What others say about Build a Better Story:
"...A unique approach to creating a story. Written in plain English…" Jan Clark
"The text is written in an easy to read and understand style. I can see how this book would benefit authors, especially new authors. I highly recommend this book to all writers." Readers Favorite
"Build a Better Story is the perfect companion for anyone looking to start writing fiction. The explanations are clear and to the point, and help to simplify the many complexities that are necessary to transform a good story into a great one. With hints and tips to prevent those ‘first-timer’ mistakes, this book is essential for new writers and old hands alike." Emma Walker
BUILD A BETTER STORY
By Hank Quense
Published by Strange Worlds Publishing at Smashwords 2010
©2010 Hank Quense
All Rights Reserved.
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
First Publication
ISBN 978-0-615-35369-2
Published in the United States of America
Published by Hank Quense
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Story Construction
Chapter 3: Motivation
Chapter 4: Patience
Chapter 5: Character Development
Chapter 6: Plotting a Story
Chapter 7: Daytime TV
Chapter 8: Writing Humor
Chapter 9: Writing a Scene
Chapter 10: Point of View
Chapter 11: Setting
Chapter 12: Getting Started
Chapter 13: Writing Tips
Chapter 14: Odds & Ends
Chapter 15: Story Construction Flow Charts
Chapter 16: Books on Writing
Chapter 17: Writing Forms
Chapter 18: About the Author
Chapter 19: And in Conclusion
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION:
This book is primarily aimed at the writer trying to master the craft of story telling and fiction writing. It will also be useful to experienced writers as a refresher course to correct the slovenly writing habits that we all fall into over time.
The premise behind this book is that stories don't pop into the author's head fully formed. A story is the product of many hours of patient work on the different facets that are needed to build a compelling story. These major facets include character building, plotting, motivation and finally, story design or construction. The book addresses those facets and simplifies the author's struggle by including design forms that can be used to guide the processes of character and plot development.
I'm sure some people will claim I am stifling creativity with a design process. I disagree. Nothing in my process stifles creativity; rather the process channels the creative ideas so that more time is available to the author to be creative.
Trying to write a first draft before the preliminary work is like an artist trying to paint a picture without preparing the canvas by drawing lines of perspective and drawing an outline copied from paper sketches. My process details how an author should 'prepare the canvas.'
I realize the process I describe won't satisfy every writer. Many of them will feel they can't get their mind to adapt to my way of working through a story design. That's cool. For them, I say take whatever you find practical and use it. Ignore the rest.
Some of these articles have been previously published in writing journals online or in print magazines. They are incorporated into the appropriate chapters and other material added to amplify the topic.
Many of the issues addressed here are the ones that writing books and manuals either gloss over or explain using a wealth of technical-sounding gibberish. My approach uses plain language and gives simple examples to explain these concepts.
If you have a specific question about the material in this book, you can email at hanque99 at verizon dot net and I'll try to answer them.
Recently, I discussed fiction writing on the Newbie Writer Discussion Forum. Here is a link to the main page of the site (http://www.newbiewriters.com/). My comments generated some relevant discussion and I have incorporated my answers into the material when appropriate. The site is an excellent place for new or inexperienced writers to get support and help. I highly recommend it.
This book is dedicated to all the many writers who taught me how to write fiction by critiquing my early, pathetic attempts to write a short story.
Author Jan Clark provided me with inestimable help on certain topics for which I am grateful.
CHAPTER TWO
STORY CONSTRUCTION
© 2008 Hank Quense
Originally published by Absolute Write June 2008
As a subscriber to several fiction-writing newsgroups, I see messages asking for advice on a problem that crops up repeatedly. The writer -- inspired by an idea, character, event or scene -- drops all other writing projects and throws herself into creating the first draft of the new story. After fifteen hundred words or so, the writer finds the story has run out of steam and she is unable to get it going again. I have done this more than a few times myself and can sympathize with the sense of disappointment that follows. This frustration led me to revise the way I approach a new story. I believe this approach can benefit other authors by eliminating the time and effort wasted in writing these dead-end stories.
My premise is that writers have to resist the urge to start a new story draft as soon as they get an idea because the process of constructing a story involves a great deal of work that must be done before writing the manuscript. Writing the initial draft is the last step in the process, not the first. Think of the manuscript as the roof on a new building. The builder can’t start the roof until the foundation and walls are in place. Similarly, a writer shouldn’t start the manuscript until all the elements -- foundation and walls -- of the story are finished.
