I didn’t actually get to “attend” this virtual event in person, as the sessions were mostly while I was at work, but I’m rewatching the highlights on the website and enjoying them.
My favorite sessions so far have been “Take Off Your Pants” (a session urging you to outline at least the main points of your plot) and “Up The Ante” (about adding conflict to your story). Of course, the Jane Friedman session about self-publishing is also quite informative.
Some of the tips we’ve learned so far include the “beats” of your story:
- Opening Scene: we see the character in their ordinary life
- Inciting Event: this changes their entire life with no way back
- Character Realizes External Goal: they know what they want
- Display of Flaw: we see the character’s main flaw that has prevented them from gaining that goal before
- Drive for Goal: character makes an effort to reach their goal
- Antagonist Revealed
- Thwart #1: the antagonist (or something else) gets in the way of the goal
- Revisiting Flaw: we see the flaw keeping the character from the goal
- New Drive for Goal: the character tries even harder
- Antagonist Attacks
- Thwart #2: Another obstacle in the way
- Changed Goal: the character finds a new goal
- Ally Attacks: a friend/mentor points out flaws/challenges character
- Girding the Loins: the character finally recognizes their flaws
- Battle: the character fights the antagonist
- Death: the dark moment where everything looks hopeless
- Outcome: end of the story/wrap-up
And for Conflict. we learned the following:
- Central Conflict: the main engine driving the story; the central question of the book; the major challenge the protagonist must overcome by the end of the story
- Underlying (Chronic) Conflict: an outside conflict thrust onto the character
- Internal Conflict: thoughts/emotions
- Transient Conflict: circumstantial (Act of God)
A scene must either advance the plot or reveal something about the character. You need some sort of conflict in each scene, also, either explicit or internal. Ask yourself, “What’s the worst that could happen here?” — and then make it happen.