Story totally grisly about east (8)
I believe the answer is:
allegory
'story' is the definition.
(allegory is a kind of story)
'totally grisly about east' is the wordplay.
'totally' becomes 'all' (I've seen this in another clue).
'grisly' becomes 'gory' (I've seen this before).
'about' says to put letters next to each other.
'east' becomes 'E' (synonyms).
'gory' after 'e' is 'egory'.
'all'+'egory'='ALLEGORY'
(Other definitions for allegory that I've seen before include "Pilgrim's Progress, say" , "Story with symbolic characters" , "Symbolic narrative" , "literary device" , "'Gulliver's Travels', for example" .)