Notes on Jim Butcher's Writing Advise

8/11/2019 Notes on Jim Butcher's Writing Advise

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Introduction------------

I suppose the first thing to do is to talk about what these articles are, andaren't, and why I'm writing them.

What I'm doing here is laying out what I know about writing a genre fiction

novel. Frankly, the principles here could be used to write any decent story, butthey are geared specifically to help train an aspiring writer to produce asolid effort that an editor will recognize as a solid effort worth the gambleof publishing.

Some of these methods and techniques may seem stiff, wooden, unyielding, boringand stifling to work with. A lot of people may look at them and reject them withmuch to say about "magic formulas" and "studying under a writing mystic" andvarious similar comments. I've seen (and written) a whole bunch of them in mytime learning to write. There is always, always, always someone who willcomplain that some of these techniques are inflexible and boring and that theyare incompatible with creativity.

To that person I say; stop being a petulant baby.Writing a decent story is as much craft as art, and while some might be bornenormously gifted at art, the craft part of the writing only gets learned oneway: practice. Otherwise known as "work." Professional musicians don't justsuddenly pick up an instrument for the first time, walk into a recording studio,and start to cut a CD. They practice. They start off playing scales andpracticing chords, move up to "House of the Rising Sun" or "The Sloop John B.,"and some Christmas carols, and then, after a lot of effort, they finally get upto speed and start playing music that people might actually want to pay for.

Aspiring writers, as a whole, tend to want to skip directly from playing scalesto the getting paid part. Most of them (myself included) never considered the

fact that it might take a considerable length of time and an even larger amountof effort to get from A to Z.

These articles are intended to show you the craft techniques that will help youwrite reliably interesting, coherent and well-paced stories, and solidcharacters people want to read about. Learn to use these techniques, and you'llmanage B through Y with the minimum amount of frustration. That's their firstpurpose.

The second reason to employ these techniques is that they give you a solidfoundation for writing stories even when you are under hideous time-pressures orfeeling utterly uninspired, artistically speaking. Writing craft is the heart

and soul of the mercenary component of being a genre fiction writer. It givesyou what you need to take care of business.

(I can tell you from first-hand experience that THEY WORK. I cannot begin toimagine what I would have done under my most recent set of deadlines if I hadn'thad the tools I needed to write a solid story as quickly as possible.)

Keep in mind that learning these techniques only gives you a solid place tobegin. Once you've got them down, you'll begin to understand a lot more aboutWHY they work. Once you see that, you'll know when you can alter or disregardthem entirely, and still have a great story. Every rule has its exceptions.

Oh, I should also mention what these articles are NOT.

They are NOT my creation. I learned virtually everything I know about writingcraft from Debbie Chester, herself a best-selling author with better than 40published novels to her credit. She teaches in the Professional Writing


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department at the University of Oklahoma's School of Journalism,where she learned it from her teacher, Jack Bickham. Bickham has written severalwell-regarded books on writing craft, and still publishes the occasional novelhimself. These people know what they are talking about.

I don't know as much as them. But on the other hand, I'm a lot closer to thataspiring author-me, temporally speaking, than they are, so it might be fair to

say that I'm in a better position to pass this information clearly to the newbiewriters. I'll do my best to teach you what they taught me, only simplified andclarified for the newbie author.

Oh, one other thing these articles are NOT. They are NOT the One True Path toWriting. They're essentially MY path. They're a pretty darned GOOD path, even ifit's a little longer than I had expected. Maybe you'll hate this path so muchthat you run off and find a shortcut that gets you there in a tenth of thetime. On the other hand, maybe you'll slip on a crumbling ledge and be devouredby dyspeptic crocodiles. Who knows?

All I can say for sure is that if you are willing to work for it, THIS path will

get you there.

Eventually.

What Is This Craft You Speak Of?--------------------------------

To talk about writing a story, first you have to ask, "What IS writing?"

Writing, in its most essential sense, is an artificial means for gettingthoughts and images which reside in YOUR brain over to the guy holding your bookin the most effective and accurate fashion possible, so that the reader willsuccessfully translate your thoughts into HIS brain.

The written word uses symbols to describe sights, sounds, and situations,in order to let the reader create the story inside his own imagination as hereads.

Writing is the original virtual reality.

If all goes well, the imaginary world you help the reader create in his headbecomes as believable, exciting, and interesting as the real world.

But that means you need to make everything go well.In order to do THAT, you apply story craft.

Story? What story? 80-------------------

To talk about story craft, first you have to answer the question,"What is a story?"

Simply put, a story is a narrative description of a character(the protagonist/hero) struggling to attain an important goal. In general, theprotagonist is opposed by another character (the antagonist/villain).

The protagonist sets out to achieve his goal and faces problems and opposition

to his intentions along the way. His risk of loss increases as the narrativeproceeds, and casts an element of doubt over whether or not the protagonist willattain his goal. Then, in a final confrontation of some sort (the climax),


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the protagonist either succeeds or fails, based upon his own choices andactions. We'll talk more about protagonists and antagonists and climaxesand conflict as we go along.

Story craft, writing technique, story structure. They're all different namesthat mean the same thing (at least for the purposes of these articles). Theydescribe the practice of methodically approaching the writing of any given story

with a definite, specific goal, and a plan for making that narrative engagingand entertaining as possible.

Get to the Story Craft Already!-------------------------------

Story craft describes the practice of using every possible element at yourdisposal to write a good story. It means that you have a plan for the book--youknow where you want it to go, and why. It means that you understand somethingabout how human psychology ticks, and you use it to your advantage.It means that every piece of the story has a definite purpose, and that it

furthers your story in the most engaging way possible.

Simply put, story craft is nothing more and nothing less than manipulating theemotions of your reader.

Sounds cynical and mercenary, don't it?

It isn't. And it is.

Stop and think about it for a minute. You've all read books. You've all paidmoney for them in the expectation of being entertained. The books written wellenough to make you burst out laughing, break down in tears, tremble with fear,snarl with anger or smolder with desire are probably the ones you like the most.

They're also the ones you are happiest to pay for and most enjoy talking about.As a reader, you want to be entertained.

You WANT the author to manipulate you.

Authors are the other side of the coin. From an artistic perspective, you havean obligation to manipulate the reader to the best of your ability--that's whatmakes a good story. From a mercenary standpoint, successful manipulation is alsowhat gains the most readers and makes the most money through increased sales.

Long story short: The story craft I'll be describing here is a toolbox. Insideit are time-proven techniques for exploiting human psychology in your favor.Learn to use the tools.

Just remember to wear your safety glasses and try not to accidentally chop offany of your fingers.

Conflict, Logical Response and Point of View--------------------------------------------

This article addresses three basic concepts for a structured approach towriting. While this one won't be specific enough to actually apply as yet, it'simportant to understand the basic ideas on which a structured approach isfounded before we go tinkering with nuts and bolts.

Conflict--It's Not the Best Way. It's the Only Way.


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First things first. This is the absolute core truth of telling a story, and isas important to your writing as the laws of physics are to the real universe:

Stories are about conflict.

One more time, because something this important bears repeating.

STORIES ARE ABOUT CONFLICT!

If I wasn't in ASCII, I'd say it three times, the last time in giant animated3-d letters that were on fire. That's just how important it is. Alas, I'll justhave to settle for saying it twice.

Conflict is the single most important facet of writing fiction. Conflict shouldexist in one form or another in every scene. In a previous article I said thatstories are about following a character in pursuit of a goal, and who is opposedby someone with an opposite or conflicting goal. That's the overall shape of a

story.

But that format of Goal-Conflict is also the basic model for any scene. ALL ofyour characters need to have a goal. If they don't have a goal, then what thehell are they doing wandering aimlessly around on stage? Not only that, butyou've also got to have someone who is trying to ruin your character's day byone means or another. No one wants to read about Odysseus leaving the sack ofTroy, sailing home in moderate weather and settling down to focus on that urbanrenewal project he's been putting off.

Conflict exists in infinite forms, and need not (necessarily) involve explosionsor blood. A mobster kicking down the door and spraying bullets is one kind ofconflict, sure. But a well-intentioned relative determined to sway your

character from his goal is, too. So is a boss who refuses to give yourcharacter the day off to pick up his sick kid from school.

We'll get into specifics on conflict when we talk scene structure. For now, justremember that stories are about conflict, and that they best way to createconflict is to give your characters goals and strong motivation to pursue them.

(Oh, a quick word about crippling information you might need to unlearn.Literature departments are real big on describing the "forms of conflict." Don'ttry to deny it. Some of you know them, and you know it. Man versus man,man versus nature, man versus himself. Let me give you a piece of advice.The only one of any value to anyone who wants to learn to write commercialfiction is the first one. Man versus nature stories and man versus himselfstories can work, but the writer has to work a lot harder to make it happen.You're going to be more than busy enough without making your life moredifficult across the board.)

