Plot Development: Writer Resources, #4

Plot Development

An Outlining Method for Fiction

Jesper Schmidt

Autumn M. Birt

Fantasy Realms Publishing

Your Free Book!

A book on plotting isn’t worth much if you have no story idea to outline. It’s like fishing without bait. Pretty useless...

While this book will assume that you already have the story’s premise developed, and that you are looking for a method, or system, to transform that idea into a fully-fledged story, this might not always be the case.

To be on the safe side, we wanted to make sure that you’re in a position to reap all the benefits from what you’re about to learn.

As an exclusive offer, and as a token of our appreciation for purchasing Plot Development, here’s the book, Developing Story Ideas, for FREE.

Download from here: www.amwritingfantasy.com/free-story-idea-book/

If you haven’t created your story’s premise (or story idea) yet, our recommendation is that you go through Developing Story Ideas first. Once done, come back here and leverage the information shared between these covers to their full potential.

Contents

The Secret Ingredient

Writing is an Art Form

6 Common Questions About Plotting

Pantsers vs. Plotters

The 7 Pillars of Story Structure

Pillar 1

The Characters

Why Start With Characters?

Cast of Characters

Choosing POV Characters

Character Backstory

Developing the Protagonist

How to Make Readers Fall in Love With the Protagonist

Fundamental Attributes

The Character’s Personality

Developing the Antagonist

Developing POV Characters

Developing Minor Characters

Fatal Flaw and Inner Conflict

The Foolproof Character Arc

Incorporating Need & Motive Into The Arc

Different Types of Character Arcs

The Four Stages of the Character Arc

Showing Character Change to the Reader - A Quick Example

Making Characters Sound Distinctive

Character Names

Character Audit

Pillar 2

Plot Posts

Plot Posts

Understanding Your Genre

Preliminary Plot Inspiration

The I and E plot

Overlaying Character Arc & The External Plot

Defining the Plot Posts

Plot Post 1: Intro

Plot Post 2: Inciting Incident

Plot Post 3: Reaction

Plot Post 4: New Info

Plot Post 5: Develop Plan

Plot Post 6: Climax

Plot Post 7: Wrap Up

Pillar 3

Adding Subplots

Understanding Subplots

Creating Subplots

Pillar 4

Creating Awesome Chapters

Tight vs Loose Chapter Outlines

The Structure of a Chapter

The Elementary Units of a Strong Chapter

Lulls

Subplots

Pacing

Foreshadowing

Multiple Characters

Variation

Chapter by Chapter Outline

Pillar 5

The Tension Graph

Plot Validation

Pillar 6

Deepening the Plot

Revision

Pillar 7

Revising Opening & Closing Chapters

What to Watch Out for

Character Introduction

Last Chapter

Opening and Closing Lines

Bonus Chapters

Theme

Writing a Killer Prologue and Epilogue

Structural Editor or Alpha Readers

Beta Readers

Killing a Character

Info Dumping

Short Stories

The Perfect Story

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Appendix A: An example outline

The Secret Ingredient

You’ve got your story idea, and it’s a good one! It excites you as much as it will the reader ...

Yet, the cursor blinks on the screen before you, or the blank piece of paper stares back at you, daring you to articulate what has been simmering in your mind – perhaps for months or years. Or, maybe you’re trying to make sense of that mess of a manuscript.

Regardless of your situation, you’re taking your writing seriously (we know you are: you purchased this book), so you also recognize that there is more to stories than pure entertainment. Wowing the reader isn’t as easy as your favorite author made it seem with his or her latest release.

You want to write not only a good book, but a great book. You want your fable to have the power to make the reader cry and laugh while creating moments that are so sweet that people can taste them. However, to achieve this, it isn’t enough to have strong skills with prose. There is more to it than that. A lot more!

Stories that ‘work’ touch something inside of us. They have a sense of magic to them that reaches the reader on a fundamental level.

But how do we create a story that works? Do we focus on the characters? The plot? The theme? Something else ...?

With the Internet booming with advice, and associated acronyms, it’s like tumbling down a bottomless rabbit hole of confusion.

Granted, some of us will, at some point in our career, accumulate enough know-how to write powerful stories – even if we will never be able to express what we have internalized – yet others will never understand story structure. There’s nothing wrong with that. On the contrary, it’s perfectly normal. You see, the majority of people don’t truly understand story structure.

When we watch a movie or read a book and don’t like it, it’s quite common that we aren’t able to pinpoint exactly why.

Sure, on the surface, it’s easy to say that you don’t like a particular plot point or character; however, it remains a shallow judgment. Take the Lord of the Rings, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Silence of the Lambs, or any of the great classics, as an example. Not everyone likes these stories, but there is one thing we can all agree upon, and that is how these great works constitute much more than a series of random events strung together. The narratives have been carefully constructed and fire on all cylinders.

