An Unbreakable Story is one that will motivate, inspire, encourage, or empower someone from a true story about ordinary people having extraordinary experiences. It is a story that gives an example of a real life experience that inspires the reader with the fact that if it is possible for you then it is possible for the reader to have the same experience. It is a simple piece that touches our readers and helps them discover basic principles they can use in their own lives. These stories are personal and often filled with emotion and drama. They are filled with vivid images created by using the five senses. In some stories, the readers feel that they are actually in the scene with the people.
Unbreakable Stories are written in the first person and have a beginning, middle and an end. The stories often close with a punch, creating emotion, rather than simply talking about it. Unbreakable Stories have heart, but also something extra—an element that makes us all feel more hopeful, more connected, more thankful, more passionate and better about life in general. A good story causes tears, laughter, goose bumps or any combination of these.
The most powerful stories are about people extending themselves, or performing an act of love, service or courage for another person.
Guidelines for an Unbreakable Story
- Tell an exciting, heartwarming story about something that has happened to you or someone you know. Your story should be written in the first person and should be about yourself or someone close to you.
- Tell your story in a way that will make the reader cry, laugh, get goose bumps or say “Wow!”
- The story should start “in the action” and draw in the reader. Do not start your story with an introduction about what you are going to say, or end with a concluding paragraph about what you just said.
- Don’t be afraid to speak from the heart. Many people tell personal stories for the first time in our books, and they find it to be a cathartic and productive experience. We do let you use a pen name for your story if you do not want to use your real name.
- Don’t try fancy moves with tenses. Writing in the present tense about something that happened in the past rarely works.
- Keep your story to 1000 words or less. Tighten, tighten, tighten!
- Your story must be true. No fiction, no creative writing.
What an Unbreakable Story IS NOT:
- A sermon, an essay or eulogy.
- An “as told to” story written by you for someone else. If you ghost-write a story for someone, we thank you for helping that person share his or her story. That person’s name will be listed as the author and he or she can acknowledge your help in the bio section.
- A term paper, thesis, letter or journal entry.
- About politics or controversial issues.
- A biography or testimonial.
- A journalistic article about a third party that reads like a newspaper article.
A few more tips about submitting
- The only way to submit your stories or poems to us is via our website. If you have any problems when trying to fill out the form and submit your work, please contact our webmaster at: support@unbreakablestories.com Responses from the webmaster usually take several days, so be patient.
- Our webmaster cannot help you with your personal computer problems. If you have questions, such as, “How do I paste my story into the submission form?” Please ask a friend or relative, not our webmaster.
- Please submit only stories that have not been previously published. The only exception to this is if your work has only been published in a small local publication with limited circulation or on your own blog.
- Please do not send us any book manuscripts, unless through a literary agent, as these will be automatically discarded. Also, we do not accept title ideas from the public. If we receive any, they will be discarded and will not be shown to our editor.
What happens after I submit my story?
Please be patient after you press the SUBMIT button. Wait for the next screen to come up with a message that says: Thank you! Your information has been received. This is your confirmation that we have received your story and that it has been entered into our database. This is the only confirmation you will receive.
How will you know if your story is selected? We do not send rejection letters, and we occasionally will save a submission for consideration for a future book. But in general, if you have not heard from us that probably means we have decided not to use your story. You can check the on-sale dates for our future books by checking the Coming Soon page on our website. We get thousands of submissions for each book and we only have room for 50 stories per book, so please don’t take our silence personally!
It takes time for an Unbreakable Stories book to be completed. Please be patient, as the selection of stories is a time-consuming process. Please do not contact us to ask for an update about your story unless you need to know whether we are considering it because another publisher is interested in it too.
If we choose your story for a future edition of Unbreakable Stories or any of our other projects, we will notify you by e-mail and request your permission to print it. We never publish anything without permission from the author.
If your email address changes after you submit your story, be sure to let our webmaster know by emailing support@unbreakablestories.com You need to let us know which book you submitted to so that we can update your information.
What happens if we publish your story
If we publish your story, you will receive a free copy of the eBook your story appears in. You will also become part of the Unbreakable Stories family and be eligible for access to our Inner Circle of benefits. You will also receive our monthly newsletter that is sent exclusively to our published writers, with advance notice of new books, contests to win Unbreakable Stories merchandise, and so much more . . . .
If your story is selected to be published in one of our Unbreakable Stories books, you will be asked to sign our standard permission release agreement. That agreement asks for non-exclusive rights to publish your story. This means that you retain ownership of your story but you grant us the rights to publish it and use it again in any future Unbreakable Stories book title or any Unbreakable Stories product to include but not limited to a podcast reading of your story, social media posts using quotes from your story, etc . . . .