Dammit, Jim, I'm A Writer, Not A Logistician--------------------------------------------

Another foundation stone of clear writing is a careful observence of logicalresponse.

Remember, one of your goals in telling a story is to make it come alive in yourreaders' minds. To do that, it's important that you present things in a clearand understandable fashion. You have to create clear mental pictures of


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characters, objects and places for your reader.

(We'll get more into that when we talk about characters, later on.)

While it isn't too terribly hard to create vivid character-images, it is MUCHmore difficult to create those same mental pictures of actions. Nothing takesyour reader out of virtual headspace faster than reading a sentence and

description of action, then blinking and thinking, "What?" Once your reader isstopping to go back and puzzle through confusing language, you've lost the game.

The best way to keep that flow going is to understand logical-response, or whatmy teacher called "Stimulus-Response Transactions." (Which sounds fancy, butthey're working in a university there, and if you don't use lots of sixteenpenny words you don't get any R-E-S-P-E-C-T from the other faculty.)

It breaks down into something really simple, though. Something happens to yourcharacter (stimulus). Your character reacts to it (response). Your charactertakes an action (stimulus). Something happens (response).

You don't start mucking around with the order. It's confusing. You don't havethe response occur before the stimulus. For example:

"His fist lashed out at me [stimulus]. My jaw exploded in a flash of pain[response-stimulus], and it drove me to the ground [response]."

See? There's a logical order to it, stimulus-response, stimulus-response. That'swhat "stimulus-response transaction" means. Stimulus comes first, and for everystimulus you have one response.

If you screw up the order, the same action-description gets a lot harder tounderstand:

"I was driven to the ground when a flash of pain exploded in my jaw as his fistlashed out at me."

Strictly speaking there's not any kind of grammar-based felony going on here,but the sentence is clunky, and the reader has to mentally juggle it to get itall in the right order. It isn't really DIFFICULT for them to juggle it around,but it does take a little extra effort to sort it into a logical order.

That effort might seem trivial, but remember that the reader is gonna go throughhundreds or thousands of your sentences in fairly short order. As a result,that kind of minor error could have two effects.

First, it could result in a mental speedbump in your story that jolts thereader right out of their storyspace. Second, those many trivial shuffles willaccumulate. It isn't something that most readers are going to actually,specifically notice in your work--they're just going to know that it isn't asmuch fun to read as they would like it to be

"But but but," someone is surely saying by now, "Spielberg uses just thething all the time! He'll go through separate close-ups of eighty six peoplestaring at a dinosaur before the viewer ever gets to see the dinosaur thatstimulated them to stare!

Yes, well, Steve has an advantage. HE ISN'T USING THE WRITTEN WORD. You are. The

reversal of stimulus-response in a movie doesn't confuse anyone because theydon't have to read words and turn it into a movie in their head. The movie isalready THERE. Those shots in Jurassic Park work because they create suspense


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instead of confusion, precisely BECAUSE the viewer knows that the responsethey're seeing must have a stimulus, and they're wondering what it could be.

Besides. You aren't Spielberg. You're an aspiring writer who wants to learn thecraft. So if you want things to go smoothly for the reader and give you everyadvantage you can get, observe stimulus-response transactions religiously.

It All Depends On Your Point of View------------------------------------

Literally. In a very real sense, the success or failure of your story depends onit. Strong, entertaining, believable characters are what make or break a story,and a prime component for creating that kind of character is the effective useof point of view.

What makes it so important, you may ask? (Someone go ahead and ask, or I'm gonnalook pretty silly up here.) Good, I'm glad you asked that. To answer thequestion, let's go back to our goal as a storyteller--specifically, to create a

story so compelling that it takes on a life of its own in the reader's mind.We want to create storyspace.

In order for the reader to have that kind of experience, they need a vehicle todo it in--or put another way, we use point of view as a means of inserting thereader into the story. We write from the point of view of our characters inorder to vicariously plug the reader in to the emotions, experiences, thoughtsand actions of a viewpoint character. Some genres are heavier into this aspectof telling the story than others, but it is not at all unfair to say that we usepoint of view to allow the reader to experience the story through one of ourcharacters' eyes (and ears, and mind, and possibly several other organs).

Get it now? The reader is going to experience your story world through the

thoughts, perceptions, emotions and actions of your viewpoint character orcharacters. Do you see how freaking important it is that you select the bestcharacters to use? The perspective of the character viewing the story has aprofound effect on how it comes across to your readers.

Try to imagine watching Star Trek from the viewpoint of Nurse Chapel. I'm notsaying it would be a lame show, but it sure as hell wouldn't be the Star Trek weknow. Chapel was a decent character, but she wasn't exactly hips-deep in mostof the events on the Enterprise. The Lord of the Rings would be a ratherdifferent story told from the viewpoint of Bill Ferny. I don't even want toconsider what Star Wars would look like through the eyes of Jabba the Hut . . .well. Except maybe for Leia getting fit for that slavegirl outfit . . .

Anyway, the point being that it's absolutely critical that you select the bestcharacters for use as point-of-view (oh for goodness' sake, I'm going to commitacronym and just call it POV) characters. And how do you do that, you may ask?

(Quick, someone ask bef--) Yes, I'm glad you asked that.

First, you decide what kind of point of view you want to use.

Once more, you may be burdened with an education in literature that can get inthe way of writing. I'm sure any lit people out there can rattle off half adozen different kinds of point of view that can be used in a story. I'll break

them down into the most familiar:

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First Person--Written from the interior perspective of one character. "I went tothe store and bought cookies. I ate them." The Dresden Files are first personPOV.

Second Person--Written as if being described to the reader as their own actions."You went to the store and bought cookies. You ate them."

Third Person--Written from an exterior perspective to one or more characters."He went to the store and bought cookies. He choked on them and died."

Omniscient Viewpoint--Told from the perspective of an outside, all-knowingobserver. "He went to the store, never knowing that the cookies were theinstrument of the Grim Reaper. If only he'd purchased milk to go with them,he might have made it. But he didn't, and so sealed his fate with sweet,corrupt chocolately goodness."

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Let me give you some advice my own teacher gave me: write in First Person, orThird Person. Omniscient viewpoint has been out of style for maybe a century.Second person is best reserved for Choose Your Own Adventure books.First and Third person are the most common and easy-to-read viewpoints, and noeditor will ever take you seriously if you wade into the publishing fray tryingto sell anything else.

So, next thing's next. How do you decide? First or Third? Let's take a look attheir pros and cons.

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First person strengths: An immediate immersion into storyspace through the most

personally identifiable language. In the Dresden Files, the text might read"I went here" or "I did that," in reference to Harry's activities--but on somelevel in the reader's head, the reader is experiencing those thingsvicariously. The language is subversive, and is possibly better suited tocreating that kind of storyspace than any other viewpoint. Bickham calledfirst-person viewpoint "perfect viewpoint" for that exact reason. It's also theeasiest viewpoint to learn to write in because, check it out--it's how wexperience life.

First Person Weaknesses: The major problems with First Person viewpoint lie inthe difficulties it creates for story structure. Since you are locked into oneviewpoint, your story has to happen around your viewpoint character all thetime. You can't show the reader anything that the viewpoint character doesn'tsee, and that can become an annoying obstacle, particularly when variouscharacters with conflicting goals are all pursuing them at once.

The only way around these problems is to be scrupulous about keeping track ofwhat characters are doing when they're "off stage." But that still leaves youwith figuring out ways to convey the plot-necessary things they do to yourreader. Typically, this is where you get villains who will drone on in anendless summary of what the hero didn't see, or when characters will otherwisebreak into a travelogue. It takes planning and creativity to get around thelimitations of first-person viewpoint, but it has the side effect of forcing youto make your character extremely proactive and nosy, poking into everyone'sbusiness--which is probably why the mystery genre is best known for

first-person viewpoint stories.

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Third Person Strengths: Third person viewpoint is the compliment to FirstPerson, in terms of strengths and weaknesses. Third person viewpoint allows youto introduce more than one POV character, which frees up a whole universe of new

options to you as a writer. Since you can hop around to whatever characters youplease, (though usually POV characters are of a fairly limited number) you canplay all kinds of wonderful head games with the reader which result in thereader knowing things that the characters don't--that's when you get peoplescreaming at the book, "NO YOU IDIOT DON'T YOU KNOW THAT'S A VAMPIRE?" andsimilar sentiments, because the reader's been handed more pieces than anyone viewpoint character.