These stories have been designed to affect you. Perhaps some of the authors did so unintentionally, who knows? But with this book, we aim to make it intentional. We want you to become capable of repeating the pattern over and over again, and produce books that are guaranteed to resonate with the reader, despite the genre. We want to not only create page-turners but also uncover that special ingredient that makes our work stand out and win a place in the hearts of readers.

To that end, the good news is that even though all human beings are unique in their own right, we also share many similarities. As we go through life, we have all struggled with self-doubt, we have all experienced the loss of someone we loved dearly or reached a goal we had been chasing for a long time. There is a pattern to our existence, and it’s one that we all share. In a sense, it’s part of what makes us human.

If we can mimic these universal elements in our fiction, we can unlock the power to reach readers on a deep and primal level.

By witnessing characters who struggle with these sorts of timeless challenges, the words on the page become a lens through which we view our own life. Humans have grown through stories since the dawn of time, yet the truth is that most stories fail to connect with readers. It seems that the secret juice capable of conjuring up this degree of magic is far more elusive than one might think.

What we are getting at here is this: Great stories aren’t about the plot. It’s about how we deliver the story as a tightly woven flying carpet that carries the reader away so fast that they never even stop to wonder what might happen next.

Many writers (and readers) mistake the story for what they see on the page. They believe prose, action, and dialogue constitute creative writing. All of this is important, no doubt about it, but these elements will never be able to bring a story to life and give it meaning. To write a truly great book, story structure is far more important than talent or having a distinctive voice will ever be. That’s not to say that imaginative plotting will deliver this effect on its own either. No. But, a firm grasp of story structure will set you down the path of success.

The thing is, if the story meanders, far fewer people will read it, and even fewer will talk about it. Structure allows you to write off the rails while keeping the core on track.

At least until we hit the other elephant in the room, that is.

That creature is called fear.

Many writers fear that story structure will box them in and suck all originality out of the story. It’s a feeling more common than you might think. Maybe, you’re thinking it right now. What is important to point out is that this couldn’t be farther from the truth. More on that in a bit.

For now, know that Plot Development will teach you how to create layers so rich that readers will connect with your story on that all-important emotional level. However, there isn’t one single ingredient that makes all the difference. Instead, the essence is hidden in how you put all the different pieces together. How you weave a cohesive whole, strong enough to form an archetypal structure that transverses genres and touches us as human beings. That’s where the true power of story structure comes into play.

Our brains are hardwired to think in stories. We know how to respond to them from birth, yet the ability to design a story isn’t a skill nature has granted us. It needs to be learned. Once you know how to decipher the charts that make up the sea of fiction, you’ll be able to guide the reader straight through the troubled waters.

Is it going to be easy? No! Writing a novel is hard.

When you first set out to learn what this book has to offer, it might seem a bit clunky. To some of us, story structure just is. That’s okay.

Stick with it and view it as just another one of those challenges that makes it so exciting to be a writer. It’s a journey of exploration where every time you think you’ve got it all figured out, a new horizon opens up before you.

We’re going to hand you the keys to unlock the world of story structure, but as Hemingway once said, We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.

Welcome to Plot Development.

Writing is an Art Form

The intended audience for this book is fledgling writers and experienced authors alike. We’ve designed it intending to share in-depth techniques on plotting and structuring stories.

Know that, whether you classify yourself as a writer (according to the dictionary, it’s a person who expresses ideas in writing) or an author (a person who writes a novel, poem, essay, etc.), there’s always more to learn about writing. It’s a curved and snarled journey through which you can keep growing – hence the Hemingway quote.

This is also the view we’ve taken in writing this book. Enclosed, you’ll find lots of advice, but know that you might not agree with all of what you read. Writing is an art form, and therefore also subjective. What works for us might not work for you, and vice versa. So, as you move through the coming chapters, know that you can pick and choose techniques as you please. Don’t be afraid to experiment if the need calls for it. Some stories are just different than others.

That said, what we can tell you is that our step-by-step method works. Therefore, it’s our recommendation to follow it to the letter, but as you do so, realize that the underlying philosophy is that the art of writing cannot be taught – story structure can.

We have read lots of books on the subject of plotting. We’ve trialed many techniques. We’ve educated ourselves until our own system has formed a reliable and polished process. One where we can explain, not only how we plot, but also, why we do what we do.

We are sharing the exact approach we use to write the book before we write the book.

It has to be said that we don’t consider ourselves oracles on story structure. We are writers, authors – whichever label you feel most comfortable with – just like yourself. However, between the two of us, we happen to have written and published more than twenty books. That’s not counting a long stream of short stories. In addition, we’ve both had books become bestsellers, so we have lots of experience to share.

We hope that by teaching you what we know on story structure, we’ll be able to deepen your understanding of outlining. Who knows, perhaps even transform your writing altogether.

