Write Great Fiction--Plot & Structure (27 page)

QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR STORY'S ADHESIVE NATURE

• Is the conflict between the Lead and opposition
  crucial
  for both?
  
• Why can't they just walk away? What holds them together?
  

QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR SCENES

• Are the big scenes big enough? Surprising enough? Can you make them more original, unanticipated, and draw them out for all they are worth?
  
• Is there enough
  conflict
  in the scenes?
  
• What is the least memorable scene? Cut it! Now we have a
  new
  “least memorable scene.” Consider cutting it, too.
  
• What else can be
  cut
  in order to
  move the story relentlessly forward
  ?
  
• Does the
  climactic scene
  come too fast (through writer fatigue)? Can you make it more, write it for all it's worth? Set a ticking clock?
  
• Do we need a new
  minor subplot
  to build up a sagging midsection?
  

QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR MINOR CHARACTERS

• What is their purpose in the plot?
  
• Are they unique and colorful?
  

Just walk around thinking about your draft. Be careful not to bump into walls or other people.

Do this for five to seven days. Each day when you first wake up, jot down some more notes about your novel, or write things down in a journal. Take one last look at all your notes.

Some writers begin their second draft at page one and write the whole thing as if new. Others cut and paste and use lots of the original material. You'll have to see what works best for you. Only don't resist a massive rewrite just because it looks like a lot of work.

Great writing
is
a lot of work, but that being said, I don't know of any more satisfying labor.

The good news is from here on it gets easier. After the second draft is completed, set it aside for a week. Then come to it fresh and read it through. This time you will tighten or cut scenes, deepen characters, and expand or revise subplots. You have a solid story. This draft only refines it so the big elements — character, plot, scenes, theme — come through exactly the way you want them to.

Some teachers advise that you “kill your darlings.” If you are so in love with a line, they say, it probably sticks out too much. You're no longer objective. So kill it. Take it out.

“But the poor darlings,” you plead.

Use common sense. Always ask yourself if a “darling” serves the story or if it makes the reader momentarily aware of the author. If it's the latter, you know what to do: Cut it.

Finally, move on to the polish. As the name suggests, you go through and give everything that last bit of shine. Do a
scene
read-through, and ask yourself the following questions:

• Are you
  hooking
  the reader from the beginning?
  
• Are suspenseful scenes
  drawn out
  for the ultimate tension?
  
• Can any information be
  delayed
  ? This creates tension in the reader, always a good thing.
  
• Are there enough
  surprises
  ?
  
• Are character-
  reaction
  scenes deep and interesting?
  
• Read
  chapter endings
  for read-on prompts.
  
• Are there places you can replace describing how a character feels with
  actions
  ?
  
• Do I use visual,
  sensory-laden words
  ?
  

Now, do a
dialogue
read-through:

• Dialogue is almost always strengthened by cutting words within the lines. For example: “I do not want to go in there now because it looks too scary” becomes “I don't want to go in. Too scary.”
  
• In dialogue, be fair to
  both
  sides. Don't give one character all the good lines.
  
• Great dialogue surprises the reader and creates tension. View it like a game, where the players are trying to outfox each other.
  
• Can you get more
  conflict
  into dialogue, even among allies?
  

Learn to love rewriting because it's a necessary part of the craft. You are going to be a better writer every time you go through this process. And your plots will be stronger by far.

To get a feel for the revision process, take two or three chapters of a work in progress and print a fresh copy. Go through it and make the following marks in the margin:

• A checkmark if you feel the story dragging
  
• Parentheses around incomprehensible sentences
  
• A circle in the margin where you feel material may need to be added. This may be in the form of stretching out tension or making the writing less “jerky”
  
• A question mark for material that may need to be cut. This could include long expository sections or places where you're “telling” rather than “showing”
  

Look at the chapter beginnings and endings in your sample. Is there an immediate hook in the beginnings and a prompt to read on at the ends? Revise them accordingly. Play with several alternatives, and then select the best.

You can increase your awareness of revision by marking up novels you read with the symbols listed in Exercise 1. If something doesn't work for you, try to figure out why. If something
does
work, try to figure out why. This is self-teaching of the craft at a high level.

When you steal from one author it's plagiarism; if you steal from many, it's research.

— Wilson Mizner

Over the years, numerous writing instructors have pointed out recurring types of plot patterns. The number of patterns varies. Is it thirty-six? Or three?

No matter what number you prefer, it is helpful to consider different patterns if only to understand what they're trying to do. Understanding plot patterns helps you gain a clearer comprehension of plot overall.

There is another benefit to studying plot patterns — they may suggest fresh plot ideas to you. While the way a story is told belongs to an author, the pattern does not. Feel free to borrow liberally from the patterns as you brainstorm your own plots.

You can even combine patterns to create a fresh plot. That's what Dean Koontz does in
Midnight
, a combination of the film
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
and H.G.Wells's
The Island of Dr. Moreau
. He set it in a contemporary location and peopled it with his own character inventions, and there you have it — an original tale that shot up the bestseller list.

Below are some of the more prevalent plot patterns. I have not attempted to make a complete list. But these patterns seem to recur frequently, suggesting their timeless value.

This may be the oldest plot of all. A hero goes out into the dark world and searches for something. It might be for a sacred item, as in the story of Sir Galahad and the search for the Holy Grail. It might be the search for a person.

The quest for knowledge or inner peace can also form the basis of this plot pattern.
The Catcher in the Rye
is a quest plot — a young man searches for a reason to live in a world where most people are phonies.