Third Person Weaknesses: Because you have so many more options with thirdperson, you have at least as many more ways you can screw things up. Mostproblematic in a third person viewpoints are problems with displaying enoughemotional depth in characters (compared to first person, anyway), and the risk

that a larger cast of characters will grow increasingly more difficult for thereader to keep track of. (*kaffkaff*JORDAN*kaffkaff*) When you head into a thirdperson story, you have to be sure to be extra careful about establishingcharacters and their goals, in order to help the reader keep the various POVsstraight in his head. Often writers also have trouble keeping the currentviewpoint clear to the reader--and some of them even jump back and forth tovarious viewpoints within the same scene, chapter, or page, a guaranteed mentalspeedbump for the reader as he tries to puzzle out whose head the story is inright now.

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To make matters even more complicated, writing in first or third person also

seems to be heavily influenced by the tempeSrament and skills of the writer inquestion. Some people couldn't write third person to save their life. I wroteSEVEN BOOKS in the third person and they were universally lame. When I finallytook Debbie's advice and wrote my first novel in the first person, I producedStorm Front. I was better suited for first person writing, clearly. Since then,I've continued to grind my teeth and practice third person, and I think I'mfinally getting somewhere, but it was a struggle for me. Other writers take towriting third person like baby ducks to water. The freaks.

Okay, broken down to the simplest thoughts I can:

First person offers the novice writer an intuitive advantage in writing astrong, emotional central character. It creates a few problems for your plot,but nothing that can't be gotten around. It's best suited to a story focusedupon a single central character, and as such is most often found in mysteriesand thrillers, with occasional appearances in fantasy/sf.

Third person is far more flexible and offers you a wider range of options,dramatically speaking, but it's also considerably more difficult to learn tohandle well--but if you learn to do it, you can really go to town,creatively speaking. Third person is found in every genre, but is particularlyprominant in romance, on account of most of the romances like to present thestory from the perspective of the two principal characters at the very least.

So pick what kind of viewpoint you want to use based on the kind of story you

want to tell and on your own personal gifts and preferences.

Now. All you need to do is pick WHICH characters get to become POV characters.


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And how do I do that, you might ask?

For first person it's easy. You pick the guy who keeps telling the reader"I, me, I me." But when writing third person, the sheer flexibility of thechoices available to you can make it tough to pick who will be the POV characterin any given scene.

But there is a simple rule of thumb to help you decide that. Viewpoints belongto the characters who are the most deeply, emotionally involved in whatever isat stake in the scene. When you're wondering which character should have theviewpoint in any given scene, all you have to do is to pick the character whohas the most to lose. THAT person is the one who is going to have the strongestgoal, and his pursuit of the goal will be fertile ground for the best conflict.

It is late and I have probably forgot a bit here and there, but if so I'll beback to blow hot air all over until my ego is sure it has had its say. :) Nextarticle, I'll prattle on about laying out a plot skeleton before you startpounding on the keys.

Jim

Fundamentals--Story SkeletonsStory Skeletons---------------

Writing a structurally sound story is simple.

But it isn't easy.

"Huh?" you say. "What do you mean, simple not easy?"

A *lot* of things are really simple. Hauling an engine block out of your car issimple--but it sure as hell isn't easy. There's a lot of work to be done, andyou have to go about it the right way or the simple task can go all to hell in ahurry. Building a solid story as an aspiring writer is the same way. What I canhand you here is not going to look very complicated--but for newbie novelists,it's going to be difficult to handle. At least it was for me.

The story skeleton is a description of the main plot of your book, broken downinto its simplest elements. It's two sentences long. Neither sentence isparticularly long. Your plot needs to fit into that framework, or it's going tobe too complicated for the average newbie writer to handle well.

"Impossible," I said to myself when Debbie told us that in class."There's no way you can break down a story as epic as mine into two sentences.You can't possibly do that." As it turned out, I could.If I hadn't been able to do it, it would have been way too much story for me.

The story skeleton (also called a story question) consists of a simple format:

*WHEN SOMETHING HAPPENS*, *YOUR PROTAGONIST* *PURSUES A GOAL*.But will he succeed when *ANTAGONIST PROVIDES OPPOSITION*?

For instance, look at Storm Front.(Yes, I'll use my own books as examples, because I'm just that way. ;)

Also, I'm more familiar with them than I am with almost any other writer.)Storm Front's story question:


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****************************When a series of grisly supernatural murders tears through Chicago,wizard Harry Dresden sets out to find the killer.But will he succeed when he finds himself pitted against a dark wizard,a Warden of the White Council, a vicious gang war, and the Chicago PoliceDepartment?****************************

See! It's oh-so-simple! Almost to the point of looking ridiculous--and I have nodoubt that some of the people reading this article will think that it *is*ridiculous. They're wrong. :)

This is a fundamental description of the core conflict in your tale--andstories are all about conflict.

Not only that, but by getting your story broken down into its basic elements,you'll help yourself focus on the most important portion of the novel and avoiddumping lots of extra words into it. Always write a story as lean as youpossibly can (and still be happy with it). Every scene and every sequel should

be planned to move your story forward--and you should have the purpose of thescene in mind as you write it.

You want to write your story like a racehorse, not an elephant. It is SO mucheasier to flesh out a story that's too lean than it is to trim down a storythat's too bulky.

This doesn't mean that you don't plan a book with subplots. Even newbie writerslike I was can usually handle a couple of them, and with enough planning usuallymore. But the main plot is the skeleton that everything else builds upon.Before you get rolling on your next novel, make yourself a little form and fillit out. I know, I know, it seems corny as hell.

But trust me. It will help you in the long run.

CharactersSo your story is all about conflict, right? And you can't have conflict without,well, people. Maybe your people look like sentient renaissance mice, or maybethey look like talking cats, but there are going to be beings running aroundyour story with a bunch of conflicting desires. Those are your characters.

Sticking with the purely craft-oriented standpoint, we'll start with a basicquestion: what makes a good character?

FIRST AND FOREMOST, FICTION WRITERS, YOUR CHARACTERS MUST BE INTERESTING.

I mean, come on. Who is going to want to read about boring people? I can do thatin the newspaper, or in any history class. Increasingly, as our society movesinto the MTV-Information-broadband-instant-gratification age, reader tolerancefor the dull and the plain is going to go down.

Bottom line: without interesting characters, your book is already dead. You canwrite something that flies in the face of this if you like, and people thestory town of Plainsville with John Smiths, and who knows, maybe you'll createan immortal piece of literary art. But for poor slobs like me whose sons aresuddenly wearing larger shoes than them, and who are looking with mild panic atthe costs of a college degree, there are a couple of basic principles to think

about which could really help you in all kinds of ways.

Which leads us to the next logical question: What is (or what makes) an


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interesting character?

While no one thing can really stake a sole claim, several things consistentlymake a team contribution:

o Exaggeration.o Exotic position.

o Introduction.o Verisimilitude.o Empathy.

We'll look at them one at a time.

1. EXAGGERATION

This can be almost any kind of exaggerated feature, be it physical, mental oremotional. Virtually every character in popular fiction is an exaggerated figure

of one kind or another. Mister Monk is not merely fussy and unstable, he isfussy and unstable to an insane degree. Jack O'Neill is not merely wiseass andcavalier, but suicidally so. Sydney Bristow is not merely a spy, she's a CIASuperSpyGrrl who can look like anyone and outshoot, outfight and generallyoutdo every other spy in the business. Paul Bunyan is not just tall, he'ssixty-three axe-handles high. Pamela Anderson is . . . say no more.

The purposes of exaggerating characters are twofold:

FIRST, it's inherently interesting. Reading a sentence about Joe Average walkingdown the street is not nearly as interesting as reading a sentence about JoeTwo-Meters walking down the street and banging his head on swinging shop signsas he goes.

SECOND, it's a device to create an acute mental awareness of your character forthe reader. Remember that the goal of this kind of story-craft is to create thatvirtual world inside your reader's head. The reader is glad to help you alongwith that. I mean, readers will provide a lot of the background sets and extrasand so on if you give them a chance--but one way to make it easier for them toget into the story is to create a clear impression of a character on them, sothat they always have a clear image in their head of who that character is.Exaggeration helps with that--it gives the reader something unusual andmemorable to associate with any given character.

(More tips and techniques on how to do even more with this will follow underVerisimilitude.)

2. EXOTIC POSITION

While this is in actuality just another facet of exaggeration, there are enoughdifferences to make it worth its own heading. Locating your character in anunusual location or situation is another way to help create immediate interest.A sentence about a thirty-five year old man sitting in an office is fairlysimple and very boring. But it becomes something else entirely when it's theOVAL office and the youngest president in the history of the nation has justbeen advised that a nuclear terrorist is loose in DC. A sentence about a youngwoman sitting in a chair is far more blah than a sentence about the first female

shuttle commander maneuvering in her EVA frame in high orbit.

(Naturally there's the inversion of this, too, where you take a very unusual


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character and put him in an utterly mundane position, like Mister Incredibleworking in Insurance Cubicle Purgatory.)