We keep saying, we ...

As you’ve probably noticed, there are two names on the cover: Autumn and Jesper. That’s because this book is co-written. We’ve partnered up and jointly defined this process on how to outline a novel (there’s going to be information on outlining a series too).

Teaching is our calling.

Apart from writing books, we also run courses for authors, and in working together, we challenge each other’s ideas. That way, we ensure that all our material, whether that be books or courses, are of the highest quality and serve as a one-stop-shop.

You can use this book over and over again as a guide and blueprint for each new story. From this day forward, you have a trusted companion at your side and won’t need to consult any other books on plotting. What you’re reading is the culmination of more than ten years of writing experience.

The times when you had to ditch six months of work because your novel wasn’t ’working’ is over. Instead, you can look forward to a first draft that will warrant this sort of remark from the editor, This is one of the most together and well thought out manuscripts that I have seen. It is incredibly solid developmentally.

That was a real quote by the way!

That secret ingredient we talked about earlier will begin to appear in your books, but only if you apply what we’re teaching you. In the end, the only person who can decide to do so is you. The only person who can truly teach you to become a better storyteller is ... you!

6 Common Questions About Plotting

Chances are that more than a few have picked up this book because they are at the beginning of their writing journey. If that’s you, you will find some common questions answered in this chapter.

If, on the other hand, you’re one of our more experienced writing colleagues, who are certain that plotting is for you, feel free to skip ahead to the chapter entitled The 7 Pillars of Story Structure.

For the rest of us: Let’s get on the same page before getting into the actual plotting process.

Common Question #1: Aren’t first drafts supposed to be rough?

They can be. Many are. But supposed to: Certainly not.

At the beginning of our writing career, many of us are very eager just to start writing. The prospect of spending time plotting is just not appealing. We get that!

Where this path leads you, though, is to months spent writing something that has no internal logic to it. Conventional wisdom would then say, That’s what editing is for.

That’s one approach to take, but what often happens is that you end up trying to make sense of a first draft that is so out of shape your efforts end up being a waste of time. Since you’ve spent so much time writing this mess, it’s only natural that it torments your very soul to cut and rewrite entire sections. Instead, you end up trying to move things around. After a while, you realize that it’s possible to shift large parts around only supports the fact that there is something fundamentally wrong. There is zero congruence in your novel.

There’s a world of difference between a poor first draft that works and one that has no story structure to it whatsoever.

Common Question #2: Isn’t outlining a waste of time?

On the contrary, when you know what you are doing, plotting is actually going to save you time.

This is the principal reason why our own first drafts require very little editing. It’s extremely rare that we do any rewriting. There simply aren’t any plot holes to worry about.

As a consequence, our personal editing phase focuses on polishing the prose, nothing more.

In short, plotting is well worth the investment.

Common Question #3: Isn’t story structure dependent on the genre?

No. It’s not.

Simply put, the ingredients that make a book resonate with readers are the same across all genres. There is, of course, more to it than merely placing a major plot point at the halfway mark, then a plot twist, and a surprise revelation at the end.

Genres do have variances. Some types of stories open with action, while others take half the book to get to the first explosion. However, as we get into the meat of this book, you will see how none of this changes the underlying structure.

Common Question #4: Won’t story structure box me in and suck all originality out of my story?

Ah! Here it is. The question we promised to return to.

The line of thinking behind this question is that by following a set pattern, the story will become so blindingly obvious that it’s boring to write. If you can’t just go with the flow, how are you going to unfold your creativity? Worse yet, what if readers can predict the inciting incident because they know it’s supposed to be there?

It’s correct that if you start analyzing stories, you will begin to see similarities. It’s also true that story structure is built on principles. We can even accept how, behind this common question, lies a real artistic fear. It’s perfectly understandable that no writer wants to end up with clichés.

In this case, though, the logic missed the mark. The fact that story structure follows a formula is the whole point.

Earlier on, we talked about The Secret Ingredient and how patterns in stories that work are universal. From centuries of research, we, human beings, have become capable of identifying a reoccurring structure that appears time and again in successful stories. Structure is everywhere. Books and movies (the good ones) all follow a standard.

Originality is a way of re-telling life – all wrapped up in a cocoon of drama and emotions. Story structure isn’t inhibiting creativity – it’s the catalyst.

Common Question #5: Can I get published without structure?

You already know what we’re going to respond. The answer is, of course, a resounding No!

The fact that this question is even being asked reveals a general misconception. Those who believe that a story can still resonate with readers without respecting the commandments of story structure have gotten it backward.

As stated, story structure is inherent to us humans. For this reason, some authors have an approach to writing which aligns with the structural principles even though they give it no conscious consideration.

We are taking the reader on a journey with our books: A conflict-ridden adventure through the lives of our characters. For this emotionally impactful roller coaster to make any sense, there needs to be a flow and rhythm to the ride. One that respects the tenets of successful stories.

