Plotting With Michael Hague's Six Stage Plot Structure

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Like a lot of people this time of year, I'm utterly buried with far too many tasks, so I'm dipping into the archives today for a oldie but goodie. I'll be back to my normal posting routine before long, I promise. It's just been an exceptionally crazy few months.

There are a multitude of different plot structures writers use to create their stories, and this series looks at the handful of most popular ones.

So far we've discussed the Three-Act Structure, the Hero’s Journey, and the Save the Cat Beat Sheet. That leaves one more popular structure--Michael Hague's Six Stage Plot Structure. (Side note, if you ever get an opportunity to sit in on one of Hague's workshops, I highly recommend them.)

This structure is a great choice for those who want a minimal amount of outlining. It's elegant in its simplicity and provides a lot of room to grow your plot organically. And yes, it too uses a three-act structure. It's also a variation on the Hero's Journey, so you'll quickly notice the similarities there.

Plotting With the Hero's Journey

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The Hero's Journey is a plot structure that's been around as long as storytelling. And with Thanksgiving this week, it's a good time to dip into the archives for a little refresher.

In this mini-series, I've discussed the Three-Act Structure, Blake Snyder's Save the Cat structure, Michael Hague's Six Stage Plotting Structure), and Joyce Sweeney's Plot Clock structure. These are among the most-popular and often-used structures in creating stories, from short fiction to novels to screenplays. This time, let's dig into the hero's Journey.

The Hero's Journey is an archetypal narrative structure created by Joseph Campbell to describe the basic myth format used in storytelling for centuries—the hero on an adventure. It covers classic turning points and elements of the journey that are the basis for most modern storytelling formats.

First vs. Third Person: Choosing the Right Point of View for Your Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The wrong point of view character can throw off an entire story, so choose wisely. 

Point of view is one of the strongest tools a writer has in their toolbox, because a story can drastically change just by changing who's telling it and how they feel about those events. Like witnesses to an event who all see something different.

The wrong point of view can even hurt an otherwise great story, because a character might be too far from the story's events to make a good point of view character. They might even be too close and not able to give the proper perspective needed for that particular tale.

It's an important choice to make in any story.

Going All the Way: Should You Write the Whole Trilogy Before You Query?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

This week's Refresher Friday dips back to an updated look at writing trilogies. 

There are two views on writing trilogies. Write only the first book and see if it sells, and write the whole thing before you start querying.

I hadn't intended to write a trilogy when I started The Shifter, but as I wrote closer to the ending, I realized the story could continue for a few more books. There was a bigger world with bigger problems to explore, if I wanted to follow along.

Which I did. So I pitched the novel as a stand-alone that could continue as a trilogy, and that's how we sold it. The two editors who'd wanted it--one wanted the trilogy, the other the stand alone book. This is a good example of how this could have gone either way.

Whose Head is it Anyway? Understanding Omniscient Point of View

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

An omniscient point of view can be tricky to write if you don't know who your narrator is.

One of the more challenging point of views to write is the omniscient point of view. You'd think it would be easiest, since it's "someone outside the story telling the story," and the author fits that description, but an omniscient narrator makes it easier to fall into a common writing issues, such as infodumping and telling.

For those unfamiliar with the term, third person omniscient point of view is when someone other than a character in the book is telling the story. This outside narrator knows things the characters don't, can make comments about what's happening (or about to happen) or see inside the heads of other characters.

That's the key to omniscient point of view: it conveys things the characters don't or can't know.

Seems easy enough, right?

The trouble is, a detached third person limited can sound a lot like third person omniscient, especially if it's not changing characters. So much so, that sometimes it's hard to know the difference.

Just Another Day: Writing the "Slice of Life" Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Some stories are more challenging to write, and crafting a slice of life tale is one of them. Here's an updated look at what makes or breaks a day in the life of a character novel.

I have an uncanny ability to read a lot of the same types of books over a short period of time with no intention of doing that. Maybe I'm just in the mood for that type of story then and pick up books that are similar.

Because of that, I often get interesting perspectives on what makes stories of a certain type work and why they didn't.

This happened a few years ago with several slice of life stories. The ones where the focus is more on a character's journey through a period of time, and not so much about that one big bad problem that needs to be resolved.