Whether it is a social, geographic, intellectual or moral position, choosingsomething unusual enough to be memorable and interesting will provide you with asignificant advantage in grabbing reader interest.

3. INTRODUCTION

You never get a second chance to make a first impression. When your reader meetsany given character for the first time, it is critical to make sure you get thebare bones of your character into his head immediately. By establishing yourcharacter firmly, you'll make the whole process of virtual-story-world-creationmove more quickly and easily. There are multiple techniques for planning astrong introduction, but I'm only going to hit on the strongest one:

CHARACTERISTIC ENTRY ACTION.

A solid CHARACTERISTIC ENTRY ACTION consists of introducing your character to

the reader by bringing him into the story in the course of an action whichclearly, sharply typifies who and what he is.

Lethal Weapon 2 starts off in the front seat of a stationwagon during a policechase, with Mel Gibson howling in excitement and pounding on the ceiling whileDanny Glover fumbles for the siren, tries to talk on the radio, and tries toconvince Mel that they don't really need to be doing this. It stronglyestablishes both characters as cops. It demonstrates Mel's love of wild action,Danny's cautious approach to his work, and the relationship dynamic between thetwo. (I liked it so much that I borrowed shamelessly from it to start offGrave Peril.)

Every Bond Pic that opens on the "opening mission" template does the same thing:

it shows you Bond being a heroic spy and engaging in lots of danger and action.

Your character is a frustrated high school nerd? Then have him come on stagelate for his school bus, which promptly drives away even though the driverobviously saw him coming. (IE, Spider-Man.) Your character is a titaniclumberjack? Then start him off towering over the north woods and felling fiftytrees with each swing of his axe.

Make the introduction count. This is something you can't afford to screw up.

4. VERISIMILITUDE

(Which is a university word that means "they act believeably." It's easier forme to type V-factor.)

V-factor is the second most important element in creating interestingcharacters. The most exotic character in the world becomes nothing more than anannoying cartoon figure if he doesn't behave in a consistant and believeablemanner. (*kaffkaff*JAR-JAR*kaffkaff*)

When you are writing your characters, it is absolutely critical that you conveyto the reader the sense that your character is a whole, full person with his ownlife outside the purview of this particular story. This is a task that willtake a little bit of time, as your reader follows your character around and

sees what is in his world.

The single most important technique for doing that is through showing your


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character's:1. EMOTIONS2. REACTIONS and3. DECISIONS.

When something happens in your story, a character with a decent V-factor willreact to it. The reader will see his emotional reaction played out,

will gain a sense of the logic of a question or problem, and will recognize thatthe character took a believeable, appropriate course of action in response.

The lion's share of this work gets done in the process of writing SEQUELS.(Not like Rocky II. It's a writing-craft term.)

(SEQUELS are an indispensable portion of your story and will have their own article later.)

But forethought and preparation will play a role in this process, too.Here's another cool craft-tool for you guys to use: TAGS and TRAITS

TAGS are words you hang upon your character when you describe them. When you'reputting things together, for each character, pick a word or two or three to usein describing them. Then, every so often, hit on one of those words in referenceto them, and avoid using them elsewhere when possible. By doing this, you'll becreating a psychological link between those words and that strong entry imageof your character.

For example; Thomas Raith's tag words are pale, beautiful, dark hair, grey eyes.I use them when I introduce him for the first time in each book, and thenwhenever he shows up on stage again, I remind the reader of who he is by usingone or more of those words.

This is a really subtle psychological device, and it is far more powerful than

it first seems. It's invaluable for both you as the writer, and for theconstruction of the virtual story for the reader.

TRAITS are like tags, except that instead of picking specific words, you pick anumber of unique things ranging from a trademark prop to a specific mentalattitude. Harry's traits include his black duster, his staff, his blasting rodand his pentacle amulet. These things are decorations hung onto the characterfor the reader's benefit, so that it's easy to imagine Harry when the story paceis really rolling.

Similarly, Bob the Skull's traits are the skull, its eyelights, his intelligence, his role as a lab assistant, his obsession with sex and his wiseass dialog.It works for the same reason.

Seriously. Before you introduce another character, write some tags and traitsdown. You'll be surprised how much easier it makes your job.

4. EMPATHY

If you can manage to create a vivid character in a reader's mind, then establishhim as someone believable, you have a real shot at the Holy Grail of characterdesign. If you do your job, you will create a sense of empathy in your readerfor your characters. This is what makes people burst out laughing while reading. It's what makes readers cry, or cheer, or run off to take a cold shower.

Like V-Factor, empathy takes time to build and it relies heavily upon theskilled use of sequels. But if you can get the reader to this point,


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as an author, then you WIN. Big time. This is the ENTIRE GOAL of all thischaracter work, because the reader's emotional involvement is the single mostimportant factor in how well your story is going to fly.

Or put another way, if you can make people love who you want them to love andhate who you want them to hate, you're going to have readers coming back to youover and over again.

comment:

How did Twain put it? Something like: Literature is a book everyone wants to*have* read, but no one wants to *read*.

I'm talking genre fiction, here. I don't say this to offend your sensibilities,but I've got a lit degree, I'm familiar with the field, and my opinion of thevast majority of English literature is that it has little or no actual value tosociety outside of the university-level English Lit community.

This stuff is all craft for writing fiction that people will actually want toread. Let's face it: if Pride and Prejudice landed on an editor's desk today,it would be on the floor and propping open a door about ten minutes after theeditor started looking at it and the rejection letter to its author would probably create a sonic boom on its way out.

Which is not to say that literature and popularity are incompatible--and neitherare literature and storytelling craft. Look at The Stand, for example, or theGunslinger. But I think there's an overwhelming tendancy in the lit-writingcommunity to automatically discard basic storytelling craft and (especially)genre fiction as being somehow inferior because people in 8th grade can readthe results.

The whole point of using storytelling craft is to keep your readers' interest.Most lit needs a university and a study program and a minimum GPA to convincesomeone to read it.

This is a personal windmill that I occasionally tilt at, and it isn't supposedto be a personal assault (and I remember talking to you at Worldcon! Wasn't itin the vendors room?). There are people who would disagree with me with theirdying breath, and could take up a fantastic counter-argument about theviability of literature in genre fiction--Patrick Neilsen-Hayden comes to mind.But even he will admit that he has to publish someone like Terry Goodkind inorder to give more literary books a shot at the market.

If it helps, think of all of this stuff as a kind of literary form, like . . .like sonnets. I mean now /that/ is a constrained format, but Bill Shakespeardid some great work with it. :)

Re: Special SnowflakeHmmm. Without reading the book, I cannot of course offer you a truly informedreply. I can, however, suggest the causes of your problems with the charactersin question.

First, look at their introductions. If all of them come into the story withsupercool action music in the background and awesomely awesome martial artsmoves, then I'd say it's possible that the writer either didn't distinguishthem well enough from one another to give you a clear picture in your head

beyond "hyper-competent."

Second, exaggeration. Is the writer just laying it on way too thick?


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Do all the characters do something that saves the universe every twenty minutesor so? Even worse, if /everyone/ is showing up with lots of badass powers,then the author has actually watered down the exaggeration factor for all of thecharacters. You can't exaggerate without having some significant contrastsbetween characters.

Finally, verisimilitude. People aren't perfect and most characters probably

shouldn't be perfect either. If you're looking at a big crew of supercoolSpecial Snowflakes, there's an inherent uphill battle for the writer, to try toget you to suspend your disbelief about the crowd of 99.9999999th percentilepeople so that you can enjoy the story.

Not everyone in the Justice League has the same powers as Superman. If they did,it would be boring as hell. :)

The Great Swampy MiddleTHE GREAT SWAMPY MIDDLE

Every writer runs into this, generally in every single book. The middle. Itlurks between the beginning of your book and the exciting conclusion, and itsmission in life is to Atreyu you right down into the yucky, mucky mire in orderto prevent you from ever actually finishing.

The Great Swampy Middle (or GSM) knows no fear, no mercy, no regret. It doesn'tcome after you. It darned well knows that you're going to come to it. It knowsthat you're going to be charging along, sending up the spinning plates, rippingout the strong character introductions, planting cool bits into your story forthe future, and generally feeling high on life. And just then, as you get allthat fun opening-story stuff done, it pounces. And suddenly, you're staring at ablank word processor screen trying to figure out how to get your story through

the next paragraph.

And it laughs at you. It laughs and dances on the ashes of your enthusiasm. Itknows full well that you are going to be its bitch from now until you somehowfinish the book or else give up in despair and slit your wrists with the edge ofone of those index cards you're using to try to figure out the rest of theplot. It rejoices and dances around a primal bonfire, howling its glee at theuncaring stars.

The smug bastard.

Okay. Maybe I'm anthropomorphosizing it a little. But not by much.

