How Does a Story ''Work"?

Objective:   This discussion explains why good stories are good, bad stories are not, and where those "stupid" stories left you behind.

We hear stories from friends, watch them on television and in theatres, read them in books.  We know good ones from bad ones, too. Good stories entertain.  We become involved in the plot, enjoy the characters, appreciate ideas or effects, feel emotions at the end. 

Bad stories lack that.  Sometimes, it is because the story is just plain bad: a rambling tale with no point, a cheap movie.  Other times, we don't "like" it: the ideas or characters do not interest us.  We can respect the fact that others are entertained, but we do not share that opinion.

Then, there are those stories that lie somewhere else, the ones we cannot figure out.  They may "appear" to be stories and have even held our interest for a time.  They may be well-regarded by many others, but we don't "get" them.  They start off fine, but then they just go off on a tangent and leave us wondering what the heck that was all about.

"That was a stupid movie," someone once said about those type of stories.

So was that movie really unintelligent ?  Or was it just unintelligible ?  Did it just not make sense to that particular viewer?

In order to understand how a story "entertains" a reader or viewer, we must begin with all the objects, events, and ideas in a story that might possibly catch and hold a person's attention.  If we can somehow divide the pieces of a story up into sensible groups, then we ought to be able to figure out how each of those groups might entertain some individual.

Let's begin by separating a story into two parts:  the Plot, and Not-the-Plot.