To illustrate the process, let’s suppose I get this great (and unoriginal) idea for a story: Brutal aliens invade Earth. I first start an electronic file to hold notes on the story. Inevitably, a new idea produces a blizzard of ideas on an opening scene, the characters, settings, scenes, plots, snippets of dialog, possible confrontations. All I do at this point is enter them into the file. Once I judge I have enough material, I begin work on the story, but I do so in a fashion that is the opposite of the practice of writing the draft as the first step. My initial priority is to determine an acceptable ending.
By acceptable, I mean one that is believable to me, the writer, as well as to a reader. I often come up with endings that I think won’t satisfy a reader who has agreed to suspend belief for the course of the story. While struggling for this ending, I’ll think up more bits of plots or dialog or scene settings, but there is no guarantee any of these bits will be in the manuscript because I don’t yet know the ending. Consequently, I can’t tell if this material is appropriate for the story.
Why is the ending so important? As Robert McKee tells us in his book Story, much of the story construction is backward, working from the climax to the beginning. This ensures that the dialog, the scenes and the conflict move the reader from the opening of the story to the final action. It also guarantees that all the plot way-points will be consistent and without detours. This illustrates the main problem in trying to write a story before knowing the ending: an author can’t point the reader towards the conclusion of the story; it doesn’t exist yet! This way of working will always result in a vast amount of rewriting once the ending is finally discovered, since much of the initial writing will no longer be germane to the story, if an ending even develops.
For our hypothetical story, once I come up with the ending, I summarize the story in a single sentence: Character X outwits brutal alien invaders and saves the world only to discover his maternal grandmother was an alien infiltrator. The importance of this sentence is that it channels the characters’ activities as they move to the climax of the story. For instance, Character X -- the protagonist -- has to outwit the invaders. Therefore, killing them all in an explosion will violate the summary. The ending and story summarization may also effect the character sketches I have made. If I have previously thought of X as a muscle man, I now know he will need more brain than brawn to stay within the parameters of the story.
If I haven’t already done it, my next step is to fill in the cast of characters so I develop Character Y as X’s sidekick and Z as the alien commander who will be the antagonist.
With these characters in place, I need a plot problem for X and Z to fight over. In this case, it’s quite obvious that the plot problem is to get the aliens to leave Earth and, in most instances, grasping the plot problem is easy once you have discovered the ending.
Now I can develop a plot that has X trying to defeat Z, only to fail. Several times. Finally, in desperation, X tries again and succeeds (or not!). As the plot unfolds, I ensure that it moves the story towards my preconceived ending. Any encounters or action that don’t satisfy this requirement are removed because they are wordy distractions.
By now, I have a great sense of the story, the characters and the ending and I use all these to write a story synopsis. This is a four to eight paragraph summary of the story as I see it. In effect, this is a road map for telling the story and reaching the climax. It also serves a check on the story itself. If the summary doesn’t satisfy me as a writer and a reader, then the story construction needs more work. As a preview of the story, I ask myself if someone would want to read this? If I can’t honestly answer ‘yes’, then it’s back to the construction process. This underscores the big advantage to the process. If the summary shows the need for more work, I have only invested a few hundred words on it rather than thousands on a completed short story. For instance, in a story I’m now working on, the story summary showed the ending to be dull but it had a rousing action scene in the middle of the story. Since the climax has to be the best part of the story, I lifted the middle scene and put it at the end. This change required less than five minutes of work. If I didn’t see this problem until after I completed the manuscript, it would have required a lengthy revision to accomplish the same change.
I must emphasize that the story summary is a critically important step because if the summary doesn’t sing, neither will the story.
The final step is to develop the scenes in the story. The story synopsis provides a guide to determine how many scenes will be required. Some stories will need only one or two and others may require six or seven scenes to tell the complete short story. This is where I also decide how to space the description of the characters, allocating material to the different scenes so the descriptions don’t come in a clump that stops the action. Ideally, each scene will take place in a different location so setting ideas have to be developed and sketched out here as well.
