A writer I work with grapples with a problem I often see. She loves her story SO much and thinks the plot is so cool that she is afraid she is going to ruin it by writing it. Her fear, at the least, slows down her progress toward her goal. At the most, her fear prevents her from reaching her goal.Throughout a story and throughout your life, the energy of the Universal Story rises and falls.Antagonists, because their role is to prevent or delay the protagonist (and you) from successfully …
Evolution of a Book — Part Four: Plotting a Book Launch
A book launch is like a wedding, a birthday, a coming out party, a graduation. Two people present themselves as individuals and ceremoniously become a couple. We throw a party to celebrate the day we are born. Before family and friends, we introduce a child into adulthood. A book launch signifies the movement away from the private and ordinary world to the communal and part of the whole. It is a moment best marked with a party. The wildest book launch on record for me is the party for Holly …
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Evolution of a Book — Part Three: Working with an Editor
I like to think of them as potter people. People who look like us but are more eccentric, often with a flair of whimsy. They magically appear, complete a task effortlessly and disappear -- the exact right person at the exact right time. Peter Archer is a bit of a potter person to me. He also exemplifies to me an East Coast intellectual. Granted, my impressions are just that... I have never met the man. He was the editor assigned me for The Plot Whisperer: Secrets of Story Structure Any Writer …
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Backstory versus Front Story
Watch your delivery of backstory ~ the story of what, in the past, made the character who they are today (in story time). Writers want to cram everything right up front. "I know all their history, why would I want to withhold it from the reader?" "I wrote it that way." "It's the good part." Writers spend lots of time imagining and writing every little detail about a character's past, be it for a child or an adult. So, of course, writers would want to tell everything right away. Perhaps, …
2 Major Story Settings
Stories generally have at least two major settings. A story is about a character transformed over time in a meaningful way by the dramatic action. In order to make this character transformation more dramatic, writers convey who the character is within the safety of a world that is familiar to her or at least not as threatening as the next world or setting she is thrust into. The reader meets the protagonist in her usual environment and defines the beginning quarter of the story. The heart of …
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