Slice if life stories can be a lot harder to pull off than your typical plot-driven novel, because character growth isn't all that exciting in and of itself. It's the results of that growth, and the struggle to achieve that growth within a particular situation that's intriguing.

Point of View Basics: Through My Eyes. Or Your Eyes. Or Somebody's Eyes.

By Janice Hardy. @Janice_Hardy

Point of view defines the scope of a story--from the close and personal journey to the epic tale of generations. 

Anyone who's ever attended one of my writing workshops has heard me say how vital point of view is to a writer. It's at the heart of everything we write, and the better we understand how to use it, the better our writing will be. Understanding point of view fixes (or helps us avoid) most common writing problems, such as telling, backstory, passive writing, and infodumping.

When you nail point of view, everything else gets easier. That's how strongly I feel about it.

When you're just starting out, point of view can be a murky aspect to master, let alone really get. Even writers who are solid one one type, can be clueless about another. And not just newbies have difficulties here. I recently ran into an extremely talented published author who was struggling with third person, since she'd never really written it before.

What's at Stake? How to Make Readers Care About Your Story

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

If readers don't care about your story, they'll never get past the first scene. 

Like many writers, I have story ideas languishing in my files that I really like, but haven't been able to make work yet because they don't have an answer to the "who cares?" question: 

Why should the reader care about this person and this problem?

Until I figure out a way to make the stakes personal, to make me care, those stories will stay languished.

I know I'm not alone in this. I do a lot of critiques for a wide variety of writers. One of the most common comments I make is about the stakes. Why does this matter? Why should the reader care? 

Often I can see the stakes in the story, but they're general and vast, so they don't make me care. The author could put any protagonist into the lead and nothing about the consequences really changes.

Send up the (Red) Flag: Telling Words That Often Spell Trouble in Our Writing

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

It's easier to find told prose in your work when you know what red flag words to look for.

Show, don't tell is one of those pieces of advice that nearly every writer hears at some point, and not just when we're just starting out. Even when we know how to fix it (use strong nouns and verbs), we can't always find the problem in our work to fix it.

This frustrated me back in the day, and I set off to figure out how to find told prose. After a lot of study and analyzing, I found a series of "red flag words" often found in told prose. Not every word found meant the prose that contained it was told, but when I received feedback that a section sounded told, one of these red flag words almost always appeared.

Let's look at a quick round-up of the different types of red flag words commonly found in told prose.

The Difference Between Critique Partners and Beta Readers

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Critique partners and beta readers have similar jobs, but they’re not the same thing.

January is a common month to start revisions and the search for critique partners and beta readers, and my various social media feeds are always filled with comments and thoughts related to both.

This year, I received a direct question from a reader about the difference between a critique and a beta read—and the people who do them.

Like so many other writing terms, these are often used interchangeably, but have slightly different meanings.

So What? Making Readers Care About Your Story

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Give readers a reason to care and they'll read on. Problem is, sometimes you can have all the right pieces of good storytelling in place and the reader still doesn't care, but you're not sure why. This often equates to the dreaded "it was well written, but it just didn't grab me" type comments and rejections.

So how do you get those pesky readers to care in the first place?

Four things.

1. Stakes 

"Go to bed" doesn't get much of a response. "Go to bed or else" does, because the "or else" could be something bad. The fear of that something bad forces a reaction. When the reaction you want is fear and worry (which leads to caring), you have to dangle something bad as a threat.

Let's say you have a scene where Joey is sitting at the dinner table, and his babysitter is forcing him to eat his broccoli. He refuses, she insists. This is going to get ugly and one person is going to end the night unhappy. Even though they both have strong goals to drive the scene, do you care if Joey eats his vegetables? Probably not. It doesn't matter if he does. Nothing will happen to him if he doesn't.

8 Tips for Creating Characters

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Characters make the story. No matter how intriguing the idea or exciting the plot, if there isn't a character there we care about (even if it's just curiosity or fascination) the rest of it falls flat.

There are all kinds of ways to develop characters. One of the more common ways is the character worksheet--long lists of questions you fill out that determine physical characteristics, likes, dislikes, history, etc. For many writers, this is a useful way to develop and create a character.