Finally, I’m ready to write the first draft that threatens to burst out of me and the writing sessions are fun. Most often I can get a complete draft of four to five thousand words written in three sessions. After that comes the pain of editing and revision, followed by the agony of marketing.
Since no two writers are alike there can be no single process that will be right for everyone. This is the process that works best for me and I’ve developed it over several years of trial and error. Some writers will see merits in parts of it and can adapt those aspects that will work for them. The process works equally well for short stories or for novels. With novels, I repeat the process for each main plot and each subplot.
At the present time, I have notes and character sketches for over a dozen potential stories. None of these stories has an ending (yet!) and consequently, I haven’t written a single word of the manuscript (yet!). A recent story I completed involved a character and a situation I developed over two years ago. During that time, I could never find a fitting climax nor could I come up with the character’s motivation. Earlier this year, I reviewed my notes again and the ending and the motivation popped into my head. Then and only then, did I move into the next steps of story construction. Not all stories take this long. Frequently, the time from initial concept to finished draft of a short story takes place rather quickly.
Some authors may object to this process because it reduces writing a story to a series of chores; simply fill in the forms. On the surface, it may seem this way, but this process doesn’t replace creativity, it guides it so it is concentrated on developing the necessary story elements.
This method will seem restrictive to other writers who want to listen to their characters and follow their lead, but it really isn’t. What this process does is channel these characters so they don’t wander away from the story and take the writer on an unnecessary journey. I find there is plenty of room for the characters to roam around, but their rambles will be confined to the story that I constructed. This effectively prevents the characters from moving onto a different story. After all, who is on charge of telling the story? The author or the characters? In my stories, I am.
STORY CONSTRUCTION NOTES:
STORY CLIMAX
The key purpose of all this construction activity is to produce a tightly woven structure that leads the reader on the path from the beginning to the conclusion of the story. This climax must be the best and strongest part of the story. As much as seventy to eighty percent of the author's struggles and activities is to design and bring the climax to fruition. If the reader remembers anything about the story, it must be the climax.
If you develop a great climax, you may have to change the characters or some of the action to make the climax credible. For instance, a climax filled with the protag fighting the bad guy in a ten-page long duel with knifes, bricks and tree limbs during a blinding snowstorm won't sit well with the reader if the protag is an elderly, feeble man. In this case, you'll have to change the age and description of the story's hero. While this example is deliberately exaggerated, in reality the necessary changes will be much more subtle and these changes may be hard to find, but the author has to find them before editors, or readers, do.
CONTROLLING IDEA
Along with developing all this material, there is one other component that I spend a lot of time on. This has to do with the climax of the story. In some of the other chapters I emphasized the need to establish the story's ending in advance of starting the first draft. Initially, it may be sufficient to say, "bad guy dies: end of story," but the climax has to be the best part of the tale, so this brief phrase has to be expanded into an action scene or scenes that will keep the reader turning the pages. How I approach the expanded view of the climax is to develop what Robert McKee (in Story pp. 115-117) calls the "Controlling idea." Essentially, this consists of two components: a character value and the cause that produced that value. The first is the primary value that the character experiences at the conclusion of the story and the cause is the mechanism that brought that value into being. These two components are then expressed as a single sentence. This sentence is the Controlling Idea and it controls the entire story, since the single most important purpose of the story is lead the reader to this ending. The story line mentioned above should begin with controlling idea and focus on directing the story to the climax.
As an example, here is what I used in a fantasy/scifi novel:
Drakin's (the Protag) Value: Life is good
The Cause behind this Value: working together to save their world, Drakin and Higginbottom (Drakin's main squeeze) come close together.
Controlling idea: In defeating the invaders, Drakin & Higginbottom find true love
STORY CONSTRUCTION FLOW CHART
In Chapter Fifteen, I constructed a flow chart that illustrates the process of constructing a story. It blends all the concepts in succeeding chapters into an orderly and easy to use pictorial direction. It can be printed and used to monitor your progress as you build your story. Another application is to use it as road map to direct your efforts to the important aspects of story design.
STORY DESIGN APPLICATION
I deliberately paced this chapter in front of the book because I believe it is most important material in the book. Once the other elements of a story have been developed, it will be time to apply these principles. With the characters, setting and plot in hand, the author is ready to begin constructing the story with the ultimate aim of writing the first draft.
Good luck on your project.
