Applying such an idea is not only limited to being used in sitcoms. Our write my essay service believes that humor is appropriate in any genre to help reach a broader audience.

However, be careful with jokes in academic paper writing. You walk the fine line! But the light vein of humor will make your narrative or descriptive essay brilliant.

5. Write what you love

In the first place, be obsessed with the topic or quit it. Here our topic generator will come to your aid. Some of the best films ever were not box-office bomb – Citizen Kane or Blade Runner. One must pursue their vision even if nobody praised them at first.

In essay writing, be accurate and open-minded experimentalist true to your fundamental idea. May it bring you joy!

Suffering from writer’s block? Avoid panicking or thinking you are not talented enough to create something unique in a timely manner since the EssayService is here to give you custom essay help. Believe it, or not a lot of us have engaged in creative essay writing in one way or another at some point in our lives. In this article, we will explore fun, interactive ways which one may use to surpass the difficulties of picking up good creative paper topics.

What is a Creative Essay?

Regarding trying to explain how to write a creative essay, it is best to start by defining it to help us break it down the concept. Mostly such assignments will require the student to create an intriguing fictional scenario, which may be based on real events, designed to fit a set of given criteria. Thus, simply put one may say the secret to finding good creative essay topics can be found by letting our imagination run wild. As strange as it may seem at first to engage in such activities since academic papers are usually quite objective and factual, seeking to communicate concrete ideas or solid arguments in a clear and concise manner. However, as different and unrelated the two may seem at first it is important to realize that what they both have in common is a unique set of writing techniques capable of making the task much easier. Both factual and creative essays are meant to be read by experts in the field and the general population. Thus it is crucial to maintain their interest in the piece.

One thing to admire about the art of creative writing is that it has survived the test of time as it has endured various schools of thought critiquing its existence. Thus, what experts from our writing paper service will be exploring in the article are the elements that have secured its survival and how you should apply them in college. Using these items accordingly will give you the best possible sources of inspiration. Now that we have a basic understanding of what this assignment requires from us, it is time to have a look at what kind of topics and themes produce the best results.

Popular Topics and Creative Paper Ideas

In case you have not been given any creative college essay prompts or have been looking for a starting point, here are some general ideas that could help guide you in the right direction.

• What if dinosaurs came back to life? What would we do as a response?
• Walk us through what it felt like to fall in love for the first time. A more romantic approach to any creative college essay assignment.
• Describe how you see the end of the world or explain why you think it is eternal?
• Explore religious themes like the existence of God or Heaven and Hell. What makes you know these things are a certainty?
• Create a scenario where a meteorite hit the earth, who knows what mysteries can be found near its remains.
• Do you like detective stories? Maybe you should give it a try in a creative essay!
• If World War 3 was to break out today whose side would you take and why? Is such a thing even reasonable after we have seen the result of two world wars already?
• Let us say you just got back home, but everything has changed on the inside from the furniture to the bathroom. Looking through the house, you realize nobody is home. Nonetheless, your keys opened the door. What will happen next in our creative college essay?
• What defines good and evil for us? More so who decides such a fact? Why is there such a controversy behind it?
• Your body has been frozen for 100 years, but now the slumber has ended. What does the future look like 100 years from now? Would you try to find your family or explore the future thinking they are all gone?
• If prose is not working out, why not try put your thought into rhymes? Poetry is a prevalent form of creative essay writing.

We hope these general ideas help shed some light on how one should begin exploring their creative essay writing ideas and turn them into fascinating topics for us all to enjoy reading. In the following sections, we will cover some effective tactics to use when tackling the assignment.

How To Combine the Art of Essay Writing and Storytelling

We all have our unique gifts, however, if we find ourselves having writer’s block or not knowing how to combine academic paper writing with the art of storytelling effectively then here’s how it’s done.

