Newspaper Style Guide,
or
"The Souvenir Tells the Story"
Originally published 8/26/2023 - 8/27/2023
Additional mention of discourse examples added 9/16/2023
Appendix examples subject to change
Table of Contents
Introduction and Notes
Hello! This guide was written with fiction writers in mind, especially those of us who write epistolary fiction.
If you're making a video game, alternate reality game, interactive website, or other written work that relies on the reader gathering a collection of individual documents for plot purposes, this guide is for you.
If your written work involves documents that a narrator “gathers” or “collects” in the same way (like a novel, story anthology or a web series), this guide is also for you.
I wrote this to explain the reasons why you might want to make a fake document for your story and provide some guidance about how to make a specific document.
I'll use a fictional newspaper article about a building fire as an extended example to illustrate the process. I am using this example because it is both commonly used in stories for exposition and is useful for efficiently getting that exposition into the audience’s heads. The same process is helpful for other types of documents you might want to make. But I will go into extensive detail using this example.
Appendix 1 focuses on some real-life newspaper articles you might find helpful for reference, and they are relatively recent at time of writing. You will probably find the most useful examples from recent and local (for you) newspapers relative to the context of your document. A story that takes place in South America will probably not find the most useful examples in a US newspaper. A story that takes place in the 1920s will probably not find the most useful examples in a 2020s newspaper.
There are plenty of tools and templates you can find to make your fake document approximate its real-life counterpart. Appendix 2 includes a few of them. Appendices 3, 4 and 0.5 also include examples for other types of documents you might want to make, for reference purposes. This guide’s main focus is writing: making your words sound like a real document your audience might recognize.
Again, this is a guide for fiction writers to create fictional material for storytelling. This is not an encouragement to spread misinformation or disinformation. It is also not an encouragement to do actual journalism without any training. I am not claiming to teach actual journalism here, only the elements of journalism which are useful for this specific type of fiction writing. I am also not claiming to teach technical writing, only the elements of technical writing which are useful for this type of fiction.
I do have to include some specific caveats about how this guide is written.
Note 1
I'm using the word "Paper" in this article to refer to the type of company that hires journalists and creates a product called a newspaper.
In the real world, people may use the same word "newspaper" to describe both the company and the product.
I'm deliberately distinguishing between those two ideas — because you are making the product without being the company.
Not only do you likely not have the resources and infrastructure to make a real, circulated newspaper, you almost certainly don’t need to. Your primary concern as a writer is to tell a good story. Even a single artifact is often enough to accomplish this. Papers also have entire editorial teams to review and fact-check their articles. You likely don’t. And you don’t have to.
For the purposes of illustrating the process as holistically as possible, I’m assuming your document will be a newspaper on physical, printed paper (or a deliberate imitation of that format).
You certainly have other options for an article’s medium, like radio, television or online. I’m not writing your story for you. I assume you know which of these mediums will best suit your work. The general storytelling principles are the same.
Note 2
Many real-world newspapers do investigative journalism, in which a journalist spends extended periods of time personally researching and experiencing parts of an event and including those details in their article. These types of articles usually get a lot more leeway about style and tone, more reminiscent of a narrative. This may be a completely appropriate format to use for your fiction story.
I'm ignoring that fact for the purposes of this guide. I’m assuming that you’re making a fake newspaper article because you want to achieve something that can’t be done in a straight narrative story. Many of the visual design concerns may still apply to this type of document, as well.
Note 3
Many real-world newspapers have editorial sections or other sections not strictly for the purposes of "reporting the news". Again, I'm ignoring that fact for the purposes of this guide. I'm assuming your article would be appropriate on the front page of a newspaper, again to take as much advantage of the medium as possible.
Also: to illustrate that the process is the same no matter what specific attributes the story has, the example character Tag uses gender-neutral pronouns.
Part 1: The Paper
The souvenir shows the story
You, in your writing career, may have heard of the piece of advice “Show, don’t tell”. This is meant to discourage writers from narrating character emotions instead of letting the audience experience character actions by themselves and drawing their own conclusions. So instead of saying, “Tag was really angry,” you might write, “Tag crumpled up the piece of paper into his fist and pitched it across the room with a grunt”. The action gives the audience a clearer sense of the emotions Tag feels without Tag (or the narrator) telling the audience exactly how they feel.
Regardless of your personal opinion on applications of “show, don’t tell”, it is useful as a point of reference. Writers use techniques like fake newspaper articles to achieve the same effect as something like “show, don’t tell”. That seems like a paradox, using an expository telling technique to show the audience a building fire happened. It’s not. Because Tag has a newspaper article in their possession about a building fire, the audience can tell that Tag is thinking about that building fire. I am not writing the story for you. I don’t actually care why Tag is thinking about the events of this newspaper article. But there is a reason. These types of documents are meant to connect “Tag is thinking about something” and “the audience knows what Tag is thinking about” without you telling the audience “Tag is thinking about this event”.
