Tip of the Day
Always carry an idea book with you wherever you go. Cut out clippings from articles and magazines that you enjoy, or have words that you don't know. Use it to create lists, or even write down snipets of conversations you over hear and then turn that into a story later on.
Be sure to include images and anything that inspires you within the idea book.
Contact Us
Have comments? Got Questions? Just want to know more about us? Or tell us more about you? We wanna know and we love to tell you about ourselves.
Feel free to contact us Here
Sponsors
What is a Plot?
Mauren Evans | Editor in Chief
plot / 'plät / n.: 1. A small piece of ground, generally used for burying dead people, including writers. 2. A plan, as for designing a building or novel.
Plot happens.
You might be one of those writers who likes to have the story all worked out in your mind before you write your novel. You preplan, plan, and revise the plan before writing. Maybe you have index cards all over your wall or you store your scenes in your computer.
Or you might be one of those seat-of-the-pants writers who loves to plop down each day at the computer or over a pad of paper and just write, letting the story flow without planning, anxious to see what your wild writer’s mind comes up with.
The plot of the story is one of the most important components. Readers, agents, publishers, are all looking and ask themselves four questions when they first open your book. Whats this story about?, Why should I keep reading?, is anything happening?, and why should I care?. Some of these things are influenced by other aspects of the story but mostly by the plot. It might be a crappy, slow moving, or a keep you on the edge of your seat plot but the only question you should be asking yourself is "Does it work?".
By work I mean connect with readers. That’s the function of plot after all. The reading experience is supposed to transport people, move them through the power of story. Plot is the power grid that makes it happen.
Of course there is the "what about my Characters?" question. You might think you can just create fasicnating characters and hope for the best and who knows, people might care so much about your characters that the plot can take them anywhere it doesn't matter but most of the time thats not so.
If you want to sell your book, you need to be thinking and answering the questions the reader is asking. Why do they care whats going on? This should be the characters job. But Whats going on is definatly the plot. The plot is going to guide you through the story.
I mean whats the point of reading a story if nothing happens. To create a good plot make sure that it is planed out that all the loose ends wrap up, unless your looking for a sequl or trying to create a saga. Nobody likes to get to the end of the story and say "Wait, what happened to so and so, weren't they doing something did they just drop off the face of the earth?" Make sure that everyone, and every sub plot you start comes to a close.
n right, but is it really a story? I suppose that’s an academic debate.
But if you’re interested in selling your books, plot is something you need to wrestle with.
And wrestling makes you stronger. Even if you ultimately decide, as a writer, that you want to forget about plotting conventions, the effort to understand them will serve you well. You’ll become a better novelist.