Whether we are elevating an instinctive knowledge, or simply learning the principles of story structure, matters little. In the end, the knowledge you’ll acquire through these pages is what grants you the ability to write better stories. Much better!

You might ask, But aren’t the rules of writing meant to be broken?

If you want to get published, tread carefully here. That’s all we have to say in response.

Common Question #6: Is story structure different for short stories and novellas?

In short, no.

The fundamentals of story structure are the same, but we will come back to this later in this book.

So, is plotting for everyone?

At the very least, as with all aspects of life, we should try something out before dismissing it.

An outline gives you the opportunity to construct the big picture well before you get yourself lost in the forest of prose. Once your novel is plotted, you’ve got both a compass and a map to guide you safely towards these famous words: The End.

Yet, many still feel animosity against outlining. It still feels like a pair of shackles.

We’re indeed all different. Some of us are pantsers, some methodical outliners, and many fall in between. While there’s no right or wrong, and the art of writing is your own, there are still some clear misconceptions.

In the coming chapter, we’ll talk about the benefits of plotting and then get into the actual step-by-step approach for outlining.

Pantsers vs. Plotters

Whether to plot or not is a topic that is often heavily debated among writers. Some claim that plotting is too restrictive (we already touched upon that), others feel it is a waste of time, while a third group says that it takes away the enjoyment of discovering what the story is about. Those people are referred to as pantsers. Their approach to writing is ’flying by the seat of their pants’ or, put differently, they go with the flow.

On the other side of the chasm, we find the plotters. That’s those of us who outline all the details of the story before we commit a single word to the page.

We used the term ’chasm’ there, because, at times, it can be quite a heated debate as to which camp is right or wrong. At the end of the previous chapter, we pointed out that there is no right or wrong. There is no universal process to writing, and each of us has to find our own way. In this pursuit, many authors study how-to books and listen to interviews with other writers in order to reach a conclusion. However, reading or hearing about something isn’t the same as trying it out for yourself.

While information can certainly be gleaned from listening to the experiences of others, we also, inadvertently, tap into the collective viewpoint of the topic. This can easily sway us to take sides with the one who makes the best argument. This could be a mistake. You shouldn’t allow another’s point of view to become the determining factor in whether or not plotting is for you.

This chapter is dedicated to those of you who believe pantsing to be the only true path to writing success. You might think it purer to discover the story as you go. Perhaps, you’ve picked up this book out of pure curiosity, or maybe you actually want to give outlining a try, but only to confirm that your preconceived opinions on plotting were correct.

You see, pantsing is a very seductive method of writing.

It has that power because it’s so easy just to sit down and let everything pour out onto the page. You can worry about the result during editing, right?

The allure is understandable. At our core, we humans are lazy. Researchers from Simon Fraser University in Canada published a study in the journal, Current Biology, confirming that we are born that way. The subconscious nervous system continuously fine-tunes our every move to keep energy consumption as low as possible.

That’s pretty neat, but it also means that we, by default, believe that time is better spent writing a novel than outlining it. It’s all about energy consumption.

Our job here is not to convince you that plotting is better than pantsing. We hope you’ve already realized that from what you’ve read so far. However, we know that the step-by-step approach you are about to learn will require some dedication.

Since we humans are wired to be lazy, here are the benefits of plotting.

Outlining ... Increases the Speed of Writing

A frequent argument against outlining is that it takes too long. It’s a continuation of Common Question #2 from the previous chapter, and that’s because it’s true. It does take time.

Creating a detailed plot can take weeks. It requires patience to put in this level of effort, instead of just starting with chapter one. However, preparation will pay dividends in the end.

We’ve tried pantsing too, but we quickly came to realize that the ramblings on the page were incohesive and needed lots of rework. As a result, full novels have been trashed, and others had to be completely rewritten. If that’s not a waste of time, what is?

You see, in today’s fast-paced Internet world, it’s very hard to make a living from writing if you only produce one book a year. Some of the most popular authors can make that work, but that’s the exception rather than the rule.

If the truth is that the more books you have available, the more opportunities you have to reach new readers, then the time you spend producing your next novel becomes a factor. More books equal more sales, hence the quicker you can write them, the better.

You could be trying to achieve this by increasing your daily word count. However, that is not a long-term sustainable solution. Many authors have faced burnout attempting that. Instead, it’s much better to put a system in place that allows you to achieve your goals by doing things right the first time.

Let’s face it: At the end of the day, very few of us are capable of flying by the seat of our pants and simultaneously cranking out quality books in high volumes. Unless that’s already you, that’s nothing to strive for.

An effective method for outlining is what will assure your health and a speedy production schedule.

Outlining ... Leverages the Power of the Brain

The human brain is a wonderful organ. It’s often referred to as a muscle because of its ability to learn