Holly Bodger

Every plot line in a novel has five major points:

1. beginning (aka inciting incident)
2. first plot point (1st turn)
3. mid-point (2nd turn)
4. climax (everything goes to Hell)
5. resolution (big sigh)

So if you have 5 major plot lines, that would mean you have 25 plot points in your novel. Note that I’ve picked 5 just because it’s a pretty number. I usually have more like 10. But then, I also usually have cheese for dinner.

If you were to write each of these 25 points on pieces of paper and then plot them on the three-act structure, placing them in the order in which they appear, you’d come up with something like this (note that I’ve used different colors to identify different plot lines):

Still with me? Good. I would HIGHLY recommend you create one of these for your novel. Why? Because if you do, you will discover the following:

1) If you’ve included all of your plot lines on your graph, every scene in your novel will correspond to one of these boxes. Why does this matter? Because, if you can find a scene that does not correspond to one of the boxes, or connect two of the boxes, you should delete it. It’s not moving the plot forward which means it’s useless. Sorry. I know that hurt. If you think I’m wrong, then maybe you need to re-think whether or not you’ve forgotten a plot line or layer. But if the point of your scene is just to provide elevator music between plot point 2 and 3, you need to kill it.

2) There are times when one scene can be used to move multiple plots forward at once (in the graph above, these are the ones that have the same numbers such as 13 and 15). These are referred to as “big” scenes. At the beginning of your novel, you don’t want too many scenes like this, but as the novel moves forward, you want more of them. When you reach the climax, there is nothing better than if you can get as many plots to intersect as possible. This creates what Blake Snyder calls the “All Is Lost” feeling. If you’ve drawn your graph and can’t find any overlapping numbers, try to see if you can combine two by making two things happen at once (or by making one thing create two outcomes). This will tighten your plot.

3) Plots generally need to open and close in a nested fashion. You will notice above the the B plot (in black) opens later in the novel and closes earlier. Conversely, the BIG plot (green) opens at the very beginning and closes at the very end.

4) There is nothing more confusing to a reader than a book that constantly hops between different plot lines. This is why you want to see “chunks”. For example, in the graph above, you will see that 7-10 and 13-16 relate to only two plot lines.

If you haven’t done this before, I would HIGHLY recommend you try it. I would also HIGHLY recommend you try gorgonzola. To die for. Seriously.

At the university I attended, it was a requirement that all Arts majors take a first year Philosophy course called Reasoning and Critical Thinking. While I enjoyed this course, at the time, I didn’t see how it could possibly be useful in my future. I was wrong. Dead wrong.

The main point of the course was to teach students how to recognize errors in reasoning or “fallacies”. Fabulous but how was this supposed to help me write a novel? Well, in most novels, there is some kind of mystery that keeps the reader hooked. Something like, Why did Bob leave a great job to take a crappy job? While there are other plots going on, the point of this one is just to keep the reader interested in the answer. Because of this, you have to do everything you can to NOT give away the secret until the end or near end. After all, it wouldn’t be much of a mystery if you asked why Bob moved on page one and then told us it was because he got fired for stealing on page two. At the same time, it is not very interesting to just have the mystery unsolved because the MC doesn’t try to solve it or because no one will tell her the answer. You need it to be a quest for the answer. A quest with twists and turns; times when she thinks she know but doesn’t…that kind of thing.

So how can you prevent your MC (and reader) from finding out the secret? You can use a fallacy in the MC’s reasoning. There are many fallacies you can use (I’d recommend reading this page  if you want to see them all) but I am going to concentrate on four for now:

1) The Red Herring: This is a fallacy in which topic B is presented in order to divert attention from topic A. For example, maybe your MC wants to find out why Bob took this crappy job when he had a great job before. The logical assumption is that Bob did something to get himself fired, but then Suzie comes along and implies that Bob had a relationship with Linda, forcing your MC to divert her attention to Bob’s personal life rather than his work performance. The main character then spends the entire book trying to find out what happened to make Bob want to get away from Linda, only to find out that his departure had nothing to do with Linda.

2) Guilt by Association: This is a fallacy in which a person rejects a claim simply because it is pointed out that people she dislikes accept the claim. Using the same example, the MC wants to know why Bob left his job. MC’s worst enemy is Peter and Peter says Bob left because he stole money. MC dismisses claim because she hates Peter.