• Explain to yourself the main idea of the creative college essay as well as the main character, whether it be the antagonist or protagonist. Does it all make sense and flow smoothly?
• All academic assignments and creative essay topics must have an introduction and conclusion, they might be named or expressed differently, but the core idea does not change.
• Character development and the conflicts occurring between them serve as the main body of the piece and thus should have the same impactful effect on the audience.
• The creative essay topics make use of supporting characters the same way we use supporting arguments to help highlight a particular concept.
• Make sure to connect all the creative paper ideas and components as you would the statistics in a business plan, to show any existing correlations between the data in the discussion.
• Another way to think about is like a cause and effect essay which gets a little bit more imaginative than usual, filled with mythical characters and magical adventures.

Finding any means to make the assignment more relatable to one’s self is the key to breaking it down into reachable goals. Nonetheless, keep in mind at all times that it is vital to maintaining the reader’s interest at all times throughout the paper. We hope some of these suggestions come in handy when tackling your creative college essay.

How To Tackle the Creative College Essay

• Identify your audience from the start

Before one begins to set the tone in their creative college essay, it is vital to identify our audience as this help narrow down the style which the piece should follow. Let us pause briefly and give it some consideration. If we are to perform beyond expectation, we must find the means to keep the readers hooked and left them wanting more. Thus, let us have a look at who our audience might be while putting our wits to the test with some creative paper ideas.

In most cases, the audience will be our college/university lecturers or our high school teachers, so there is not so much to worry about there. It is not an unknown fact that these professors quite often have to grade a large number of creative essays, meaning they have a pretty good idea of what the result should look like. If they have set the prompts themselves then even more so they are anticipating a particular type of response. However, this is a chance to make your creative essay stand out from the rest. Keep in mind there is a very high possibility they might be slightly bored by the time they read your piece. Hence it is vital to capitalize on the opportunity. You know what they say, beat the iron while it’s hot!

Lastly, a rather forgotten fact is the lecturers grading all these creative college essays are on a tight schedule as grades need to be submitted by a particular date. With that in mind, professionals from different writing services recommend revisiting your piece as many times as possible before submitting it since examiners will most likely not have the time or energy to go over poorly written passages and try to make sense of it all. One of the best ways to avoid this during the editing stage is by structuring the creative college essay sentences in a succinct fashion that is easy to read and gets to the point without any hesitation.

• Brainstorm potential creative essay topics or use the given prompts

Having a readily given prompt can be a great help in such a situation as one may develop their creative essay plot around it. Nonetheless, if you have to start from scratch think of something that will most likely not be overused by everyone. It is often considered a good idea to bounce ideas off your classmates as it will help create something unique. If that does not give the desired result try going into a quiet room and jot down every single creative idea you have. It might not sound like much, but it will generate a starting point which can later be defined and edited. Remember, these are just drafts.

Short Creative College Essay Example:

Dinosaurs come back to life in New York from the ancient history museum. By eating people, they regain their flesh and evolve from just simple bone.

When I first met him, I thought he would never even say a word to anyone. It took him about a week before he even said hi, but by this point, I figured he was a complete jerk.

She was walking down the road near Westminster Abbey as the electricity went off in the entire district. To her surprise there seemed to be nobody around to ask what’s happened. As her journey home continued, she was not prepared for what awaited her around the corner.

• Always record your thoughts

As previously mentioned having a lot of variety is good in creative essay writing since it allows you to explore various possibilities for the story and its plot. Thus, even when having what seems to be an uninspired thought write it down, it could come in handy later. Some of the greatest ideas we have often come at random moments so be prepared when tackling such an assignment.

• Grab the reader’s attention using witty metaphors as well as interesting settings or locations

This is where things get a little bit tricky in our creative college essay assignment. It is not a mystery that we all like different things, it’s why there are so many flavors of Ben n Jerry’s ice cream which we can enjoy. The same spectrum of variety is what should be included in our use of metaphors, allegories, and other literary elements to spice up our creative college essay. Some of the best places to take advantage of these are considered to be for example when trying to explain a rather complex meaning, or comparison one may choose to make use of an analogy to convey the meaning better. Doing so helps the reader visualize the concept being explained leading to the experience becoming more relatable to the reader as well as a tendency to become personally involved in the piece. What some writers do in their creative college essay is describe one of their characters will as being similar to a flowing river. When doing, we can illustrate how obstacles throughout their journey might impede them, but just like the river, they will find a way to course right through it in time.