Your audience is sentimental. They understand “Tag is keeping this newspaper article because they care about this building fire” as an intrinsic motivation and typically don’t need this spelled out. Same with “Tag is keeping this receipt because they care about this item they bought”. Same with “Tag is keeping this commemorative souvenir because they care about what happened at that event”. Same even with extrinsic motivations, like “Tag is writing down information about this monster they fought because it’s a video game and the player will fight more of those monsters later on”.
Epistolary fiction is so effective and long-lasting as a style because it has this effect on the audience. They understand why Tag is keeping the cut-out article because they keep cut-out articles, too. Real-world communication scholars call this “narrative fidelity” because the story you’re telling is faithful to experiences your audience has. It helps keep the audience engaged and immersed in your story.
So, I’m writing about a building fire. The building fire is an event in the plot of the story. My main character, Tag, has some sort of emotional connection to this building fire. The article itself is a souvenir designed to show that connection. These are helpful to remember as core assumptions when you are actually making the article.
Get out of my head
Considering that we’re writing about a building fire, we have choices about what kind of document we want to use. There are reasons why a newspaper article might be a good choice to tell this part of the story.
The next section goes into a bit of detail about the philosophical purposes of Newspapers. The quick version is: newspaper articles give the audience information about an interaction between lots of characters, or between characters and their setting. They help us understand the world outside of a specific character’s head. They can also show larger-scale consequences of a character’s actions.
Building fires, like most disasters, are public events. When a fire starts, everyone within the building is in danger. People nearby the fire are possibly in danger. Other people further away may see the fire or smoke. Firefighters on the way to the fire may interrupt traffic. Other emergency services, like police and ambulances, may assist with making sure the people in the building are safe. And then the local news reports on it, so even people who are not anywhere nearby know about the fire.
The entire community begins a disaster response process. From a sociology perspective, the fire actually helps identify who the community is. Everyone involved gathers in the same place for a common purpose. A community gathers itself, explores ideas, shares ideas, chooses ideas that reflect what the community thinks and cares about. Some experiences from this event are remembered, and some are dismissed or forgotten. This is a process called *discourse*. Real-world communication and journalism scholars have more to say about this, but that’s the first major reason why newspapers are a good storytelling choice.
The reason a building fire is mentioned in a newspaper is because several people nearby care that a building fire happened.
Another reason Papers are important is what exactly a Paper does to an event.
Papers can both
recordkeep
&
spotlight
I mean that Papers are recordkeepers of information: they describe what happens in the event. But, on some level, Papers also spotlight information by making decisions about what information is important enough to report. Why do they include some details of the fire and not others? Why do they interview some people and not others? When they talk about the reputation of the building, is that reputation good or bad? By spending time and column inches talking about a building fire, what is the Paper not spending time or column inches on?
All of these decisions (intentionally made or not) impact the discourse of the event. The Paper can (does) influence how the community thinks about the fire. The process of discourse is the reason why your parents see social media posts on their cable news shows. It’s the reason algorithms recommend content to you.
On one hand, if you wonder why there are so many talk shows and podcasts and review channels - or complaints about these in the form of "talking heads" or "media nonsense" - this is why that happens.
On the other hand, that's the reason why history exists. Not just events happening, but a record. Because someone decided an idea was worth knowing. Anytime a media personality says an idea is “going viral”, they’re referring to discourse. Anytime a media personality says “Everybody’s talking about this topic”, they’re referring to discourse. Both "everybody" and the person saying so are part of the process. This is the power of Papers. They are recording information (I think of this as “recordkeeping”) and choosing a record of information (I think of this as “spotlighting”).
These two conflicting purposes make journalism messy.
Besides all of the nasty ethical issues that arise, this conflict also brings up some questions about what the main purpose of a Paper is. Does the Paper print an article about the building fire because people care about this event? Or do people only care about the building fire because they read an article about it in the newspaper? Knowing that they can do both, should a Paper share public knowledge? Or create public knowledge?
This is a really interesting ethical debate that I’m not interested in settling. These are the philosophical underpinnings of a practical narrative recommendation.
For your storytelling purposes, unless you're making some meta-critique specifically about Papers and their impacts on social behavior (for example, including themes of media censorship, bias or complacency), it is easier to assume that your newspaper is only recordkeeping and is not spotlighting. You want to get information into the audience’s heads, not make them think too hard about how exactly it got there.
But it is important to recognize that a Paper is making lots of these decisions about information all the time,
because, as a character, Tag is making similar choices about what information they keep and what information they don’t
and as a writer, so are you.
Public Events
Papers write about public events in real life, including building fires and other events like
-
crimes,
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missing persons,
-
public health concerns,
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scientific discoveries,
-
upcoming entertainment productions
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celebrity gossip,
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local community events
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and other topics.
In short, newspaper articles can be about anything that is relevant or interesting to a given public community of people.
There are a lot of topics Papers don't write about.