FURTHER READING
Story: Robert McKee: Part 3
Writing to the Point: Algis Budrys: pp. 9-17
Creating Short Fiction: Damon Knight: pp.31-102
CHAPTER THREE
MOTIVATION
© 2008 Hank Quense
Originally Published by Writing World September 2008
INTRODUCTION
How many times has this happened to you? You’re in the middle of a story and suddenly, you stop to ask yourself; "Why did the character do that?" The lack of motivation by the character has jerked you out of the story and has you scratching your head.
Try watching a TV show with the sound turned off. You can see the actors moving around and performing, but you can't understand what motivates them. Why did that actor jump into a pool with his clothes on? Why did the woman slap the guy's face? You don't know, and that lack of understanding limits your ability to enjoy the show. So too novels or short stories; without understanding the motivation of the characters, the reader will never enjoy the story.
A character's motivation is a stealth trait. Readers don't examine stories looking for the motivational aspects. However, they instinctively know when they aren't there. They'll know the story is flawed and will stop reading.
While motivation isn’t a visible trait like a character's physical features, it is essential to supporting the readers suspension of belief. Motivation provides the rationale on why a character -- especially the protagonist -- does the things he does in the story. This is never more important then when the protagonist deliberately puts himself in harm’s way. If the reader doesn’t understand the motivation driving the character to face the danger, the reader won’t believe in the story, and they will conclude the entire episode is contrived.
Motivation can be a straightforward desire to achieve a goal or it can be a stew of complex and often competing beliefs and moralities. The longer the story, the more time must be spent developing motives and the more complicated they can be.
This article discusses two types of motivational issues. One is related to bits of action in a scene and the other is the character's driving force that propels the story forward.
MINOR MOTIVATIONAL ISSUES
These are the character's reaction to the events within the scene.
As an example of a minor motivational problem consider this scene: the protagonist, Jack, is walking along the street when he sees Character B. This character is new and hasn't been introduced to the reader.
"Jack!" Character B calls out. "How you doing, Dude?"
Jack frowns and doesn't reply right away. Finally he says, "I'm okay." Jack turns and stomps off without looking back.
The motivational issue here is that the reader doesn't understand why Jack acted the way he did. No rational is given for the reaction, consequently, the reader is perplexed, wondering why Jack doesn't like B. This type of situation occurs quite frequently in stories written by inexperienced writers. As soon as Jack frowns, the author has to fill in the reader on the situation.
These bits of the scene involve two elements: action and reaction. The action doesn't always need a motive to be believable and sometimes the reaction doesn't need it either. If a character sees a runaway car headed for him and the character reacts by diving out of the way, his motivation will be assumed by the reader; he's trying to save his life. However, if the character stands his ground, pulls out a gun and blasts away at the car, the reader will want to know why he's risking his life, and why he's trying to kill the driver. It is the author's responsibility to ensure motivation is provided when necessary.
MAJOR MOTIVATIONAL ISSUES
The motivation that makes the story tick is the rational on why the protagonist attempts to solve the plot problem. When faced with a difficult and possible life-threatening problem, the reader demands the protagonist show a strong motive for risking his life. If the protagonist puts himself into danger because he has nothing better to do, the story won't hold a reader's interest. For that matter, it won't hold an editor's interest either.
Suppose someone shoots at a protagonist who jumps behind a forklift, the reader will understand why he did that, but the reader also has to understand the more basic motivations. These include; Why was the character in the warehouse with the shooter? Did he go there deliberately or accidentally? Is he trying to provoke the shooter? These issues go to the reasons or situations that drive the character not just in the scene, but throughout the entire story, whether it is a short story or a novel.
The reasons the protagonist undertakes to solve the plot problem goes to his inner character. Something deep inside drives the character to strive to rescue the kidnapped woman, slay the dragon, challenge the alien invaders or track down the mass murderer.
There are several aspects of inner characterization that must be addressed if the motivation is to be convincing.
CONSISTENCY WITH CHARACTER'S PERSONA
Motivation is more complex than simply telling the reader why a character acted in particular fashion: the reason must fit the character's persona. In other words, a character’s motivation has to be consistent with the character’s personal belief system and internal disposition. Suppose a timid, shy character is in love with a woman and wants to marry her. The author can’t have the man charge into a crowded restaurant and sweep the girl off her feet with a display of wit and charm. No matter how much he loves the girl and wants to marry her, his nature will prevent him from using such public methods. He will have to use subtlety in a quiet, uncrowded place to keep the reader turning pages. In this way, his motivation and his persona are consistent.