Effectively making use of these elements is just a part of hooking the reader. The next step is bringing the creative essay to life using fascinating settings and exotic locations that are bound to keep the audience interested. It is quite similar to seasoning a meal; it just doesn’t taste the same without the perfect amount of added ingredients.

How To Structure A Creative Essay

In today’s academic environment college papers can have a multitude of structures, formats and referencing styles. However, if you have not been given a particular form to run with by the lecturer, then it is strongly advised to get acquainted with the three-act structure. What it does for our creative college essay is give it a basic skeleton to build our ideas upon. So without any further introduction let’s get into what this type of creative essay structure means.

For those of you who are not familiar with what the three-act structure and what it entails regarding a creative college essay, then do not worry since it is not extremely complicated if explained adequately. In essence, the role of such a format is to establish a plotline which will have all the necessary elements to produce the desired result from the audience. One can say they are similar to the acts of a play. However, the transition between scenes, in this case, can be done differently according to the writer’s vision.

The first stage of tackling any creative essay ideas starts by creating a set-up. Here one should look to create a scene for the reader in which the main concept of the piece can be introduced without losing their interest. The best way to hook the audience is by having a compelling plotline and intriguing characters. Thus, the implications here for us when trying to develop the idea of our creative college essay are:

1. Establish their background details
2. Who are they?
3. Why are they relevant to us?
4. Are they related to each other? If so, then how?
5. Where do they live?
6. What is the determining factor in how we judge each character?

In essence, our goal here now is to use the opportunity to introduce climax into the creative college essay story. Thus leading to a potential turning point which is always bound to occur in the plotline. Overall this section should have set the tone and the scene of the confrontation that will occur between the chosen characters.

The second stage of our creative essay’s structure involves developing the previously mentioned battle into the center point of the piece. The main reason in doing so is that it creates a puzzle the main character or the protagonist must solve to achieve their goals. This usually occurs with numerous obstacles along the way trying to impede our hero’s path due to the utter importance of the task at hand. A good creative essay example is always detective stories since they are filled with many trials and tribulations. For example, our private eye Desmond discovers something is wrong with a crime scene photo his partner has been describing as lacking in color. Who could have known that a shade of grey can hide so many things? Thus, by describing the situation in our creative college essay as such not only have we involved the supporting characters into the main action but also shows Desmond, the protagonist, getting closer to figuring out the murder case.

And last but not least, being a favorite of many is the resolution of our story where the action should reach its climax in a highly dramatic scene. In this section look to summarize and conclude the confrontation between the two rival characters in the creative college essay while also subtly expressing your view on how it all transpired into the current events. Such an element is an opportunity to tie up any loose ends that might have been left unresolved throughout the story as they served the purpose of building up the climax. One may also choose to leave the conclusion open-ended as most due in the cases of sequel novels, films, books, articles and even creative college essay topics.

What Other Types of Papers Involve Creative Writing?

It is not a mystery that many assignments throughout academia are often interlinked and can turn out to be quite similar. In the case of the creative essay, there are numerous types of papers which borrow or share some of their elements to it as was previously mentioned while we were exploring how to combine the art of storytelling with academic writing. So without any further adieu, here are some of the creative essay’s family members:

The Narrative Essay

Such assignments are similar in the sense since they seek to tell a story that carries forth some form of a life lesson which can be expressed in the shape of an anecdotal tale. It is one of the closest cousins to the creative college essay as they both paint pictures with words at the highest level. The primary goal is to describe the plot and its progression while also enlightening the audience in one way or another.