Partway through a two-hour plot consultation, the writer I was working with related a scene in which the protagonist does something entirely out of character. The protagonist of this young adult novel steals pot from her father's illegal pot growing shed."Whoa!" I cried. "Where does this come from? You've set up the story so that the protagonist does not respect her father because of his pot growing, right?""She's not going to smoke any. She wants to get back at her dad.""She's going to take …
Mystery Writers Need Plot, too!
Are you nuts?Leave a fire roaring, dog snoring, husband chatting, and a pot of soup bubbling for the long walk down a cold hallway in the dark and all alone to a quiet and still room filled with expectations and uncertainty??? Lately, so goes the lament from many of the writers I work with on an on-going basis.Everyone seems slow to jump into the writing life this year. Rather, self-doubts, and threats of going back and starting again, fear and uncertainty hold us back. The drama keeps us …
Happy New Year!
The private plot consultations resume next week. Until I have a chance to write a new plot post, please read my comments below. I'd enjoy your impressions. …
Ticking Clock
The last few consultations have brought writers with well thought out scenes that draw the reader into the Beginning 1/4 of the project. Each one was able to develop the character emotional development through dramatic action in the Middle 1/2. In other words, for these three writers, three quarters of their projects work, at least on a structural plot level.However, these same three projects had little or no real Climax to top off the entire work. In each case, the protagonist is reawakened by …
Ain’t it the Way
P"Ain’t it the way?"So ended an email from a best-selling author who had just recounted an exotic plot twist she had come up with now that she was writing the end ~ not brainstorming or plotting out or talking about, but actually writing the end of her second book.Yesterday I spoke to a college writing class. A student asked what everyone worries ~ "Won't the universal story template lead to formulatic outcomes?"The act of creation is an amazing thing.The linear, organized approach of …
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