Nanowrimo Day 1: If you're stuck, skip ahead!

Screenwriting Tricks for Authors

For the month of Nano I’m doing a weekly post running down the most important story elements of each Act, with links to expanded articles on each element.

In case you missed them, here are the Act I posts:

Nanowrimo: 10 Essential Elements of Act I

Nanowrimo Act I Cheat Sheet

I’m also going to do a daily prompt or trick, which I’ll do in Substack’s Notes feature.

(Go to Notes.)

You will NOT get an email for every Note I post!

But if you WANT notifications of Notes, maybe especially for this month, there’s more at the bottom of the post on how to set that up.

Here are two to get you started!

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Nanowrimo Day I: You Don’t Have to Write in Order!

This goes for the whole month, not just Day 1:

1. If you find yourself stuck or stalled on a chapter, skip ahead to another one and write that instead.

This always comes as a surprise to some writers, so I want to make it clear: There is no law of writing that says you have to write in order.

If you’re stuck or stalling on a scene or chapter you’re writing, skip it for now and go on, either to the next chapter— or one somewhere else in the book that you’re excited about writing. Chances are your creative brain will solve the problem of the chapter you skipped and you’ll go back to it soon, But if not, so what? That’s what rewriting is for!

Photo by Sammie Chaffin on Unsplash

2. Use your Master List to solve story problems.

Make sure you’ve made your Master List of films and books in your genre and/or that are similar in structure to your own book or script. When you don’t know what’s next, you can watch 15 minutes or a half hour of one of those movies to see how those storytellers handle the same section of the story that you’re struggling with.

Doing this in tandem with the Story Elements lists I’m posting for each act should give you ideas for scenes and action and twists to carry you forward. Check the Story Elements list for each Act periodically to see if you’re leaving something out that might be the answer to whatever you’re struggling with!

Also find Story Elements lists in Stealing Hollywood and Writing Love — Chapters 7, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. The full Story Breakdowns in each book break down popular movies Act by Act, Sequence by Sequence, and Story Element by Story Element.

Got a question or request? Ask it in the Comments!

On your marks, get set… and go for it!

—Alex

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If you WANT notifications of Notes, maybe especially for this month:

Subscribers and followers can receive a notification in your Substack activity bell with new Notes. This can be enabled or disabled in your Substack account Settings page in the Notifications section. Go to Settings, find New notes, and make your choice:

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Need some help? The Screenwriting Tricks for Authors workshop is available online, as a self-paced course with all the videos, assignments, movie breakdowns and personalized feedback you need to get that book written this year, 15 minutes at time.

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• If you have a first draft of a book or script already, or need more feedback, get targeted help getting you over the finish line in The Writers’ Room.

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