A zine might be dedicated to a niche topic. A Paper is not.
A top-secret espionage document might discuss confidential information. A Paper does not.
A vlog might be personable and friendly with their audience. A Paper is not.
A team of scientists might do original research and publish data they discovered themselves. A Paper does not.
Papers might write about historical preservation efforts, declassified formerly confidential information or scientific research. They might respond to specific readers in editorials. But they are not making that content in the first place. They are not created with the purpose of only writing about specific topics. Magazines or other documents might have more leeway in any or all of these areas, but in general, newspapers don’t.
Newspapers are how most people learn about the world they live in. They typically can’t afford to write about only one topic at a time. But each individual article is usually only about one topic at a time, maybe giving additional historical context if that is needed.
Your main character, Tag, is going to read this newspaper article about the building fire. Tag will present it as part of their collection of items that will together make the plot — the epistolary story.
Tag is interested in this building fire. I'm sure they have a lot of compelling personal motivations why. Again, it's not my character. But Tag is interested. Tag reads this article and decides it is important enough to keep instead of getting rid of it like so much other daily ephemera. Tag is also not the reporter who wrote the article. Something about the fire itself or the reporter's perspective about the fire interests Tag, especially if Tag also saw the building fire happen. The mystery happens in the difference between the “official”, and “objective” point of view the Paper has and the “personal”, and “subjective” experience of a specific character like Tag.
Public events like building fires have semiotic significance: different characters understand different things about a single event. An event can have a lot of meanings all at once. The meanings change based on how the fire starts, what building is burning, who sees the fire, and other factors.
A teenager might find the daydream of burning down a building, like their stifling school or boring suburban home, appealing. The fire is compelling as an authority-defying symbol.
A middle-aged adult might worry about insurance or finding somewhere else to live. They might worry about the safety of their family living in the house. They might mourn an irreplaceable public space, like their favorite restaurant burning down.
An elderly adult may find the nightmare of their burning house terrifying, removing their last symbol of freedom and large-scale community.
Tag doesn’t just care about the discursive significance of the fire as part of a community created by the fire. Tag also cares about the semiotic significance, the change to the way they understand themselves. If Tag was directly involved, the newspaper article shows that other characters notice. If Tag wasn’t directly involved, something/someone that they care about was involved. Documents like this show what Tag is doing and what they are thinking about.
By reading the article, Tag has learned something about the world they live in. Which means the audience does, too.
Other types of documents can give the audience different types of information. A receipt can show both what products Tag is interested in buying and Tag’s location at a specific time. A flyer for an event can show Tag’s social affiliations. A missing pet (or even missing person) poster can show that Tag’s personal motivations have changed, or their relationship to a character has changed. A return receipt for a product shows that Tag doesn’t like an item. A prescription shows that Tag has an illness, or at least that other characters think Tag has an illness. A work badge shows information about Tag’s job, and what they spend a lot of time doing and thinking about.
The same process is true for activities Tag doesn’t do. If Tag doesn’t call the police or other emergency services with suspicious potential criminal activity, there won’t be a police report. If Tag does call the police and there is no police report, something has gone wrong. If Tag doesn't go to a doctor, there won't be a prescription. If nobody tells a reporter that a newsworthy event is happening, the event won't end up in a newspaper article.
The appeal of this epistolary format is Tag does not have to sit down and narrate to the audience about their interests or backstory. Because Tag keeps a newspaper article about a building fire and makes an effort to show it to the audience, the audience can assume this building fire is not just a random set dressing. This newspaper article - and the events behind it - are probably important to the plot.
And because it’s specifically a newspaper article, the plot now impacts a lot more people besides Tag. A single document has revealed information about a character, a setting, and the plot all at once.
The souvenir shows the story!
Part 2: The Reporter
Talking about tone
Let's say, for some reason, you can only either make the newspaper article look aesthetically like a newspaper article or match news reporting tone in your writing. What should you do?
Match tone. No exceptions.
You should assume that your audience has some experience in living. As part of their education or life, they have almost certainly read some form of newspaper article before. They understand what a newspaper article looks like, with features like columns and newsprint paper. They understand a newspaper article's written tone, formal but not ceremonial or instructional. They talk about events based on observable facts. They do not spend time advertising a product. They do not spend time teaching or describing an in-depth procedure for a task, like a recipe.
Again, one of the appeals of making a fake newspaper article is that your audience immediately recognizes that they are getting information about the world of your story. It will be timely and relevant to the plot, because real-life news is timely and relevant to its given community. If it’s breaking or developing news, it will be quick and trying to confirm details as it goes. If it’s a more in-depth piece, like the equivalent of CBS’s “60 Minutes” investigative journalism show (in the United States), it will be slow and methodical.
Readers are, in general, much more willing to forgive a newspaper article that doesn't look exactly like columns on newsprint, if the article does match the written tone. Online newspaper articles, for example, don't necessarily follow that format. But if your writing doesn't sound like a newspaper article, or includes information that is not appropriate for a newspaper article, your reader can tell quickly.