3) Poisoning the Well: This sort of reasoning involves trying to discredit what a person might later claim by presenting unfavorable information about the person making it. Using the same example, your MC wants to know why Bob left his job. Suzie lies about A, B, and C, so when she tells the MC why Bob left, the MC doesn’t believe her. This is very similar to #2 except the information is dismissed because of Suzie’s credibility rather than a dislike for Suzie.

4) Circular Reasoning (aka, Begging the Question): This is a fallacy in which the premises include the claim that the conclusion is true or (directly or indirectly) assume that the conclusion is true. Using the example above, Peter tells the MC that he is sure Bob was fired because everyone believes that Bob was fired. When the MC asks everyone why they believe it, they say because Peter told them it was true.

In all examples above, the MC needs to break down the fallacies as the novels develops. Using #4 as an example, Peter might tell her that Bob was fired in Act 1. Then, in Act 2, she might get suspicious and ask Peter how he knows. He would tell her that Suzie and Barb believe it, so it must be true. MC then goes along thinking she has solid evidence, but something makes her question it again so she goes back to ask Suzie and Barb how they know. That’s when they tell her that Peter told them and the whole thing falls apart.

In my next post, I will discuss how Trigonometry can help you with your character arc. Okay, maybe not…

Giving descriptive text of the character who is speaking is a great way to add further detail to dialogue, while at the same time letting the reader know who is speaking. For example, you could write:

“That’s my cup,” said Bob. “Give it back.”

But it would be better if you wrote:

Bob narrowed his focus on the chipped, blue mug in my hand. “That’s my cup. Give it back.”

The second example gives the reader more information about the situation between the main character and Bob. There are three possible placements for descriptive text within dialogue:

1) Before the dialogue

Bob narrowed his focus on the chipped, blue mug in my hand. “That’s my cup. Give it back.”

2) After the dialogue

“That’s my cup. Give it back.” Bob narrowed his focus on the chipped, blue mug in my hand.

3) In the middle of the dialogue

“That’s my cup.” Bob narrowed his focus on the chipped, blue mug in my hand. “Give it back.”

You can and should use a variety of these placements in your writing, but note the following rules:

a) Before the dialogue is the best choice if the reader has no idea who is speaking as you want to give that information as soon as possible. Otherwise, the reader has to rethink the dialogue after they figure it out and this pulls them out of the flow.

b) After the dialogue is the best choice if you want to go on to a longish description of Bob’s actions. But if what you are giving are physical actions (like above) consider the placement carefully. People tend to physically react before they speak. For example, if something shocked you, your eyes would grow wide before you said “Wow! I can’t believe that!” You wouldn’t say “Wow! I can’t belive that!” and then widen your eyes when you stopped speaking. But if you put the physical description after the dialogue, that is what it means.

c) In the middle of the dialogue is the best choice when you want to break the flow of the dialogue in order to slow down the pace or give the reader time to consider what has been said. This is not a good choice when the speaker is supposed to be saying something that needs to remain unbroken (for example, a screaming rant) because it essentially acts like a pause.

If you are ever unsure which of these to use, take your dialogue and descriptions and act them out. The one that feels most natural is probably the right choice.

I love a good love triangle. Nothing more intriguing than the whole “one dog, two bones” kinda struggle. But here’s the problem: it’s really hard to do a love triangle well. Why? Because you need more than just one girl and two guys. A good love triangle requires the following:

1) A main character who wants a mate, even if she won’t admit it (in fact, it’s even better if she won’t admit it!)

2) Mate option A: someone who appeals to the MC. The reader must believe that this person could make the MC happy, but if he’s already in her life, he can’t actually be doing so. And if he’s new to her life, he has to be failing somewhere. This is very important.  There must be a hole.

3) Mate option B: someone who appeals to the MC in a way that fills the hole created by A. The reader must believe that B can make the MC happy as well. Note that the MC cannot meet B before the relationship with A is established nor can she flip back to thinking about A while the relationship with B is being established. This is really important. Both relationships need to be fully and independently established before the tension starts. Otherwise, the reader will not believe that either relationship will work (plus she might think the MC is flighty). Think about the Twilight series here. Stephenie Meyer pretty much spent all of book 1 establishing the relationship with Edward and then all of book 2 establishing the one with Jacob. The real pull between them doesn’t start until book 3.

4) A situation that makes the MC see a hole in B while showing A in a new light. This is the flip back. You can do it more than once but be careful you don’t do it too often or you’ll create the flighty MC again.

5) A situation that forces the MC to make an irrevocable choice between A and B. This means that A can’t be sitting around saying, “Even if you choose B, I will still love you and wait for you forever.” Why? Because if the MC thinks she can change her mind later, then the choice doesn’t matter. She needs to believe that her choice is final.