The middle of books is HARD, especially for beginning writers. Why? Because themiddle of a book gives you the most flexibility in terms of telling your story.The beginnings and ends of stories share many similar demands, craftwise, butthe MIDDLE is where your personal style has room to play. IE, there are aberjillion-and-one different things you can do in the middle of a story, andsince you're a beginning writer, about a berjillion of them are probably thewrong things to do.

It's like a swamp. There are apparent paths all around you--but sometimes theground that looks solid actually sucks you under and paralyzes you and stranglesyou. Sometimes the water that looks deep and unpleasant is actually shallow andsafe. Sometimes apparent paths aren't paths at all--they just wander all over

and wind up at a dead end. Sometimes the safe-looking waters are teeming withalligators and poisonous snakes just below the surface.


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Man. The middle of a book is /dangerous/.

It's when an author starts getting lost that the book's middle becomes the GreatSwampy Middle. Once you've taken a wrong turn in the GSM, you've got to besmart about which way you move, because if you just keep wandering around, you(and by "you" I mean "your story") is just going to keep bumbling around incircles and never get out of the GSM.

Those of you who have written this much of a book already know exactly what I'mtalking about. You hit that point where you're not sure what to do next--whensmall details and points of logic start tripping you up. Where your storybegins to veer off from your outline, and feel fairly confident that it'snever, EVER going to veer back. You aren't sure where things went wrong,exactly. Characters and situations start popping out of your fingers as if oftheir own volition. They're often fun, even intriguing, but they're really aform of denial, you poor deluded, benighted sap. You're lost. You just don'twant to admit it to anyone, least of all yourself.

News flash: the reader is going to get that, and it's going to kill their fun.

Readers are not stupid. They have a surprising amount of insight, even if theydon't always consciously work out why something seems to be wrong with thestory. Many readers, God bless every one of them, will plow ahead through theswamp, trusting you to get your act together eventually.

But most won't have that kind of patience. You'll lose them.

(That's bad.)

But I say unto you, fear not. For though the GSM be all around you, there areways to escape its fearsome grasp. I'll share my own favorite methods with you,and go over several other techniques and tips, and finish off with the WMD(Weapon of Middle Destruction) which can snickersnack that GSM monster back into

the slivy toves with 100 percent reliability.

Here we go:

The problem with GSMs is that most writers don't have a very good idea ofexactly where they want to go. I mean sure, they want to get "to the other sideof the swamp," but that's sort of like saying "I want to get to the other sideof the continent." It's a good plan, as stated, but it lacks clarity,specificity, definition. Instead of saying "the other side of the continent" itmight be more helpful to say something like "I'm taking I-70 out through themidwest to Denver, then hopping on Highway Suchandsuch southwest through theRockies before taking Route Whatever across California to the Pacific."

Same thing applies in the story. If you have a good idea of your next landmark,waypoint, stepping stone, what have you, it's a lot easier not to fall off thepath and get sucked down into the mud. SO. One way to help yourself do that isto create something to help you keep on track--a structure specificallydesigned to keep the pace of your book strong throughout the middle.My favorite such construct is called THE BIG MIDDLE.

THE BIG MIDDLE:

Here's the nutshell concept: Plan a great big freaking event for the end of themiddle. You want it to be a big dramatic confrontation of whatever kind isappropriate to your genre. The fallout from your big bad Big Middle event

should be what boots the book down the homestretch to reach the story's climax.Really lay out the fireworks. Hit the reader with everything you can.PLAN THE BIG MIDDLE EVENT. Then, as you work through the middle, WORK TO BUILD


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UP TO IT. Drop in the little hints, establish the proper props and motivationsand such. Make sure that everything you do in the middle of the book is helpingyou build up to the BIG MIDDLE.

(I've used the Big Middle concept in EVERY book I've ever published. It works.It ain't broke. It ain't the only way to do the middle, either, but it's oneway.)

Example: The Dresden Files, Dead Beat. The Big Middle event in this book is thezombie attack on Harry's apartment. Corpsetaker and Grevane show up in the sameplace, at the same time, and kick off a full blown Necrobattle. There arezombies and ghosts, tons of magic, Harry's wards frying everything in sight,Butters gets captured, Harry and Thomas have to save him, plenty of specialeffects and a narrow escape.

(That's the drama part.)

In the course of the Big Middle, Harry gets information he needs to continue hispursuit, the bad guys blow out the city's power, Butters picks up a new mantra

about courage, and we segue into the next day, with Halloween and theDarkhallow charging down from the horizon.

(that's the set things in motion part)

Big Middle is a good counter to the GSM. It helps you stay focused and gets youthrough the chapters more smoothly.

MINI ARC:

Some authors get through the GSM by creating a whole little storyline of its ownand plopping it down smack in the middle. Normally, it's intertwined with themain story in some fashion, but the focus of the characters shifts onto a new

track, one that is wholly contained in the middle. It is, essentially, asmaller story, which interfaces with the overall story well enough to exposeool character stuff that is relevant to the main plot, that kind of thing.

Example: The Two Towers. For the non-Frodo non-Sam characters, the main goal(destroy the Ring and defeat Sauron) changes (to catch the orcs and rescue Merryand Pippin, save Rohan from getting suckerpunched into the great beyond). Theyhaven't given up on the Ring or whacking Sauron--but they've been diverted intoa smaller story which still carries emotional weight. They'll get back toantiMordor insurgency soon, you know. But for the time being, we're learningmore about their characters, establishing some of the best characterinteraction in the whole of the story.

NEW SUBPLOT:

A watered down version of Mini-Arc, a new subplot is just that--a subplot thatsuddenly develops and has to be dealt with, without actually becoming a bigoverwhelming part of the story on its own. The new subplot begins and ends inthe middle, and generally introduces you to some cool characters or threatsnative to that subplot.

Example: Trash Compactors and Tractor Beams. Luke's main goal (save the princessand defeat the Empire!) gets altered (don't get squashed flat! Escape! Come in,Threepio, where could he be!?). It doesn't change the overall goal--but it DOEStake the story into a new direction, and you get the cool periscope-tentacle

monster, a new setting, and a really suspenseful impending doom scene. Kenobigets an even tamer version of the same thing, because his presence would makerescuing the princess way too easy. He gets sent off on the tractor beam


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sabotage mission. Again, a small subplot bound to the main goal, but NOT themain goal, and it creates tension by separating him from the others, lettinghim smell Darth's BO coming steadily closer, and showing us cool Jedi tricksthat only seem to work on Stormtroopers.

NEW CHARACTER:

A new character tromps out onto the stage in a more flamboyent or memorablefashion than most supporting characters would do. They aren't on stage long, butthey serve an important role in forwarding the story, and they entertain thehell out of the audience while they do it.

Example: The Incredibles, Edna Mode. Edna shows up to make Bob a new suit, makethe whole family new suits, and to tip Helen off to the fact that MisterIncredible is off on Fantasy Island with Storm's bolemia-stricken baby sister.Edna is a freaking riot, but her total time on stage is a bare fraction of themain cast, and she's there to keep the plot moving quickly.

There. THAT hatful of techniques should be able to help anybody sinking into thequicksand. Be aware that using this stuff is simple--but not EASY. It takespractice. Play with it and see what works best for you, but PRACTICE.

Which leads me up nicely to segue into the ultimate Vorpal Sword for slaying theGSM:

Keep writing.

Here, let me repeat that.

KEEP WRITING.

One more time, only louder.

KEEEEEEEEEEEP!

WRRRRRIIIIIIIITTTTTIIIIIIIIINNNNNGGGGGG!

The ultimate way to get out of the GSM is to keep on plowing ahead. Sooner orlater, you're bound to pop out the other side or else stumble onto adiscernable path.

Note, I say that this is the ultimate way. It isn't the fast way. It isn't thesmart way. But, by God, if you sit down, grit your teeth and WRITE WRITE WRITE,ONWARD ONWARD ONWARD, you're bound to get out eventually. You'll do ten timesthe work and probably need to cut and slash your story with a whale flenserbefore you move on to the next draft, but it WILL get you unstuck and out,sooner or later.

Okay, I think I'm about metaphored out. So, one more, and then I'll shut up.

Finding your way through the middle of your novel is like finding any otherpath. You're best off if you NEVER GET OFF IT. Solid outlines are the best wayto stay on it, but they aren't an easy way, either. That's just as well.Devloping some skills you'll need to find your way when accidents happen and youget off track is important and useful.

These techniques above are tools, stuff you can use to help stay focused on theproper path (IE, your PLOT) so that you don't veer off on accident, slow the


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pace of your story and kill the interest of your audience. If you get off track,employing one of the tools (or about a million others I've forgotten about,=never heard of, or can't quite remember just now) can help you get your storyback on track, charging for that big finish. They're best used in the planningstages of a book, as preventatives, but you can use them after the fact withjust as much success.