This is one of the most common complaints from readers about fake documents.
If you are making a document that emulates a doctor’s observation notes about a patient, for example, a neutral diagnostic tone with events listed as non-judgementally as possible is the most “matching” to the real-life counterpart. A real-life doctor would probably not make digressions into their own medical history during observation notes. A bored store clerk might write “souls of the innocent lol” in the margins of an inventory list, but this is
-
an annotation onto an existing document, and
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a rare break from formatting to show a character’s personality.
It would not be convincing to include this in place of a real document’s tone. Certain corporate branding, like local advertisements or internal training resources, may have some leeway in overall kitchiness. This can certainly have its own appeal and use in a story. You’re using a newspaper article because it is not kitchy or personal. It is a reference point towards reality, as far as the internal consistent framework of your story. I spent all of Part 1 going over the motivations for this in-depth. Play to the strengths of the document you choose.
Piecing the story together
For style purposes specific to a newspaper, the reporter did not see the building fire happen. In real life, most newsworthy events happen so quickly that by the time the reporter has arrived at the fire, the building has already burned down and the fire is already put out (or firefighters are containing the fire in real-time).
The reporter has to figure out what happened without the guarantee of seeing the fire, without seeing the event they are supposed to report on.
This is actually helpful for a reporter. Most news stories are told from the perspective of the newspaper, not from the individual reporter, for this exact reason. Individual people might be distracted, misremember details, or have a wide variety of other cognitive biases that impact how much relevant information they might provide to a reporter (and the community, by extension). Reporters don't rely on the perspective of one individual person because they don't have to. They can learn more about the fire by gathering information and interviewing multiple people.
These people are mostly witnesses who saw the fire. But, again, these types of events create a community of affected people. The reporter might also interview an occupant of the building who saw the fire. Or the firefighters who helped put out the fire.
The reporter will also look for official statements from the people or groups who are affected by the fire. When I mentioned that Newspapers make communities, this is that process. Those people might be from the fire department. Or from the owner of the building. Or a neighborhood homeowner’s association. Or from a safety inspector who inspected the building before it burned down. Or maybe from an insurance company that is estimating the cost of the damages. A good reporter might interview all of these people to understand their perspectives, specifically to avoid a need to rely on their own personal experience. It is typically useful to gather more interviews than the reporter will eventually need, so they can make editorial decisions about which comments are insightful or otherwise relevant to the fire.
When the reporter writes their report, the only information they can use is from their cameras, from their witness testimonies, from the official statements, or from public documents. They can say what facts they were able to verify. They can also mention what specific facts they weren't able to verify while specifying that those facts are currently not verifiable. That's why it's important for the reporter to gather a variety of witness perspectives and records.
In the context of your story’s fictional universe, the reporter does not get to make things up. The story is fiction. But the reporter doesn’t know that.
The reporter can't just know things or rely on their personal experiences. As I’ve mentioned at length above, this defeats the purpose of a Newspaper. The reporter has to disclose where they get their information (to the extent that their sources are not harmed). Everything should be backed up as "Witness Character described the scene as 'blah blah blah'", or "According to the study, published in Scientific journal in 2023, the ash sample was identified as 'blah blah blah'". The reporter is finding information in places. They are relying on primary sources who experienced the fire because the reporter didn’t.
It's important to understand all of these steps as a conceptual process for a reporter character. If your story focuses on this reporter character and their process for plot reasons, these are all points you should take into consideration. Even if your story doesn't do that, the process is still the same. You just don't have to focus on laying it out.
There are lots of things that a good, reputable reporter doesn't do.
Reporters don't include personal tangents. The reporter's thoughts and feelings about the building fire don't matter. And worse, they're not verifiable. The reporter can record on camera what a witness says happened. They can also record what a witness says they felt. The reporter can describe themes or overall impressions based on multiple witness testimonies. The reporter would never say "I was really scared" in their article. The reporter would never say "This reminds me of the sandwich I had for lunch this afternoon" in their article. Again, it might be helpful to think of the article as written from the Paper’s point of view instead of the individual reporter.
Reporters don't include speculative comments. The reporter would never say "I think the fire was caused by the chemical plant next door. The people who work there are stupid." The reporter does not know that and can’t write something like that without a publicly verifiable source. That's called defamation because you're publicly damaging a person's/company's reputation instead of reporting facts. That’s a real thing that real-life Papers take seriously.
The reporter would never say "Occupants think the fire was caused by the chemical plant next door" if none of the occupants had suggested that idea. Even if a witness does say this, the reporter would likely describe the comment as a speculation. If it's something that isn't a fact the reporter can verify or it doesn't come directly from a witness, a reporter would leave it out.
