the quality that makes your stories (and you) go viral

What makes a story go viral? In his blog post The Elements of Awe (check it out) Donald Maass draws your attention to a piece in the New York Times that describes how sociologists "have been studying data provided by The New York Times showing which of the paper's articles are the most often e-mailed".

Says Maass:

Their conclusions have some relevance for fiction writers because they reveal what it is about stories that probably generate word of mouth.

In his post (which promises to be the...