The Great Swampy Middle doesn't love you. It wants you to never write a book,ever. The GSM wants you to give up and go home.

So take my advice and take a few tools with you--mine or someone else's, youwon't hurt my feelings. If the GSM so much as looks at you crosseyed, go upsideits head with them.

That'll learn the smug bastard.

Jim

Don't suppose you have any advice on how to construct a good story synopsis for

Agents/publishers do you?

RJ

jimbutcher

July 16 2006, 04:27:42 UTC

link

See above re: STORY SKELETON, I think. The part about when BLANK happens,PROTAGONIST sets out to STORY GOAL, etc.

The information in those two sentences is gonna tell an editor what they need toknow about the specifics of your book. The brevity, clarity, andprofessionalism of the letter itself is what they're going to look at to judgewhether or not you come off like an actual writer.

SCENES----------

Scenes are important. Scenes are where all the plot in your book happens. Anytime your character is actively pursuing his goal (as opposed to a character whois pausing to reflect or react emotionally to the events of the story) he isengaged in a SCENE.

The basic structure of a scene is simple. Your POINT OF VIEW character sets outin pursuit of a SPECIFIC GOAL. Someone else (usually, but not always,the antagonist) actively, knowingly tries to stop him. There is a CONFLICT. Thereader is left to wonder whether or not the POV character will succeed (whichcan also be thought of as the SCENE QUESTION). The result of the conflict is*always* a SETBACK of one kind or another (also thought of as the SCENE ANSWER)--at least, until you get to the end of the book.

Let me break that into a simple format. This is the one I use every time I writea scene. I fill it out, like a freaking class worksheet (which at one time it

was):

POINT OF VIEW CHARACTER:


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GOAL:CONFLICT (SCENE QUESTION):SETBACK (SCENE ANSWER):

We'll look at each of them, one at a time.

POINT OF VIEW CHARACTER

------------------------------------Sometimes, this is easy--for instance, when you're writing a first-personviewpoint novel, like the Dresden Files. The point of view character is alwaysthe same person.

Other times, though, you've got more lattitude (IE, a better chance to screw up). You've got multiple point of view characters in your book, and often more thanone of them is participating in the scene. (Romance writers, especially, runinto this issue a lot.) If you pick the wrong viewpoint character, you'll cheatyourself out of making your scene as interesting and appealing as it could be.Picking the optimal viewpoint character is VITAL.

Fortunately, there's a simple rule of thumb for people getting started. ALWAYSpick the person with the MOST AT STAKE, emotionally, in the scene. If you dothat, you help build in additional tension, you get to show more emotion(aka, create greater empathy in the reader), and you help ensure that theconflict is real, that it matters.

You can break this rule--just like you can break all of these rules--once youknow what you're doing. But until you are CERTAIN that you understand why thisworks, how it works, and what you can accomplish by NOT following the rule . . .don't. Please, until you've worked enough to get it yourself, just take my wordfor it that this rule of thumb is frickin' critical, and you will do well byyourself to stick with it.

GOAL-------

Once you've got your point of view character, the next thing you need is a GOALfor them to pursue. This needs to be an ACTIVE, SPECIFIC goal, not justsomething vague. Instead of your character setting out to "do something to savethe day" he needs to have a goal more like, "go pound Joe Blow for informationthat might let me save the day." Instead of "make the girl like me" his goalneeds to be something more like "take the girl out for a wonderful night on thetown with lots of attention to detail and customized surprises for her."

(That's the great part about writing action scenes. You get really clear, simplegoals like "Get out of the room alive.")

Your goal doesn't always have to be life-shatteringly important. It can be assimple as "I want breakfast." The most important thing about it is that it mustbe clear, apparently attainable, specific, and important to your viewpointcharacter.

CONFLICT-------------

Ah, conflict. The heart of every story. If you screw up absolutely everythingelse about a scene but GET THE CONFLICT RIGHT, you're gonna be way closer to

getting published than most people ever manage.

Conflict is what happens when someone, for some reason, up and decides that your


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character needs to fail in his goal, or else is pursuing a goal which, if met,will prevent your viewpoint character from reaching his goal.

CONFLICT IS ALL ABOUT CHARACTERS. IT HAPPENS BETWEEN CHARACTERS. Conflict is NOT"there's a forest fire!" or "it's really cold outside!" Those things can beused as dramatic elements, don't get me wrong--but they aren't CONFLICT. Theyare referred to as "adversity" and they are inherently second-class citizens

when it comes to establishing interesting scenes.

(Most often, they serve best as a supporting role. It's one thing to be in aknife fight with your most hated enemy. It's quite another to be in a knifefight with your most hated enemy in the middle of a forest fire.)

CONFLICT, ideally, is two characters going head-to-head (on whatever level isappropriate--social knife-fighting can make reading every bit as interesting asliteral knife-fighting), while both of them try to achieve conflicting goals.

All this really means is that you need an antagonist with the same specific,attainable goal, the same kinds of emotional stakes, as your protagonist.

Once you've got the right kind of set up, the scene almost writes itself.

(Notice that I say "antagonist" and not "villain." It doesn't have to be avillain. It can be a concerned friend, trying to talk your character out ofdoing something. It can be a misguided heroic-type, who just happens to beacting against your protagonist, like Murphy was in the first couple of Dresdenbooks. It can be an admirable and even likeable foe, like Marshal Sam Gerard inThe Fugitive. The choices are vast. The important thing, though, is that he'sworking against your viewpoint character.)

And, done right, the conflict poses an implied SCENE QUESTION. Will yourcharacter succeed? Or even better, WHICH character is going to succeed?

SETBACK------------

The SETBACK is the result of the CONFLICT. Your character set out to accomplisha certain goal--AND HE DOESN'T GET IT.

Eh, you say? What what?

He doesn't get it. Come on, if it was that simple--Goal, attained! Goal, attained!--it really wouldn't be a terribly interesting story. Think . . . oh, the early Superman cartoons. A dozen problems would start happening--bad guys, natural disasters, what have you. Then Supes would show up and, one by one, smash/burn/freeze/throw/beat up the problems, mostly with very little apparent effort.

THAT GETS BORING FAST.

(In fact, I often don't even like to use the word "setback" to describe the results of the scene. I like referring to it as the DISASTER. But I'm melodramatic,that way.)

In any case, the character doesn't attain his full goal, his total completion, until the END OF THE STORY. If he gets it early on, hey, why keep reading? The best stories keep the reader on edge (IE, not entirely satisfied) until the story's climax, at which point all questions are resolved, all goals met, and we can a

ll go have a cigarette or something.

There are a number of ways you can end a scene--or phrased another way, there ar


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e a number of ANSWERS to the SCENE QUESTION. Let's go over them, beginning withthe least desirable, from the standpoint of a writer trying to keep a reader glued to the story:

ANSWER 1: YES. Already told you, this one is a no-no. It's the simplest, leavesyou with the least drama and the fewest options. It's predictable, almost inherently comes with less conflict, and gives you the worst odds of keeping a reader'

s attention.

("Trapped in the pit of starving, diseased wolverines, our hero struggles to getfree! He leaps to safety unscathed, and continues his journey!" See what Imean? Bor-ing.)

ANSWER 2: YES . . . BUT. This one is a lot better. In this scenario, your heroaccomplishes his scene goal all right--but there's a complication of some kind,and one that might have consequences down the line. Generally, the more direand/or disastrous the potential consequence, the better.

("Trapped in the pit of starving, diseased wolverines, our hero struggles to get

free! He leaps up to climb to safety, the wolverines raging and foaming beneathhim--but just as he reaches the edge of the pit, and freedom, he is savagelybitten on the leg! He is free! But it is only a matter of time before MadWolverine Syndrome reduces him to a snarling, foaming monster!" See there?Way more interesting than getting away without a mark to show for it.)

ANSWER 3: NO! Another solid scene resolution, from the writing standpoint. Thehero sets out to attain his goal, but is flatly denied. Maybe he gets shut downby the antagonist. Maybe he makes a mistake and blows it completely. Either way,he gives it his best shot and is slapped down. Now he'll have to back off,re-evaluate the situation, and try something else. Use this scene answer withsome caution, because it can have the effect of bringing your story to a halt.

Too many of them can become frustrating for the reader, and can make yourcharacter look foolish and/or impotent, thus reducing reader empathy and thetension of your overall story.

("Trapped in the pit of starving, diseased wolverines, our hero struggles to getfree! He leaps up to climb to safety, but the crumbling edge of the pit givesway, dropping him back down among the foaming monsters! He reaches for hiscommunicator and shouts, "Red! I may have a problem here!" See? This can be agood way of getting other characters involved, dropping in some more characterinteraction, what have you--but you're still stuck in the pit of wolverines.Unless you are writing "Wolverine Pits of Madison County" or something,you don't want to stay stuck in the wolverine pit forever, so use your NOanswers carefully.)