Reporters don't include flowery language. The reporter has to stick to the facts. The reporter would never say "The smoke rose out of the building like a billowing fountain of rage." The reporter would never say "Who could forget that fateful morning when the chemicals were delivered by workers with evil smirks and foul laughter?" News writing is descriptive but not evocative or figurative. Again, the only exception is when a witness uses that type of language. You are mimicking the style of a reporter, not a poet.
Reporters don’t swear. Swearing is inappropriate for a Paper. A reporter marks out expletives and may write out “[expletive]” instead of using the word.
They also quote the exact spelling and grammar of the witness(es). They use the indicator "[sic]" to note that the spelling or grammar in a direct quote is not their Paper’s style standard but they are quoting a witness. For example: "Witnesses of the building fire describe the scene as "a [expletive]ton of gas that came pouring out of the ground" and "weren't nothing [sic] I could do about it but run". A reporter would not use this type of vernacular in the body of their article.
As a whole, the same is true for other types of formal documents. Medical diagnostic reports or prescriptions don’t include personal opinions. They include observations, diagnoses, and treatment recommendations. Police reports are for warrants, arrests, and convictions. The body of a receipt lists items and prices. They are not diaries for a character’s personal opinions. They are not opportunities for daydreaming.
Long story short, you can’t treat a document (especially not a newspaper article) like the common prose of your story. Use this type of storytelling to your advantage to give the audience information in a way that common prose can’t.
The Paper doesn’t know about or care about the plot.
Remember also that your document should have a sense of continuity. Unless it’s important that this article is the first the Paper has ever published, it is more convincing to suggest that this is not their first article. Remember that people learn about the world around them by reading the newspaper. So does your reader. If the first thing we learn about your setting is immediately relevant to the characters and the plot, then that is all we know.
The building had been around for a period of time before the fire. The community knows and cares about it. This is designed to avoid the same type of problem as “the reporter happened to show up at the building fire just as the fire started”.
The plot forces your characters and setting to change. If we don’t know what the setting is like outside of Tag’s thoughts, it is much more difficult to tell that they have changed. Remember that this was one of your goals in the first place. By referring to the past, we understand that there are ninety-nine articles that are boring every day. And we understand that we have something that matters. Tag is choosing to keep something they think is important.
Remember, too, that the reporter is another character who lives in the world of the story, not just a source of exposition. The reporter is not a newbie. He has done this type of story before. The firefighters are not especially nervous. They’re doing their jobs. The building fire might not be the most important thing they deal with that week or even that day. They, like most other characters, don’t know or care about The Plot. They don’t care that drama is happening. They are not writing as if they know Tag is going to care. They probably don’t even know who Tag is.
This is why so many stories with news reporters use the trope of interrupting breaking news, or cut-out articles from a physical paper. It is completely appropriate that not all of the content in a newspaper is relevant to The Plot. But the audience knows about the article because Tag cares, and Tag’s goals and efforts towards those goals are The Plot.
It is sometimes more illuminating for plot purposes that a newspaper article does not include certain information. Not all of the reporter’s efforts will work. Their potential witnesses might not have useful information. The witnesses might not provide any information at all. They might try to access records that aren’t available. These are all sources of additional intrigue. What really happened in this building fire that no one wants to talk about?
In real life, professionals in certain industries cannot (are not allowed to) comment on their activity to a reporter. These people often have access to confidential or privileged information that is not public knowledge. Legislators can’t comment on pending legislation when they’re going to vote on it soon. Police officers generally can’t comment in detail on investigations that are still active. Lawyers have attorney-client privilege to keep certain interactions with their clients private. Doctors have privacy rules like HIPAA to not disclose patient information except under specific circumstances. Accountants and finance professionals can’t discuss certain business practices with people who don’t have accounts with them.
On top of this, many businesses have spokespeople (by a whole variety of titles) just for interacting with journalists: media coordinators, public relations representatives, crisis communicators, etc.
It is not at all unusual for a reporter to ask the fire department or police department about a building fire, only to be told that the investigation is still active and that the department cannot comment further about the fire. Often in these types of situations, reporters will include eyewitness testimony with a disclaimer that the testimony cannot be independently verified. Reporters will instead focus on other available sources: independent data reports, verifiable testimony from other witnesses, or previous news coverage, for example. This is especially true for developing stories or discussions of single events in the context of larger events, like a specific suspected war crime in the context of a war.
Newspaper articles also will mention events that are referred to as a “crime” in common parlance, such as robberies. Journalists are not lawyers or juries, and journalists do not decide whether crimes have been committed or not. Journalists refer to a person accused of setting a building on fire, for example, as a “suspect” instead of an “arsonist” for this reason. (This is another situation where the personal opinions of the reporter are under particular scrutiny for not appearing. A journalist would never say “I hope they arrest Witness Character because he’s kind of shady.”)
A newspaper article gives the audience information that Tag doesn’t have. If Tag had all the information that a newspaper provides, they would have included it in the narrative. Tag would not have needed to collect a document.