So there you have it. One girl, two different but equally viable and convincing options, and an irrevocable choice.

A plot line is basically a story line in a book. It has an arc and must cross multiple chapters. It doesn’t have to appear in every scene, and–with the exception of the BIG plot–it does not have to start in the first chapter and get wrapped up in the last.

How many plot lines should you have? Honestly, I think it depends on your book, but here are the ones I always have:

1) The BIG plot. Every book needs a plot line in which all of the characters are interested. This is the mystery that keeps the characters (and readers) hooked for the whole book. For example, who shot Jim?

2) The small plot.  This is another plot line that affects everyone in the book, but this one is less important and perhaps more trivial. It can be used for the times when you need the MC to forget about the BIG plot. It also helps provide more depth to the book so it doesn’t seem like everyone is literally obsessed with the BIG plot. For example, everyone wants to find out who shot Jim but they are also puzzled by the disappearance of Bob’s dog. In the end, these plot lines will intersect and we will discover that Bob’s dog ran away when the murderer accidentally let him out.

3) The B story. This is the secondary plot and in many books, it’s the romance. For example, will Sue and Tony get together? This plot line affects two (or more) characters but not everyone in the book. It usually starts at the beginning of Act 2 and wraps up before the ending of the BIG plot. Why? Because it’s better to nest your plots (meaning, wrap up the minor ones before the major ones).

4) The back story plot.This is the “what really happened to get the MC here” story. So if your MC is trying to solve the murder, you can have a sub-plot about why she got the case in the first place. The point of this plot line is to give the MC’s back story with a purpose. Sure, you can just tell the reader what happened to her when she was 12, 13, etc…, but it will be more interesting if you make the reader WANT the back story.

5) The MC’s outer goal. This is the thing the MC is trying to achieve in the book. For example, get a promotion. Other characters will influence this plot line (especially the antagonist who is the main person trying to thwart it!)

6) The MC’s inner goal. This is what is referred to as the character arc and it is THE MOST IMPORTANT PART OF THE BOOK! This is the thing the MC wants internally. For example, to finally feel accepted by her father. In certain genres (like YA and Women’s fiction) people read for the character arc. If you don’t have this, the book is blah.

7+) The secondary characters’ arcs. If you have secondary characters, they will have much more depth if you give them their own arcs. For example, the best friend really wants a job as a hand model. In my last book, I had these for each secondary character.

That brings us to 10 (for me). This may seem like a lot, but if you map them out in a graph with the key points noted for each Act, you will find it’s not hard to use this many at all. Well, not until your agent tells you to change #2 and the whole thing falls like a deck of cards. Not that I would know…*rushes to clean up cards on floor*…*just kidding*.

The last time I needed a new idea for a book, I had an online brainstorming session with one of my crit partners. We basically exchanged a bunch of weird questions until we came up with some real ideas. I don’t want to list all of the questions here because frankly, the ones that resulted in what seemed like a brilliant idea about a girl who has an affair with cheese, well, they’re just wrong. Instead, I will give you the ones I found most helpful.

1) What’s your favourite book, TV show or movie and why? Who are your favourite characters from these? What characteristics make you love them? Make you hate them?
2) Name the 5 most pivotal moments and decisions in your life. How did they change you?
3) Name the 5 most pivotal people in your life. Why are they so influential?

Answers from #1 and #3 help you create the kind of characters you will enjoy writing about (and hopefully, ones that others will enjoy reading about). Answers from #2  go directly to the root of  WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW.  Often, people mistake this tip for settings. For example, you once worked at a Starbucks and thus should write a book about someone who works at a Starbucks. I’m not saying you shouldn’t do this but if you do, you are missing the real gems here. WHAT YOU KNOW is more about the experiences you’ve had that have shaped you into the person you are. The most important of these experiences are listed in your answers to #2. These are the kinds of things we want to see in a character arc. 

Because I like to use examples, here are some of my answers to the above questions (sorry, but I’m not giving my top ones to #2):

1. Bridget Jones’ Diary (book and movie). I love Bridget for being funny and for not taking herself too seriously. I love that she is flawed but doesn’t let that stop her from trying to find love and success.
2. When I was 14, the first boy I thought I loved told me he wanted to date me but also wanted to date another girl at the same time. He was older than me and a total Adonis. Dating him would have been like a fast-track to popularity. I wanted to say, “Okay” but instead, I told him where he could go. And it wasn’t somewhere nice. This moment was pivotal because it made me realize that I couldn’t love someone who didn’t respect me…a pretty harsh lesson at 14.
3. My sister because she knows what she wants and gets it.

