Discovering a Story’s Theme

I’ve given a lot of thought to theme during the process of revising my manuscript these last several months. Every well-written story has at least one, and often more than one theme. The interesting thing about story theme is that it usually doesn’t reveal itself until you’ve finished the first draft. Only in the full read-through and revision process does the author begin to see what the story is really all about. And so it was with me.

Oh sure, I had a story concept in mind when I began: Fo...