Newspaper articles give a writer space to tell a story from an “outside” perspective, an opportunity to not be personally invested but still focused and specific. Other characters get to fill in the rest of the story with their history, their emotions, and their opinions. A newspaper article creates the space for that to happen.
Part 3: The Article
What does a newspaper article look like?
This section borrows from both actual printing processes and prop-making. Again, Appendix 2 includes some helpful reference resources.
First and foremost, if you’re making an article that resembles a real, physical article, there are some design elements to consider.
Most paper you deal with (even the default imitation in word processors like Microsoft Word or Google Docs) is copy paper. This is the typical 8.5” x 11” stuff you put in your home printer most of the time. Newspaper articles are usually printed on newsprint — which is significantly larger, thinner, and a different color than copy paper. If a character is supposed to be holding a newspaper prop and they’re holding copy paper, the illusion is broken.
You can likely find newsprint at your local art or craft store. (These are great resources for propmaking and art projects in general, and the staff might be able to help you with printing resources as well, if you ask nicely!)
Newspapers usually have multiple loose-leaf pages inserted into a larger cover. This means there is no physical connection between the pages of the newspaper, but the front page and back page are actually a single large sheet. A character might clip out a specific article or section of a sheet, but the sheet is always part of a larger implied unit.
If the prop is not a physical newspaper, an artificial “scan” of newsprint or a screenshot of an online newspaper archive can be suitable substitutes.
Remember that there are also specific visual components within the article. This brief example below lists all of the parts. There will be a more specific example listed at the end of the guide.
Article headline briefly describes event
By Author Firstlastname, Tagline Correspondent
LOCATION — This is the content of the article. It goes on to explain what happened and why.
Witnesses are interviewed. Statements are gathered. Facts are checked.
An in-game article can have all of the content of a real newspaper article and still not look like a newspaper article. It doesn't look like it's on newsprint (or paper at all). It doesn't look passably like a scan of newsprint or a screenshot of an online newspaper archive. The words on the screen don't look like headlines, bylines, leads, other parts of a newspaper article.
Different types of documents are made on different types of paper. Posters are usually printed on heavier material like cardstock. Receipts are usually printed on a thinner thermal paper. Before digital printers, copies of documents were made on an extremely thin paper called onionskin.
You don't have to necessarily acquire any of these types of paper or use them for your document. But understand that they look and feel different from each other, even if they're all paper. An observant player can tell the difference between these. If you say your document is on newsprint but it's the size and thickness of a sheet of copy paper, the player can tell.
In the context of a physical newspaper, the article may be split into multiple columns. This is meant to make the article easier to read.
If your document comes from a physical newspaper, it may be a clipping, a small article cut out of a larger page. This is helpful for eliminating distracting details.
For newspaper articles, Times New Roman, EB Garamond, Helvetica, and Arial are common font choices. Typically, newspapers lean more towards using serif fonts (with the little feet on the letters) than sans-serif fonts (without the little feet).
This is Times New Roman, a common serif font.
This is EB Garamond, a common serif font.
This is Helvetica, a common sans-serif font.
This is Arial, a common sans-serif font.
Working backwards
This section outlines each sentence in the example article below and why it is included.
“Local police and firefighters are still cleaning up the scene of a fire at the Elbammalf tissue warehouse on Anorthosite Road early Thursday morning.”
This tells the audience what happened (a fire), where it happened (a warehouse on that specific road), when it happened (early Thursday morning), and the most recent event in the timeline (still cleaning up).
“First responders told our reporters they had received multiple calls from neighbors and nearby businesses about sounds of explosives or gunfire.”
This is the reason the newspaper knows about this fire. After the fire had started, the fire started making noises. People nearby called 911. The fire department came out to investigate.
“John Smith, 30, described the scene as ‘a [expletive]ton of gas that came pouring out of the ground.’”
The reporter is quoting directly from a witness interview. As a standard, an otherwise unrelated witness is designated with their age (30 years old). The placeholder [expletive] is used in place of the actual swear word.
“The owner of the warehouse, Sue DeNym, told reporters she had to escape the building through a broken window. ‘Weren’t nothing [sic] I could do about it but run,’ she said.”
The reporter is quoting directly from a witness interview. The owner of the building that caught fire is an affected person for the event, one specific member of the warehouse company group. The notation [sic] is used when directly quoting a witness with vernacular grammar that doesn’t match the newspaper’s style guide.
“Phlegein City Fire Chief Nathan Bicarb has released a statement, reading in part ‘We are devastated to hear about the loss of the Elbammalf warehouse. We have received evidence to suggest that a chemical spill may have started the fire before it got out of control. We are still actively investigating the cause. However, we have determined there is no active threat to the community at this time.’”
The reporter is quoting directly from the firefighters’ public statement to the media. The fire department is the affected group for the event.
“Two firefighters are currently being treated for smoke inhalation and heat exhaustion.”
These are common injuries people (especially firefighters) may receive during a fire.
“No official reports from the fire department about the cause of the fire have been released at time of print.”