The next step is to take these answers and see if you can put them together into an idea for a book. Using my above example, I could write about a girl who is funny like Bridget (#1), experiences #2 while surrounded by someone like #3.

Make sense?

There are several points of view (POV) that can be used for writing fiction, but only two are normally used: first-person and third-person.

First-person is when you write a story from the POV of one character in the story. For example:

The alarm woke me out of a deep sleep. I stumbled out of bed, flicking on the TV on the way to the kitchen.

Third-person is when you write the story from outside one or more characters. For example:

The alarm woke Bob out of a deep sleep. He stumbled out of bed, flicking on the TV on his way to the kitchen.

In this post, I am going to talk about third-person because that is where I see the most mistakes. There are two kinds of third-person: omniscient and limited. An omniscient narrator knows everything about every character while a limited narrator only sees the perspective of one character at a time.  How is this a problem, you ask? It’s a problem because some writers think they can use both omniscient and limited in the same book, while the truth is that, most third-person books are limited. Why? Because omniscient can be dull. People generally read fiction because they want to experience one character’s life, not because they want to watch several character’s lives, but experience none of them.

So how do you know if you are acting like an omniscient narrator, rather than a limited one? A limited one would only ever see things through one character at a time. Yes, it’s possible to change characters in different scenes, but you can still only be in one head at a time. If not, you get something like this:

Bob sat down at the table and looked at Susan. She wondered why he was staring at her. He picked up his coffee mug and took a sip. Susan did the same, choking on the disgusting liquid Bob passed off as coffee.

My reaction to this kind of paragraph is, WHAT THE HELL? The writer is trying to be in two heads at once, but the reader can’t do that. The reader can either “see” the scene from Bob’s eyes or he can “see” it from Susan’s eyes. He can’t see it from both. If the writer wanted to see the world from outside both of the characters (omniscient), it would sound like this:

Bob sat down at the table and looked at Susan. He picked up his coffee mug and took a sip. Susan did the same, choking on the liquid as it oozed down her throat.

Notice that we aren’t in anyone’s head in the passage above. We are watching it, like TV. If this same paragraph were TRULY third-person limited, it would sound like this:

Bob sat down at the table and looked at Susan. Why was she frowning again? He picked up his coffee mug and took a sip. She mimicked him, only she choked as she took a sip. Probably her way of telling him he’d used too much grounds again.

This last example is written from Bob’s perspective. The ONLY difference between this and first-person is that Bob is not “I”. If he was, it would say:

I sat down at the table and looked at Susan. Why was she frowning again? I picked up my coffee mug and took a sip. She mimicked me, only she choked as she took a sip. Probably her way of telling me I’d used too much grounds again.

See? The perspective of third-person limited is the same as first-person. This is a REALLY REALY REALLY (did I mention REALLY?) important lesson if you are writing third-person limited. You have to remember that you are still writing from one character’s perspective. You are NOT writing from your own. Why? BECAUSE YOU ARE NOT IN THE BOOK!

If you are writing third-person and are worried that you are crossing into omniscient or, worse, head jumping, take a section of your manuscript and re-write it from the perspective of one character. If you find any text that your character cannot know or does not experience, DELETE IT! NOW! Do not pass GO. Do not stop for a Grande, non-fat, Tazo Chai. Actually, I take that back. But get me one too…

Let me start by saying that, for me, red-eye flights are like perms: great idea until you get home and look in the mirror. Okay, enough about what my therapist calls The Perm of 92…

Rather than write one post on scenes, I’ve decided to cover the required elements separately, starting with the setting. Settings tell the reader where the action is taking place. For example, a bedroom, a car, a field. Every scene needs a setting and it should be defined right at (or near) the beginning of the scene. In my experience, there are three ways to define a setting:

1) The setting blurb. This is when the author writes a paragraph describing the setting. For example:

The school cafeteria was a basic, square room. Fluorescent lights beamed throughout the room, which was packed with beige tables sitting on top of a beige linoleum floor. Even the walls were beige.

2) Setting with perspective. This is when the author sets the scene from the perspective of a character. For example:

The moment I walked into the square room known as the school cafeteria, the fluorescent lights beamed in my eyes. I looked around the room. It was packed with beige tables sitting on top of a beige linoleum floor. Even the walls were beige.

