Prompt 21 in The Plot Whisperer Book of Writing Prompts: Easy Exercises to Get You Writing prompts you develop an object or place or detail you introduced in an earlier and that now can be repeated and then used again later for emphasis and with the potential to reveal deeper meaning in your novel, memoir, screenplay.As you scan your story for a significant detail you've created in your story, look for anything that seems to represent (or could be written to represent) suppressed emotions …
Finding the Through-line, the Primary Plot
She stakes her claim on her story boldly and with confidence. Quickly, it becomes apparent to me that the writer is speaking in a different language. I stop her mid-sentence and ask her what happens at the climax of her story. She pauses and then continues. Still, in the foreign language. I stop her again."Rather than tell me about the special features and functions of the outer-space suits they're wearing and all the other technical details about the exotic world you've created for your story, …
Time Out to Create a Plot Planner
Beginning with Prompt 6 in The Plot Whisperer Book of Writing Prompts: Easy Exercises to Get You Writing, you're asked to plot the scenes you write above or below the line on a Plot Planner for your own individual novel, memoir, screenplay.In an attempt to write purely from the Writing Prompts and without relying on the visual aide for as long as I could hold out, I kept delaying plotting out my scenes on a Plot Planner. The very rough and messy Plot Planner I'd sketched out when deciding to …
How to Create More Dramatic Action in Your Novel, Memoir, Screenplay
Prompt 11 in The Plot Whisperer Book of Writing Prompts: Easy Exercises to Get You Writing prompts you to introduce and develop a major antagonist for your novel, memoir, screenplay.In many character-driven stories, the antagonist that most interferes with the protagonist reaching her goal is herself -- an internal antagonist. However, by always or whenever possible, creating a secondary character or even a major viewpoint character who acts as an external antagonist allows for external action …
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Resistance to Maximizing Crisis
Not just sweet SCBWI writers experience resistance to putting their protagonists in true peril. At last Sunday's CWC Blockbuster Plots Intensive, writers of adult fiction and memoirs balked in an effort to prevent loss and trauma, disappointment and rejection, hurt and betrayal from befalling their beloved protagonists. Then today, I heard from a writer of a very successful memoir, wail about the same feelings about her character, too.Nearly every single one of the 21 writers who opted …
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