The reporter asked if the fire department had released a report, but the fire department has not released an official report.
“Phlegein Police have not filed any charges related to the fire at time of print.”
The reporter asked if the police department has arrested anybody they suspect of starting the fire. The police department has not arrested anybody. The police department is an affected group for the event.
“Reconstruction efforts for the warehouse are expected to begin tomorrow, according to an official statement put out by Elbammalf.”
The reporter has contacted the company who owns the warehouse, and this is their response. The warehouse company is an affected group for the event.
“‘We hope to return to serving our city’s need for tissues and other paper products as soon as possible,’ says DeNym.”
This is a direct quote from a spokesperson affected by the event. The reporter has interviewed a third affected person. It informs the community of a timeline for the warehouse to be cleaned up after the fire.
The document is further weathered in the visual editor I used with marks to imitate a cutout clipping along the edges, water damage, and slight text distortion. Real life paper is fragile. It gets crinkled and folded and curled and creased and cut. Text can get dirty, smudged or turned completely illegible. Some of this weathering if helpful for making the document feel like an object a person has interacted with before. Use it to your advantage, especially if you do not want certain pieces of information easily available to your audience.
Again, I focused on a newspaper article because it is a common example. The same principles are true of other documents you might make.
Because your audience is surrounded by paper. Even if it’s digital paper, the idea is the same. If you want to make a story connect with the audience, no matter if the story is a realism-centric novel or a an abstract high fantasy movie, seeing a recognizable document helps give the audience something familiar. Once they have a stepping stone like that, the rest of the world - your story - can open up.
Your audience has purchased things before. They will know what receipts and invoices look like. They have probably gotten some form of physical mail before. They will know what a complete envelope or shipping label or packing slip looks like. They probably have some form of smart phone. They will know what apps on a screen interface will look like.
They have an idea of what to expect from medical records, emergency service records, hospital bills, prescriptions, meeting minutes, travel brochures, coupon catalogs from a store, rain checks from a store, lecture notes, school essays, report cards, eviction notices, home repair invoices, postcards, bank statements, book inscriptions, church bulletins, magazines, doctor’s appointment reminders, business cards and more.
You're using these aesthetics because they have visual significance for your audience. You picked these objects because you know they convey meaning and (hopefully) because they convey the meaning you want to share with your audience.
That's the blessing and curse of this style of epistolary storytelling. The audience knows what you are trying to do. They are willing to recognize your technique. They can clearly tell when the technique doesn't match the real thing. You don't have to match exactly. You just have to get reasonably close.
The only thing more rewarding than the audience recognizing the effort you put into your prop is the audience not thinking of it as a prop at all. The souvenir showed the story.
Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback, or if you found this useful for your own writing! Happy writing!
Appendix 0.5: If you give a mouse a cookie...
Some types of documents can more efficiently achieve certain storytelling effects than other types.
Other examples are listed here for reference.
If your character needs to acquire a tool/item or get a specific service done...
You might use:
an invoice
If your character is missing a tool/item and has to go find it...
You might use:
an inventory list
If your character is school-age and experiences a plot point that disrupts their school activity...
You might use:
-
Attendance trackers
-
Report cards with behavioral notes
-
Gradebooks
If your character is any age and is experiencing plot-related physical or emotional changes
You might use:
-
Prescriptions
-
Doctor’s notes
-
Diagnostic forms
If your character is looking forward to an event...
Or an event disrupts your character's routine...
You might use:
-
a planner
-
a calendar
-
a to-do list
If your character has conflict in a corporate setting...
You might use:
-
Sales reports (to show growth or decline, which might put pressure on your character)
-
Memos (to show updates or new information)
-
Emails (to show communication between characters)
-
Budgets (to show how much a plot point is expected to cost)
-
Balance sheets (to show that budgets are unexpectedly changing)
-
Product roadmaps (to show progress towards a goal)
-
Meeting notes (to show what topics are/are not discussed between characters)
If your character is a child and is experiencing plot-related physical changes
You might use:
-
A height chart
-
A doctor's note
-
A prescription
Appendix 1: Newspaper Article Content Examples
This is a list of real-world newspaper articles (both online and print) you may find helpful for reference.
