How many times have you seen this scene in film and TV:
The writer finally has some time alone. They go into their study/garret/hotel room and close the door behind them, sit down at the desk in front of the typewriter/laptop (or parchment scroll), insert a blank page or open a blank screen, and type out:
CHAPTER ONE
Or if the writer is a screenwriter:
FADE IN:
But if you’ll notice, what usually follows in these films is not a frenzy of typing resulting in a full manuscript by the end of a week or month— but a severe and agonizing case of writers’ block.
(As Dr. Phil used to say, “That was your clue.”)
It’s always a painful laugh to me when that “Chapter One” scene comes in a movie.
Because sitting down at a blank page and typing CHAPTER ONE and trusting it will all flow from there is very, very rarely how a book or script actually gets written.
In fact, starting from Chapter One without knowing anything else about the entirety of your story can too often be a recipe for disaster.
A book or script begins as a gradually building swirl—hopefully becoming a tornado— of ideas, characters, places, images, themes, partial and full scenes and setpieces. A story almost never comes in a lightning strike of exact, coherent order. That is, short stories can and do. Books—with iconic exceptions like Frankenstein—rarely. The seed for a book or script is often a lightning strike. But the process of getting a book out of it is a whole other ordeal. I mean, adventure. It can take years—but I’m hoping the processes I am here to break down for you will take years off that misery.
Last week we talked about an essential step at the beginning and any stage of the writing process: writing out your premise, in both a very short form, usually no more than a sentence or two, and a three-paragraph overview. I really encourage you to do this regularly to make sure you’re keeping an up-to-date roadmap of what your book or script is really about. In the process you will be building a file of marketing materials that will be lifesaving to have, already prepared, when the book is finished.
This week I will revisit another of the most important, time-and-sanity saving processes to ensure that you actually finish that book or script:
The Index Card Method and Story Structure Grid
The index card method is a way of harnessing that tornado of ideas into a coherent book or script. It is the most important tool (I feel) in the initial outlining or structuring or breaking your book —whatever you want to call it. And it is just as important to do before a second or third draft, and it is a lifesaver when you find yourself stranded, usually somewhere in that long double second act.
First, the free-form brainstorming of cards about everything you know about your idea, and the tsunami of new and connecting ideas that comes with it, is an exhilarating quantum leap toward a full book or film.
Once you’ve brainstormed those cards, the organizing process of the Three- (really four) Act, Eight-Sequence Structure that the Story Structure Grid provides shows you step by step what has to happen for your compelling characters to move through a complex, exciting, moving, and saleable story.
I’ve detailed these processes in various formats, here:
The Index Card Method and Story Structure Grid
Chapter 6 of Stealing Hollywood and Writing Love. Also find Story Elements checklists for each Act and examples in Chapters 7-21.
And on YouTube:
The Three-Act, Eight-Sequence Structure
Beginning with Chapter 5 in Stealing Hollywood & Writing Love
And this is something I feel I have to say regularly because it is always a revelation for someone who needs to hear it:
You don’t have to write in order!
I need to stress, again, that whenever you get an inspiration for a full scene or chapter, no matter where it comes in the book, you should always drop everything and write it out in full. Those inspired flashes are the best writing days of all! Even if after carding and structuring you are committed to writing your first draft in relative order, which is a really good way to progress a first draft, it’s always perfectly allowable and important to break that routine and write a scene from any part of your book when it comes to you. Or when you’re having a bad day, skip ahead!
And for the pantsers, if there are any left of you:
However a book gets written is the right way to do it.
Your process is your process. I would never, never interfere in what works for you.
You have to find your own process, something that works for you.
Especially for newer writers, the intimacy of just letting a story unfold as the characters play out their dramas in your head can be an essential part of your development as a storyteller.
And some books require a different process than others.
But I’ve taught these workshops all over the United States and internationally, and I’ve never come across a writer who didn’t get something useful out of my workbooks or workshops. The story structure I’m teaching here is something you know already, because you’ve seen it in operation in tens of thousands of movies and TV shows you’ve watched over the course of your life (scary, isn’t it?). As you start looking at movies and television for these elements, you will realize that you’re already doing most of what I talk about! Still, it’s incredibly useful to put a name to some of these things and make them a more conscious part of your writing process.
And anything that doesn’t make sense to you? Save it to look at later, or just forget about it! As they say in twelve-step programs: Take what you want and leave the rest.
—Alex
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All material ©Alexandra Sokoloff
This is such a helpful post. As I resurrect my inner writer, I need to balance passion and organization.