Another aspect of consistency is the value of the reward versus the cost to achieve the reward. Expending vast resources to achieve a modest goal is difficult for the reader to believe in unless the author makes a convincing case on how important the goal is to the character.
While a character can (and should) change over the course of a story, the change must be accompanied by suitable motivation. This change must result from the internal conflict between two opposing aspects of the character such as fear and courage. If a character displays indecisive, weak-kneed behavior throughout the story, he can’t, at the end, become decisive and strong-willed unless the readers is shown a healthy dose of inner anguish as the characters competing aspects slug it out.
PHILOSOPHICAL OUTLOOK
A character's personal philosophy affects her reaction to events in the story. The reaction must be consistent with this philosophy or it won't be believable. Suppose, the main character has been shown to be a world-class pessimist throughout the story. As this protagonist mulls over a serious problem, her sidekick approaches and says, "I got a great idea," and he elaborates the idea. The protagonist jumps up and yells, "That's it! Let's do it!"
She has responded in a way that is inconsistent with her pessimistic persona. She responded the way an optimist would have. As a pessimist, she should sneer, "What a dumb idea. That'll never work." When the pessimist responds as an optimist, the reader will most likely groan and shut the book.
Chapter Five has a list of philosophies and their definitions that can be used.
INNER AND OUTER MOTIVES
A complex character, the kind readers love, should have both outer and inner motives. The outer motive is fairly easy to develop. It is usually based on solving the plot problem. Once this problem is resolved, the outer motive has been met. The inner motive is more complicated. It can be almost anything and doesn’t have to be related to the plot problem. The best combination of motives are a pair of mutually exclusive ones; the protagonist can’t achieve one without giving up the other. This constraint sets up natural internal conflict in the character and can lead to unexpected plot twists that will keep the reader involved. Effectively, the author has constructed an engine of motivation and anti-motivation.
As an example of conflicting inner and outer motives, consider this situation; the protagonist has to rescue a man trapped on a mountain. He does this because it's his job. That’s the protag’s outer motive. But once saved, the rescued man will marry the woman the protag loves. That is the protag’s inner motive; to marry the woman of his dreams who he’ll lose if he succeeds with his outer motive. It is easy to see the great internal conflict that will harass this protagonist. Should he let the guy die and marry the woman? Should he rescue the guy and lose the woman?
This combination of competing inner and outer motives can draw readers into the story and hold them. Will the character murder for love or selflessly lose the woman? Whatever he does, it must be consistent with his persona. If he is narcissistic, he may choose murder. If he is law-abiding, he may elect to save the guy. Whatever he chooses to do, his motivation must be made clear to the reader.
ANTAGONIST'S MOTIVATION
Successful stories need conflict, tension and emotions to hold a reader's interest. If a properly motivated protagonist strives to solve the plot problem and doesn't encounter a equally motivated antagonist, the story will lack the conflict that produces the tension that leads to emotional outbursts. Thus, the author must develop strong motives for the bad guy to keep the struggle equal. The stronger the bad guy's motives, the stronger the story will be. It won't do to have a strongly motivated protagonist fighting against a bored antagonist.
MOTIVATION NOTES:
MORE ON WHY DID HE JUST DO THAT?
Quite often the reason a character does something or the reason he responds as he does is lost to the reader. This confusion occurs because the author has neglected to include the character's motivation in the scene or the snippet of action. A snippet is a short piece of action embedded into scenes. It contains a stimulus sentence or two followed by a character's response. This sequence of action is also called cause and effect. Unfortunately, the two elements are frequently reversed to the confusion of the reader.
Sometimes the motivation is apparent, such as when a character jumps behind a wall when he hears a shot. In this case, the reader doesn't have to have the motivation explained to her. When a reaction isn't that apparent, it is essential that the author describe the character's motivation or stimulus. In the following snippet of a scene, Jody is a minor character who the reader knows nothing about:
Danny worked on the old car and whistled a nameless tune.
"Hi Danny," Jody said, giving him a big smile.
"Shut up or I'll make you shut up," Danny snarled.