Boy, 8, is killed when driver distracted by hot hair balloon, from Arizona Republic, 1985
https://azcentral.newspapers.com/clip/122503339/ben-greene-death/
Obama: ‘If not now, when?”, from The Indianapolis Star, 2011
(more useful as a visual reference than for the content since the picture is not in focus)
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/41/The_Indianapolis_Star%2C_2011.jpg
Missing couple found dead after their truck located in flooded creek near Payson, from Arizona’s Family Channel 3TV, 2023
50-car train derailment causes big fire, evacuations in Ohio, from Associated Press, 2023
https://apnews.com/article/pennsylvania-ohio-evacuations-fires-5d399dc745f51ef746e22828083d8591
Chandler woman has license suspended due to mistaken identity, from ABC15 Arizona, 2023
Menindee: Millions of dead fish wash up near Australian town, from BBC, 2023
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-64992726.amp
3D-printed rocket fails just after launch, from Associated Press, 2023
https://apnews.com/article/3d-printed-rocket-space-launch-d2cd68caef2d89fd878003b68c7bba13
Ware Building nearly done, from Arizona Republic, 2008
https://azcentral.newspapers.com/clip/122499053/arizona-republic/
Endangered status sought for gopher tortoise in 4 states, Associated Press, 2023
Rockfall closes State Route 88 near Roosevelt Lake, from The Verde Valley Independent and Camp Verde Bugle, 2020
https://www.verdenews.com/news/2020/mar/27/rockfall-closes-state-route-88-near-roosevelt-lake/
Fire breaks out at church near downtown Montgomery, from Arizona’s Family Channel 3TV, 2023
https://www.azfamily.com/video/2023/03/03/fire-breaks-out-church-near-downtown-montgomery/
Apartment fire in Glendale leaves 9 people displaced, from AZCentral, 2022
Appendix 2: Visual Template Resources
There are a variety of methods you can use to make a document look like a newspaper (or any other article).
You don’t necessarily have to use any of the resources listed below, but they may be helpful for generating most of the aesthetic of your document. I would encourage you to manipulate their PDF or image final products for added authenticity, if necessary.
Some free resources (as of August 26 2023):
Canva
Notes:
requires a free account to use
also includes pay-for and premium templates
includes other document templates
https://www.canva.com/templates/?query=newspaper
Fodey newspaper clipping generator
https://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp
101 Planners
https://www.101planners.com/borders/newspaper-generator/
Free newspaper generator
Notes:
generates and automatically downloads a PDF
uses 8.5”x11” paper format)
https://newspaper.jaguarpaw.co.uk/
Homemade Gifts Made Easy
Notes:
only uses the current access day date for an article
generates and automatically downloads a PDF
uses 8.5”x11” paper format
also has a premium version to include custom dates and multiple articles
Includes 2 pre-generated spoof articles, which may distract from your content
https://www.homemade-gifts-made-easy.com/newspaper-generator.html
Break Your Own News
Notes:
Generates an image file to look like TV breaking news
https://breakyourownnews.com/
Microsoft Word has a variety of document templates.
RGBY URL shortener - can be generally useful for obscuring links or making a long link easier to copy and paste
https://free-url-shortener.rb.gy/
A video tutorial from That Props Girl for Canva
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2XS0gh8FKg
Newspapers and Magazines as Primary Sources, from the University of Illinois https://guides.library.illinois.edu/periodicals/article
Starting a Small Town Community Newspaper, from Make My Newspaper
https://makemynewspaper.com/starting-a-small-town-community-newspaper/
Additional fake document example:
(receipt for "The Place" restaurant)
.png)
Appendix 3: Video Game Player Guides and Other Examples
Player guides are among the most well-known examples of fake documents. They are designed to assist the player with helpful information about playing the game. When the guides are presented in-game, they have to present strategies without addressing its own game mechanics. They often include bestiaries (which list and describe enemies), maps and other progress trackers.
These are only a few selected examples that I think were done memorably.
Marvel’s Spiderman (2018) has backpacks and other collectibles:
https://marvels-spider-man.fandom.com/wiki/Collections
God of War (2018) has a codex of lore and a bestiary:
https://godofwar.fandom.com/wiki/Codex
The Kingdom Hearts series (2002 - ongoing) has Jiminy’s Journal:
https://kingdomhearts.fandom.com/wiki/Jiminy%27s_Journal
TVTropes has an entire “Fictional Document” trope dedicated to examples of these types of documents.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FictionalDocument
Appendix 4: Police Reports and Other Examples
Examples of autopsy reports:
https://www.interfire.org/features/fatalities/autopsyreport.pdf
https://mtsamples.com/site/pages/browse.asp?Type=94-Autopsy
Examples of police reports:
https://www.yourpolicewrite.com/four-types-police-reports/sample-report/
https://lewisu.edu/writingcenter/pdf/police-report-resource-revised.pdf
Example air quality and fire alert:
https://twitter.com/NWSPhoenix/status/1517283349395509248/photo/1
https://www.weather.gov/safety/wildfire-ready
https://www.phoenix.gov/fire/safety-information/home/escape
A press release from a National Park in the United States:
The ARG Marble Hornets features a (fictitious) character’s medical records as part of the plot.
https://archive.org/details/tumblr_n229x8WIgH1s9evi1o2_640/tumblr_n229x8WIgH1s9evi1o1_640.png
Microsoft Word or your computer’s corresponding word processing program likely also has templates you can use to approximate other documents of your choice.
Microsoft Excel has a few charts that may be helpful for practical purposes but may be less convincing for everyday use.
Bit.ly and other URL shorteners can be added useful for shortening links to websites, either to make them easier to copy/paste into a browser or to disguise their destination.