ANSWER 4: NO! AND FURTHERMORE! My personal favorite scene answer. Not only doesyour hero NOT attain his goal, but he manages to make matters even WORSE alongthe way. It's best if the worsening of the situation is your protagonist'sfault, because that's just FUN, but it doesn't necessarily have to be.

THIS answer is really the one that gives you the most interesting scenes,provides the meat for the most interesting and endearing sequels, and isgenerally the Big Gun you pull out when your plot is slowing down.Warning: it does force you, as the writer, to get a little creative, because itmultiplies the problems your hero has to solve. But hey. If you weren't atleast a little creative, you wouldn't be here.

("Trapped in the pit of starving, diseased wolverines, our hero struggles to getfree! He leaps up to climb to safety, seizing onto the trailing end of a vine!


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But the vine gives way, sending our hero sprawling back down among theslavering beasts! He stares at them in horror, and only THEN realizes that the"vine" he seized was no such thing! He is now holding the tail of a thirty-footlong Peruvian Acid Cobra--and the incredibly deadly serpent is NOT happy tohave been suddenly seized in the middle of its siesta. It opens its deadly jawsand lunges for our hero's throat!" Mmmmm. Now that's good fallout.)

Granted, these examples are pulp fictiony, but they're meant to serve as broadillustrations. In one way or another, every scene in every story where acharacter is pursuing a goal will fall into one of those four outcomes.

And you've done it! You've written a good scene!

Simple, right? It is. But it isn't EASY. Try it out, and PRACTICE it.Shockingly, you get better with practice. These days, I don't even reallyconsciously think in terms of goal/conflict/setback. Those things are a part ofmy thinking process, and they've become transparent to me, now. I just thinkabout the scene, forming it with a solid skeleton from the get-go, and it allow

sme to focus more active effort on other aspects of the writing--pace,character, mood, setting, description. Occasionally, I'll even have time tospare for making the language pretty. But if I didn't have that solid skeletonthere, that other stuff wouldn't much matter. You've GOT to have the craftelements solid before you can start adding in artistry.

To recap:

POINT OF VIEWGOALCONFLICT

SETBACK

And that's all there is to writing a really good scene.

Of course, books aren't 100 percent full of scenes. Characters have to stop tobind up their diseased wounds, be diagnosed with Mad Wolverine Syndrome, toworry about their impending doom and steal kisses from sympatheticnurse-heroines. Where's the conflict in that? How does that fit into your sceneparadigm, Jim?

It doesn't, of course.

That's a sequel. We'll talk about those next.

*comment*

Why is your conflict always character based? i.e. man vs. man?What about man vs. nature ...vs. society ...vs. himself?Why are they not appropriate conflicts in the scene structure?

jimbutcher

Mainly because this is a series of articles intended for aspiring professionalfiction writers, and the examples you use are /really/ hard to write well andmake interesting.


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Doesn't mean it can't be done. But it's quite a bit of uphill work to pit manversus gravity and make it an interesting scene. Man vs. nature is a lot easierwhen nature is a hungry bear or a rabid wolverine. Man vs. himself? That can bereally cool, or really cheesy, or just yawningly boring--but it really isn'tfor the novice to be playing with.

Generally speaking, conflict is a lot easier to write when there are two activewills involved. It gives you the most options for scene outcomes, for unexpectedtwists in the writing, and has a tendency to draw the reader into the storymore successfully in an emotional sense.

That last is really important. I mean, it's sort of hard for a reader to boo andhiss at a fire. A fire is just a fire. It isn't anything hateworthy. Neitherare the icy conditions on the surface of Hoth, in Empire Strikes Back--but abig old shaggy snow monster, now, THAT is scary. Antagonists give you adouble-whammy on the reader, allowing you to apply emotional leverage to thescenes, making the villain more scary and despicable as you make theprotagonist more desperate and brave.

I'll tell you this much: I've got going on 20 published novels under my belt,and I hesitate strongly before I write man vs. nature or man vs. some vague andfaceless society, and ESPECIALLY before man vs. himself. Those things mightsound intelligent and intriguing, but most of the time when they're written,they come out flat and boring, and that's something novice authors can't affordif they want to get published in genre fiction.

If you're trying to write literary stuff, now, more power to you--but thislivejournal just isn't going to be of much use to you.

Re: Conflict vs. adversity

I just wanted to ask you to clarify conflict vs. adversity. Conflict in itsbasic form is one force vs. one force. But I actually think you're books

really interest me because they're so many things going on at once.For example, at the end of Full Moon I guess strictly speaking its Harry

vs. Giant werewolf, but its also Harry vs. Werewolf vs. Murphy vs. Marco

nevs. Wolf pack where everyone has their own motivations. When you're maki

ngyour outline or skeleton, Do you just break it down to the most importan

tor biggest conflict and file the rest under "adversity," or do you break

itdown more specifically.

Ah-HAH! But that's where the slight of hand comes in. Yes, all those forces areplaying against one another, but if you look at the structure of the book on ascene-by-scene basis, there's generally only two sides in operation AT ANY ONETIME.

It's like, oh, a kung fu movie: Yeah, there's like a million guys fightingJackie Chan, but what you see in the movie is Jackie versus whoever is right infront of him at the moment. They come in and out, they get support sometimes,


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sometimes there are multiple sides to the battle--but if you look at the actualframes of the movie, there are going to be only two or three people actuallyexchanging fisticuffs, while the rest of them are basically backdrop scenery.

Oh, they'll change dance partners along the way, and done right it makes forreally beautiful havoc. But in the creation phase of that kind of situation(which is what we're talking about) we have to build from the specific point of

conflict occurring there and then.

SEQUELS

And no, we're not talking about book 2. We're talking about the original meaningof the word sequel--the part that comes after, the next in the sequence. In thescenes of a book, you're getting all your plot-pursuing and action-taking andchoice-making done.

Now you get to the hard part.

Getting your reader to give a flying frack about it.

To do that, you've got to win them over to your character's point of view.You've got to establish some kind of basic emotional connection, an empathy foryour character. It needn't be deep seated agreement with everything thecharacter says and does--but they DO need to be able to UNDERSTAND what yourcharacter is thinking and feeling, and to understand WHY they are doing whatever(probably outrageous) thing you've got them doing.

That gets done in sequels.

Pay attention. This is another one of those simple, difficult things.

Sequels are what happens as an aftermath to a scene. They do several specificthings:

1) Allow a character to react emotionally to a scene's outcome.2) Allow a character to review facts and work through the logical options of hissituation.3) They allow a character to ponder probable outcomes to various choices.4) They allow a character to make a CHOICE--IE, to set themselves a new GOAL forthe next SCENE.

Do you see how neat that is? Do you see how simply that works out?

1) Scene--Denied!2) Sequel--Damn it! Think about it! That's so crazy it just might work!--New Goal!3) Next Scene!

Repeat until end of book.

See what I mean? Simple. And you can write a book EXACTLY that way.Scene-sequel-scene-sequel-scene-sequel all the way to your story climax.In fact, if you are a newbie, I RECOMMEND you write your book that way. You can

always chop and cut the extra scenes (or sequels) out later, and you will have asolid bedrock structure for getting your book done. We'll talk a little aboutbalancing them in a minute.


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First, let's outline exactly what happens in a sequel--and WHY the basic outlineI'm gonna show you works.

Here's the basic structure to a sequel. It's another little worksheet you canfill out when you're thinking about it ahead of time:

1) EMOTIONAL REACTION:2) REVIEW, LOGIC, & REASON:3) ANTICIPATION:4) CHOICE:

And it MUST happen in THAT ORDER. Why you ask me? Because we're all human beings, and THAT is the order in which we respond, psychologically, to events thathappen around us. Especially to big nasty events that bring out a lot of emotion.

Most of you have probably been in a car accident of some kind, and that's themodel I'm gonna use. Even if it was only a little accident and no one got hurt,

everybody reacts in pretty much the same way. Imagine it with me, if you will.You're driving and all of a sudden, SQUEEEEEERRRCRUUUNCH! Car accident. Whathappens next?

You react emotionally, on instinct. Maybe you sit there stunned and startled fora second. Maybe you feel a moment of horror (if it was your fault), or elseseething outrage (if it wasn't). Maybe you yell and curse, or throw up onyourself, or break out into hysterical laughter. There are a whole lot ofviable human emotional responses to that kind of stimulus--but the first oneson the scene are ALWAYS the most basic, instinctive, emotional reactions.

Next, your brain kicks in. (This takes a variable amount of time, depending onthe person.) Your brain tells you things and you pay attention to it. Maybe it

says "this accident was your fault, and if they catch you, you'll go to jail.Run!" Maybe it says, "Check to see if anyone is hurt! Call the police! Exchangeinsurance information!" Maybe it says, "Call so-and-so to help," or "Oh my God,I'm bleeding," or "Please God let me have my proof of insurance in the glovecompartment." You think about things like how the accident happened, and whatyou could have done to avoid it, what's necessary to accomplish immediately--and then you get to think about where you're suddenly not going to be.