• The Lead is someone who is incomplete in his ordinary world.
  
• The thing searched for must be of vital importance.
  
• There must be huge obstacles preventing the Lead from gaining it.
  
• The quest should result in the Lead becoming a different (usually better) person at the end; a fruitless quest, however, may end in tragedy for the Lead.
  

Act I introduces us to the Lead and shows us some inner lack that the quest will help to remedy. If there is no dissatisfaction in the Lead, then there's no believable motivation for him to go on the quest.

In
The Catcher in the Rye
, we see in various ways that Holden is not at home in his skin. He is moody, sensitive, and somewhat depressed.

The doorway of no return in Act I is the point at which the Lead commences the quest. In
Catcher
, it occurs after Holden has a fight with his roommate, Stradlater. This prompts Holden to leave school and go to New York. The quest has begun.

In a quest story, there is a series of encounters along the way, giving the plot an episodic feel. In most of these episodes, the character suffers a setback. That's the conflict. But as he struggles to overcome each setback, he moves another step closer to his objective, and thus the plot unfolds.

In
Catcher
, Holden gets a room at a hotel. He then begins a series of encounters with people in the city. There is an encounter with a prostitute and her pimp, and later with a couple of nuns. He has a date with a girl named Sally that ends badly. He gets drunk.

The quest is not going well for Holden.

The second doorway, the doorway that leads to the final act, is usually a major crisis or setback, or some discovery or major clue. In
Catcher
, Holden ends up in Central Park at night, freezing. He believes he is going to catch pneumonia and die. He has been afraid to go home for fear of what his parents will think of him. But now, thinking that death is near, he wants to see his little sister, Phoebe.

The encounter with his sister leads him to the central revelation of the book. She asks him what he wants to be, and he tells her he wants to be a catcher in the rye, an image of someone who saves children from falling off a cliff.

There is a final haunting image with Phoebe on a carousel, and a famous last chapter that leaves open the question of whether Holden has found what he was looking for.

The quest is a powerful pattern because it mirrors our own journey through life. As we encounter various challenges, we suffer setbacks and victories, but strive to move on. We all have a quest, whether we recognize it or not.

Another of the oldest plot archetypes or patterns is revenge. That is the way tribal man operated. You kill one of my brothers; I go after one of yours. Early storytellers probably inspired the tribe and trained boys with stories of heroic revenge.

Revenge is a gut-level pattern, and therefore highly emotional.

• The Lead should be sympathetic since revenge is usually violent business.
  
• The wrong done to the Lead or to someone close to the Lead is usually not his fault; if it is, the wrong is out of proportion to the fault.
  
• The desire for revenge has an effect on the Lead's inner life.
  

In Act I, the Lead and his ordinary world are introduced. This world is a place of comfort so that, when it is violently disturbed, the reader will easily accept a novel-long desire for revenge.

The disturbance to the world is
the wrong
.

Following the wrong is a period of suffering. This bonds readers to the Lead, and gives them a rooting interest in the plot to follow.

The Lead is someone who is wronged, or who is close to someone wronged. Charles Portis's
True Grit
is about a girl's revenge when her father is murdered.

The wrong can also occur when the Lead is betrayed (and often left for dead) by a person he believes is a friend or ally.
The Hunter
, by Donald E. Westlake (as Richard Stark), is an example and forms the basis for the movies
Point Blank
, starring Lee Marvin, and
Payback
, starring Mel Gibson.

Or the Lead might be set up to take the fall for a crime he did not commit, as in
The Count of Monte Cristo
, by Alexandre Dumas.

The first doorway of no return is usually when the Lead discovers who did the deed. Or, in the alternative, discovers a way to get at the wrongdoer.

The objective, as we have noted elsewhere, can take one of two forms, to get or to get away from something. In the revenge plot, it is to
get
revenge. The deeper motive is to
restore order
. A wrong has been committed, and by getting revenge the Lead hopes to balance the scales of justice.

The Lead will be opposed, usually by the machinations of the one on whom he hopes to exact revenge.

Or the opponent (in the case of Dumas's tale, three opponents) may not know what's going on. The Lead is hiding his intentions. The various confrontations he faces will amount to threats to his concealment.

Act II consists of a series of confrontations that keeps the Lead from gaining his objective. He has a chance to kill the opponent but is frustrated by some obstacle. The obstacle may be a circumstance or another character, perhaps an ally of the opponent.

So it goes, back and forth, as the Lead takes steps toward revenge and is set back.

Finally, he is given a prime opportunity — maybe it's a way to take away the opponent's own loved one, his business, or his position of power. This is the second doorway, the one leading to the climax.

Or maybe all the powers of the opponent and his allies create the biggest obstacle of all — the Lead is resoundingly defeated and almost dies.

But the Lead survives the major crisis and rebounds to complete his objective or gives it up, as suggested above.

Sometimes the Lead exacts his revenge, and it is satisfying to the reader.

Other times, he may give up his desire for a greater good — mercy or some higher good. This must satisfy the reader through the idea of sacrifice: By giving up his objective, the Lead gains something far worthier. Giving up a desire for raw revenge and replacing it with a desire that puts the greater good first actually restores the balance.

A revenge plot is a great way to explore human nature. The very real emotion of revenge is understood by all of us.

What is the best way to proceed? Is it better to personally seek cosmic justice through revenge or leave it to proper authorities? Is it better to show mercy or is mercy, in some contexts, a fool's game?