I'm not one of those writers.

Want Better Characters? Get Rid of the Dialogue

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

In novels, we often rely on what a character says to show who they are. Their actions also play a role, but the focus is usually on the big stuff—the choices made, the sweeping gestures, the plot-driving tasks. Yet, it’s often the little things people do that make them memorable.

I once read a book (I don’t remember which one or who wrote it it was so long ago), but there was a scene where something had happened and the police were talking to witnesses. The protagonist did not want to be remembered. So a character with her scrunched up the side of his face so it twitched, limped over to police, and answered questions with a strong southern accent. She was appalled, and thought he’d just given them away. He said, “Nope, all they’ll remember is the twitch, the limp, and the accent.” Funny thing, after probably twenty years, that’s all I remember about that book as well.

A Surefire Way to Add Conflict to Your Story

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

A lack of conflict is one of the main reasons books get rejected from agents, editors, and yes, even readers. It can manifest itself in many different ways, from no obstacles keeping the protagonist from a goal to scenes that feel as though nothing is going on, but it all ends with the same basic complaint—readers don’t care enough about the story to read it.

One of the pitfalls of conflict is that it’s often misunderstood. When we think “conflict” we tend to think “fighting” or “aggression” or “enemy,” but that’s only one aspect of it (and the least interesting one at that.) The simplest way to look at it is as the struggle for what we want over what’s best for us.

It’s the Halloween Candy Principle.

What Are Your Characters Not Saying?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

I was working on a fun scene yesterday, with two characters having a conversation. Each character’s goal was to get information out of the other without giving away what they knew. They had just met, didn’t trust each other one whit, but were the only clues to help both of them solve a mystery they both need to solve.

While they had particular plot reasons for keeping quiet, this verbal dance is a technique that can benefit a variety of scenes, because it adds tension and conflict, and can create mystery. People hold back information all the time. We don’t say what we think, we keep secrets, we don’t want to embarrass ourselves, and all for a myriad of reasons both good and bad.

Where Do I Go From Here? Plotting Through “What Happens Next?” Part One

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Getting past a sticky point while plotting. 

Whenever I’m not sure where the plot goes it’s almost always due to a goal issue. I've usually lost sight of what the protagonist was after and why she wanted it in the first place.

The rough part is, I often know what happens next in the plot, which makes he whole thing ever harder to manage. The story needs to go there, but I can't quite figure out how to get the protagonist from point A to B.

Make the Most of Accidental Foreshadowing

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The beauty of writing is that the unexpected happens. A random comment because the key clue to the main plot, a walk on character turns out to the star, or a relationship develops between people or events we never anticipated.

This can be good or bad, but it can also be quite useful. These accidental foreshadows are often exactly what we need to shake up a plot or add depth to an existing storyline.

Cover Me, I'm Going Back: Tips on Writing Flashbacks

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

We spend a lot of time building the histories of our characters, so it's no wonder we want to get some of that into the story. A flashback can be a useful way to convey information and add depth to both plot and character, but it can also stop a story cold if done poorly. By definition, flashbacks interrupt the story to convey information from another time.

Like so many things in writing, there's nothing wrong with flashbacks if they're done well and are necessary for the story. When the protagonist's past has bearing on the current plot, it might be an opportunity to stop and show what happened in that past. If the information is shoved in there to explain something for the readers, it might be the type of flashback to reconsider.

How Does Your Character Answer Questions?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

In any story, information is going to be shared between characters, but it doesn't have to all sound the same. How a character responds can show both their voice and personality, as well help writers control how and when information is conveyed to a reader.

Everyone has their own way of answering questions, and that even changes depending on who we're talking to. How we answer someone in authority is typically different from how we answer someone we have authority over, and both of those are different from how we answer a friend or loved one.

What Makes Your Characters Uncomfortable?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Everyone has their hot buttons topics--the ones that get their blood boiling, or makes their skin crawl, or triggers an inappropriate response to the situation. While this isn't much fun to encounter in real life, it's a great way to create conflict and tension in a novel. Pushing someone's hot button (either accidentally or on purpose) can cause a character to act in ways they otherwise wouldn't.