(During your review, logic, and reasoning process, it is very human to realizeor rediscover facts that bring on an echo of your emotional response, or whichotherwise inspire an entirely new line of emotional response. If you realizethat the guy who just slammed into your car ran a stop sign to do it,for example, it might inspire a radically different set of emotions than amoment before, when you thought neither one of you had a clear right of way.)

You can get as upset as you want, for as long as you want, but sooner or lateryou're going to have gone over all the facts of what happened a minute ago, andyou'll start thinking about what happens NEXT. You anticipate the immediatefuture, based upon what you know and what your current options are. Maybeyou've got a buddy who can pick you up and get you to work, and you'll only bea few minutes late. Or maybe you don't, and you've just lost your job. Maybeyou're going to have to find a phone to call an ambulance because someone ishurt. There are a lot of things that could be pretty obviously a part of yourimmediate future, based on your current circumstances.

And once those things have rolled through your mind, you've got to decide whatyou're doing next. Maybe you're just trading insurance information and gettingback on the road. Maybe you're hiding the body. The point is, you've got a


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choice to make, and that choice is going to determine your next action.

Voila.

You've just had a sequel, a broad, archetypical human reaction to a suddensituation that goes radically out of your control.

YOUR CHARACTERS DO THE SAME THING.

At the conclusion of a scene, they've just had something go out of THEIRcontrol. You know how I know this? Because you didn't answer YES to your scenequestion. Something went wrong, because you are a smart writer, and that's howyou did the scene. Now your characters go through the same set of reactions:

1) An immediate emotional response.2) A review of what happened, applying logic and reason to the events and whythey turned out that way, and of what options are open to them.3) Anticipation of what might follow the pursuit of those options.(Highly important, this one. Never underestimate the effects of anticipation on

a reader.)4) Your character makes up his mind and decides what to do next. IE, he makes aCHOICE.

Now, it's possible to SKIP some of these steps, or to abbreviate some of them soseverely that you all but skip them. But you CAN'T CHANGE THE ORDER.

Emotion, Reason, Anticipation, Choice. That reaction is typical to people,regardless of their sex, age, or background. It's psychologically hardwired intous--so take advantage of it. By having your character react in this verytypically human way, you establish an immediate sense of empathy with thereader. If you do it right, you get the reader nodding along with thatcharacter going "Damn right, that's what I'd do." Or better yet, you get them

opening their mouth in horror as they read, seeing the character's thoughtprocess, hating every step of where it's going while it remains undeniablyunderstandable and genuine to the way people behave.

Sequels, frankly, are what really make or break books. How you choose to showyour reader your character's reactions determines everything about the reader'sresponse to the events of the story.

Worse, sequels are very fluid, very flexible things to apply. You can do allkinds of tricks with them. Some sequels are all internal monologue. Some areconversations carried out with a character's best friend(or his all-in-black-id). Sometimes a sequel LOOKS like a scene, in thetrappings anyway, but what's actually important is the character's internalreaction.

(Search your feelings, Luke. You know it to be true. *I* am your father.*NOOOOOO*. Yeah, that lightsabre fight looks like a scene, but at that point itisn't. It's a sequel.)

This is where, frankly, I think writers have the greatest fluidity, the mostchance to apply their creative talents--which means, of course, we also have thebest chance of screwing things up here. You can approach sequels from an almostunlimited number of directions. There are no limits to how you can lay out asequel, except for your own imagination. Just remember:

1) EMOTION2) REASON3) ANTICIPATION


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4) CHOICE

Get those in there, in the right order, and you'll be fine.

Let's talk, for a moment, about how you want to weight the various parts of thesequel, based upon your genre, what you want to accomplish, etc. The sequel iswhere you can put a spin on almost any story to make it more suited to a given

genre. Each of the genres has its own bias towards a given part of a sequel.

Romance, for example, is VERY heavy on Emotion and only slightly less onAnticipation. Mystery and SF lean very heavily on the Reason portion of thesequel. Action novels go light on everything but Choice, and give you justenough sequel to get you through to the next scene. Horror loves to linger onAnticipation. Think about it for a while,and you'll start to see what I mean.

So, if you're writing a romance, you'll want to place extra emphasis on yourcharacter's Emotional reaction and on his Anticipation of what could come next.

Mystery writers had better be able to produce clear lines of logic in the

Reasoning portion of their character's reaction. If you need the reader to becozy with a character, put extra emphasis on that character's sequels. If itisn't necessary for another character, go light on the sequels, or skip thementirely.

If that wasn't enough, Sequel-to-Scene ratio is the single largest factor forcontrolling pace. Sequels have a unanimous tendancy to slow the pace of yourstory, while scenes have the opposite effect. If you've ever read a book andfelt like it blurred by too fast and never seemed to touch on anything longenough, go back and look at it. You WILL find that the book's scenes took up agreat deal more space than its sequels. If you've read a book that you thoughtwas too slow, too cerebral, or that wandered back and forth while droning on andon, go back and look at it. You WILL find that sequels took up a hell of a lot

more page space than scenes.

It's a balancing act, and how you stack up scene-to-sequel is going to depend onseveral factors, including your genre and your audience. Romance, for example,is really nothing BUT sequels with occasional scenes to make them sticktogether. Romance wallows in sequels, because that's what it's ABOUT--emotions,feelings.

If you write an action book, those emotional passages--not so much. You'll wantto spend more time and effort on the scenes, and make sure that the sequelsdon't start to outweigh them. If you're writing for a more cerebral, matureaudience, they have a much higher desire/tolerance for sequels than if you writefor, for example, young adults. The older audience might well be moreinterested in the thought and emotion behind the plot, while the youngeraudience might want you to stop moaning and dithering and get straight to thepoint. You control that pace by balancing sequels with scenes.

Sequels also determine what I've always called the "warmth" of your novel. Whenpeople talk about a "warm viewpoint" what they really mean is that you'rethrowing in a lot of emotional reaction. Oftentimes, warm viewpoint novels(like the Dresden Files) toss in micro-sequels as a part of scenes. Any timeyou see Harry talking to someone, wanting to tear his hair out, forcing himselfto control his temper and get back to the task at hand, you've just riddenthrough a micro-sequel with him.

"Cool" viewpoint novels, like the more classic hardboiled PI novel, downplaytheir protagonist's Emotional reactions--often skipping them entirely during ascene, and showing them only indirectly during sequels. They tend to emphasize


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the Reason side of things.

My God, there are so many things you can do with this stuff. Brainy, intelligentcharacters go heavy on reason--and then you cheat by going light onAnticipation, and keeping his Choice half-veiled from the reader, so that whenhe actually acts in the next scene he looks a lot smarter and more resourcefulthan he might have if you went step by step through the whole thing.

("Of course! He animated the T-Rex! Brilliant!") Characters who are balancingtheir loyalties up to some critical moment can get the whole sequel laid out,extra heavy on Anticipation, and then you deny the reader any info on theChoice until they're actually in action.

Get it? SEQUELS ARE WHERE YOU APPLY THE COLOR TO YOUR STORY. It's the best pointat which to manipulate your readers' emotions. I've been working within thiscraft structure for ten years, and I feel like I'm only barely beginning to geta handle on it. Seriously. You've got to give this some thought.

Knowledge of how sequels effect your book's impact on the reader is damned handyin rewrites, too. If a character is coming off too flighty, all you have to do

is add in a bit more Reason to their sequels. Character too dry and boring?Add in more Emotion to /his/ sequels. Someone comments that your character'smotivations aren't clear? Go give their sequels a tune-up, and make sure hisEmotion-Reason-Anticipation-Choice is in the correct order and consistent.

When you do it right, the reader knows exactly what is going through yourcharacter's head, and why. The /reader/ starts being the one anticipating alongwith your character, and when that happens, you pwn them. It creates forwardmomentum for the next scene, and it helps the reader /want/ to read it.

This basic structure for sequels is pretty much the ENTIRE secret of my success.I do it like this in every freaking book I write. I know it works because checkit out. People like my books. They like them for some of the special effects,

sure, and for some of the story ideas sometimes--but mostly it's because theyfind themselves caring about what happens to the characters, and that happensin sequels.

People don't love Harry for kicking down the monster's front door. They love himbecause he's terrified out of his mind, he knows he's putting himself in dangerby doing it, he's probably letting himself in for a world of hurt even if he issuccessful, but he chooses to do it anyway.

Emotion. Reason. Anticipation. Choice.

Special effects and swashbuckling are just the light show.

The heart of your character--and your reader--is in the

Notes on Jim Butcher's Writing Advise

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