Every story is about something. That might sound obvious, but you’d be surprised how often I come across stories that feel like they’re not. Especially in writing contests, where I have at times helped judge entries, I still encounter that rare breed of story that… just sort of exists. Things happen. People go places. But there’s no center. No shape. No real why. It’s like a hiker without a destination. It’s not even that they took a wrong turn… they just slowly drifted into a field somewhere. They miss that red thread that keeps the story from unraveling.
The “red thread” is a term borrowed from my native Dutch.
It means the central line or throughline of a story. In English, we would call it the plot, or the spine of the story. It’s the thing everything else hangs on. You can usually summarize it in one or two sentences. Like:
On his day off, Chad heads to the beach and gets caught up in a bank robbery carried out by a psychopathic clown. He ends up stopping the crime and buys a fishing rod with the reward money.
That’s a story. I’d read that.
You should be able to do the same with any story you love. Whether it’s a journey around the world (Around the World in 80 Days), a haunting family legacy (The Inheritance Games), or a war between gods (The Poppy War), there’s a clear thread that carries the story forward. And even surreal, dreamlike stories usually have some kind of thread—sometimes more like dental floss than rope, but it’s still there.
A story without a clear thread usually feels like a list of things that happen.
Chad goes to the beach. Then a clown shows up. Then he goes fishing. Then it ends.
That kind of “and then and then and then” rhythm might work for a child’s bedtime story, but in fiction that’s trying to carry emotional or narrative weight, it starts to fall apart.
More often, the red thread almost exists. The story begins with a clear direction—but halfway through, it veers off. Suddenly, it forgets what it was about.
Chad goes to the beach. A clown robs a bank. Chad chases him. Halfway through, Chad decides to abandon the chase and go fishing.
Wait—what?
That’s what a broken thread feels like. It’s not that readers need everything tied up neatly, but they do need to feel like the story has a shape. That it’s about something, not just wandering from one scene to the next.
How do you spot the thread?
If you’re not sure whether a story has a strong thread, ask this: Can you sum it up in a sentence or two? If you can’t, that’s a red flag. You might still enjoy the writing style or the characters, but the story probably lacks momentum. And when a story doesn’t know what it’s about, you can feel it. It drifts. It fizzles. Or it ends in the wrong place, like the final scene is from an entirely different book.
When the thread works, you feel it.
Probably without realising it. That moment when a story just clicks. Where every chapter pulls you further in, because it all feels connected. It’s not always about fast pacing or high drama. Sometimes it’s subtle. A relationship that changes, a secret that comes to light, a small moment of transformation. But it builds. And you can feel it pulling you toward something.
Writers don’t always get it right on the first try.
That’s what revisions are for. A first draft might have side quests, extra characters, or entire chapters that don’t serve the central idea. Most of those end up cut. (In my most recent book, I cut one of the main character’s brothers from my story. I still miss him. He was great. But he didn’t belong.)
The point is: even stories that feel seamless often didn’t start that way. Writers have to find the red thread, and then tighten it, so it runs clean through from beginning to end.
As a reader, you don’t need to see the work behind it—but when the thread isn’t there, you’ll notice.
A good story knows what it’s about.
It may twist, it may detour, but it always comes back to that central thread. When it doesn’t, it starts to unravel.
So next time a story leaves you cold, ask yourself:
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What was it really about?
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Did it stick with that, or lose the plot halfway through?
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Did it end in the right place? Or somewhere in a field, looking for a fishing rod?
That thread, when it’s there, might be invisible. But it’s doing a lot of heavy lifting.
What’s the last book you read that had a really strong story arc?
And have you ever read one where it just… fizzled out halfway through? Tell me what held you, and what lost you, in the comments.