3) Setting with reaction. This is when the author sets the scene using the reaction of a character. For example:

I rushed into the square room known as the school cafeteria, squinting the moment the fluorescent lights pierced through my retina. Great. Every single one of the beige tables was full. Well, except for the one where Laney Smith sat. Guess it would be another one of those days where my lunchtime conversation was about as exciting as the cafeteria’s beige walls.

Personally, I think the third one is best because it gives us the setting while also telling us how that setting affects the main character. Without this, we have detail without meaning, which to me, reads something like “blah blah blah, beige walls, blah blah blah”. But with it, we are drawn even closer into the character’s head, which is exactly where you want the reader to be.

To implement this in your own writing, I’d suggest you identify the details in your scenes and then ask yourself these questions: 1) Who is experiencing this detail? 2) How is it affecting them? and 3) Why should the reader care? If you cannot answer all three of these items, select the detail and then press the Delete key until it is gone.

Let me start this post by saying that, most of the time, I’m sharing things as I learn them, which is my roundabout way of saying that I haven’t always taken my own advice. Yet. But enough about cutting cheese from my diet…

I love dialogue. LOVE IT. I wrote the first draft of my most recent novel entirely in dialogue. Yes, I went back later to add some actions and feelings & crap like that (because I now know that is the secret to the breakout novel. Dialogue + actions + feelings & crap like that = winner!) I digress. Already. And I haven’t even had any cheese today. *sigh*

When I first started writing, I thought dialogue should go something like this:

“Do you have a pen?” I asked.

“Yes, I do,” replied Bob.

Sometime after I used book 1 for kindling, a crit partner told me to kill all of my dialogue tags (italics above) and use action instead. So, in book 2, I ended up with something more like this:

I turned to Bob. “Do you have a pen?”

He opened his backpack and removed a blue Bic. “Yes, I do.”

Better? Yes. The problem is that, by book 3, I discovered I was giving TOO MANY actions (see earlier post on Stage Directions). So, in book 4, I tried to use a mix of half tags, half actions, and got something like this:

“Do you have a pen?” I asked.

Bob opened his backpack and removed a blue Bic. “Yes, I do.”

Well, then my fabulous crit partner pointed out a BIG problem. My characters were too flat and robotic. I had the dialogue, I had the actions, but I was missing the F&CLT (feelings & crap like that).  So now, I am revising books 3 & 4 so the dialogue looks more like this:

“Do you have a pen?” My voice was apologetic. It’s not that I didn’t know I needed a pen before class. Of course I knew. Why else would I be begging for a Bic, five seconds before our History quiz was about to start.

Bob handed me one of the seventeen pens from his ink-stained pocket. His face said, “I’m never going to see this again, am I?”

I wrapped my fingers around the plastic shaft. My forced smile said it all. No, Bob. That you are not.

I’ll be back when I’m done making these revisions. Should be around, say, 2043?

We’ve all heard the expression, Show, Don’t Tell.  If you’re new to writing or have been living under a rock, this means that you should show a character’s actions and emotions, rather than tell them. For example, this is telling:

Bob looked embarrassed.

And this is showing:

Bob’s cheeks went red as he cast his glance on his dusty shoes.

The problem with this rule is that, sometimes, you have to break it. For example, if you’re writing in first person, you can’t say:

My face went red.

Why? Because unless you have a mirror, you have no idea that your face is red. You can know it feels hot, but you can’t know it’s red.

Having said that, sometimes, you can’t just show a character’s emotions in first person. Why? Because when you’re in someone’s head, you have to think like them and they would not think, “Wow, my face feels hot,” unless they are daft and don’t know what embarrassment feels like. They would think, “Holy crap. This is more embarrassing than the time I walked into the glass window pane of a nice restaurant in Hawaii.” Not that I’ve ever done that. Well, not since the 80’s…

So how do you know when to show and when to tell? Put yourself in the character’s shoes. Pretend whatever is happening just happened to you. For example, you’re out for a nice dinner with a friend. You walk up to the front of a restaurant, which looks like it’s completely open. But as you cross the threshold of the entrance, your face smashes into the glass. Every single person stares at you, except for your best friend who has fallen on the sidewalk in a fit of laughter.

What is the first thing that goes through you mind?

a) Man, my face looks red.
b) Man, my face feels hot.
c) How quickly can I get to the airport?

For me, it was C. Or, it would have been if I had ever walked into the window pane of a restaurant in Hawaii. Which I haven’t. Recently.