The Three Xs of a Great Story: Extraordinary, Exclusive, Extendable

A few years ago, a young writer approached me, brimming with excitement about a vampire story he was drafting in Albanian.
“Good for you,” I said, curious. But it turned out to be Dracula—relocated to northern Albania.
I told him, bluntly, that it wasn’t new. In fact, it was rather dull. The story still ended with a stake through the heart of a minor noble.
He bristled. “But it’s not Dracula! He’s not a Count. He’s younger. And it’s not Transylvania—it’s Albania.”
I laughed. We haven’t spoken since.

When you read three or four submissions a day, it becomes painfully easy to spot derivations dressed up as originality—and I hate myself for this, because I lose interest and may miss something buried deep. Stories don’t fail because they’re poorly written; they fail because they’re redundant. I don’t want polish—I want pulse. Either make my heart ache with tenderness or jolt me with adrenaline. Otherwise… next.

Of course, this sounds cold as hell, and easier said than done. But I think the opposite is true—if you know where to begin. The idea that writing requires divine inspiration is a myth. What you really need is clarity, a bit of nerve, and the willingness to tell the truth. Imagination helps, but even that can be trained through discipline. Writers don’t need a muse—they need a matrix.

So, here’s one: the Three Xs Framework—Extraordinary, Exclusive, and Extendable. A practical method for evaluating why some stories endure in cultural memory, while others, no matter how lyrical, fade fast.

Extraordinary

An extraordinary story doesn’t require alien invasions or talking dragons. It can be about a rat who loves to cook or a fish with short-term memory loss. A girl who starts fires with her mind, a child who disappears into a cornfield, or a botanist growing potatoes on Mars. The premise must surprise—not necessarily with content, but with point of view and treatment.

A retelling can be extraordinary too—so long as the angle is infectious. Reimagining Shakespeare or Alice in Wonderland can work if the setting, language, and structure are compelling. Style is not an ornament here; it’s essential. There is no extraordinarity without voice.

Exclusive

Exclusivity is not about genre. It’s about ownership. The story must feel like yours—not just technically, but conceptually. Not a clever remix. Not a familiar premise with a fresh coat of paint. Originality comes not from plot twists but from narrative insight.

Want to write a vampire saga? Fiiiine! But changing the vampire’s diet or geography doesn’t make it new. That’s already Twilight, or Blade, or one of a hundred half-remembered titles from airport shelves.

Try this instead: a vampire who spends his fortune on SPF 100+ sunscreen just to sit quietly at the beach at sunset, never once biting anyone. That’s exclusive. The absurdity doesn’t matter. What matters is that it’s yours.

Mixing genres, breaking tropes, or filtering an old archetype through a new worldview—these are paths toward narrative ownership. Mix it with your own cultural or ethnic background and you’ll have a treasure worth digging. If the story couldn’t be told by anyone else, it’s probably exclusive enough.

Extendable

A great story doesn’t end—it opens. Extendability is the measure of a story’s capacity to live beyond its initial telling. Not just sequels, but adaptations, reinterpretations, and thematic offshoots.

The Lord of the Rings wasn’t conceived as a franchise, but its linguistic and historical scaffolding made its expansion inevitable. Star Wars became a universe, not because of its special effects, but because its mythology was flexible enough to grow. Star Trek—my favorite—despite its 1960s limitations, offered a conceptual toolkit for endless storytelling: exploration, ethics, diplomacy. (What did you think of Picard?)

Extendability also applies to literary fiction: Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan series, Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead cycle, or Knausgaard’s My Struggle. These aren’t commercial franchises, but they unfold worlds that invite return and reinvestment.

Ask yourself: Can this story become a lens, not just a snapshot?

In Summary

An extraordinary story arrests the reader.
An exclusive story defines the writer.
An extendable story reshapes its medium.

Master the first two, and you’ll be a remarkable writer. Add the third, and you’re not just creating fiction—you’re building a world. And with the right agent, maybe even a business.