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Writing from Scratch #4
The Milieu Plot
The problem of the milieu plot involves a problem of location or setting. The character is often either in a place they need/want to escape from or not in the specific place they need/want to be in. The try-fail cycles will involve traveling away from or to the location. Gulliver’s Travels, The Great Escape, and The Hobbit contain milieu plots.
The Lord of the Rings contains one very large milieu – the problem of getting the One Ring from the Shire where its been hidden for a number of years to Mordor where it can finally be destroyed. We can further break this down into smaller milieu plots. Let’s look at one: the problem of crossing the Misty Mountains. (And we’ll use the events as they occur in the movie, since more people have watched that than read the book)
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Writing from Scratch #3
Flash Fiction: A Simple Plot
The first writing prompts we’re going to tackle will be flash fiction pieces. Flash fiction is a complete story written in under 1,500 words. We’ll be aiming for 250-500 words at first – that is one or two pages double spaced written in Times New Roman 12 pt. font.
The type of flash fiction I’ll encourage you to write will be Eighteen Sentence Stories*, and each of these sentences will have a very specific job.
The first Three sentences will provide the main character, the setting, and the genre (which clues the audience in on what kind of story they are about to read).
The main character should be introduced via an action that reveals their attitude at the start and with one defining job or trait that relates them to the plot. For example, a character may be both a father of three and a pilot. If the problem of the plot will deal with the kidnapping of one of his daughters, then “father” or “father of three” will be the defining job; if the problem of the plot will deal with the starship he’s piloting falling under attack, then “pilot” will be the defining job.
The setting should be introduced via a grounding sensory detail. The lingering scent of cookies left to burn when the parents received the ransom note. Or the pressure of being pinned back into the pilot’s seat under g forces.
The genre should be introduced via something specific and unique to the story. A ransom note is not specific or unique; a ransom note scrawled on the back of a picture that went missing off the fridge the week before is. A space ship is not specific or unique; a living space ship with a giant brain in its core that the pilot must psychically link to via the tentacles that suction onto his temples is.
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Writing from Scratch #7: The Event Plot
The Event Plot
The problem of an Event plot is a disruption to the status quo. The solution comes either from setting everything right again or adapting to the change. The Event plot is probably what most people think of when they think “what is a plot?” Any story that deals with a life-changing or world-changing event is an Event.
The first plot I analyzed, from The Expanse television series, is an Event plot. Let’s look at another: The Princess Diaries. As we did with Lord of the Rings, we’ll look at the movie rather than books because more people will be familiar with the movie (which is a damn shame).
The Event: Mia Thermopolis’s grandmother tells Mia that she is the princess of small European kingdom Genovia, and she must take the throne.
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Writing from Scratch #8
Now that we have gone over the four simple plot-problems (1, 2, 3, 4) and how they are solved through try-fail cycles, we’ll take a look at how to make complex, compound, and compound-complex plots through the same devices as sentence creation.
The first way we’ll try complicating a plot is by making the solution of the first noted plot-problem dependent on the solution of a second plot-problem, which stands in for easy solution prevention. We’re typically going to use dependent plots to strengthen audience satisfaction when the character is finally able to succeed. Or, like in the case-study we’ll look at today, they can be used to draw what appeared to be disparate plots together in longer works.
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Writing from Scratch #8
Now that we have gone over the four simple plot-problems (1, 2, 3, 4) and how they are solved through try-fail cycles, we’ll take a look at how to make complex, compound, and compound-complex plots through the same devices as sentence creation.
The first way we’ll try complicating a plot is by making the solution of the first noted plot-problem dependent on the solution of a second plot-problem, which stands in for easy solution prevention. We’re typically going to use dependent plots to strengthen audience satisfaction when the character is finally able to succeed. Or, like in the case-study we’ll look at today, they can be used to draw what appeared to be disparate plots together in longer works.
Read more on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #8
Now that we have gone over the four simple plot-problems (1, 2, 3, 4) and how they are solved through try-fail cycles, we’ll take a look at how to make complex, compound, and compound-complex plots through the same devices as sentence creation.
The first way we’ll try complicating a plot is by making the solution of the first noted plot-problem dependent on the solution of a second plot-problem, which stands in for easy solution prevention. We’re typically going to use dependent plots to strengthen audience satisfaction when the character is finally able to succeed. Or, like in the case-study we’ll look at today, they can be used to draw what appeared to be disparate plots together in longer works.
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Writing from Scratch #9
Complex Plots, Part 2: Modifying Plots
The second way we’ll try complicating a plot is through plot modifiers. This happens when a try-fail cycle not only furthers the solution of one plot-problem but spawns a new plot-problem. What these plots actually modify are the stakes. They can give far-off worst-case scenarios more immediacy, which is what the plot analysis we’ll be getting into today does. Or they can show clear examples of what’s at stake for more abstract cases (think of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings clarifies our fears for what could happen to Frodo).
How does this work? Let’s look back at the plot analysis I did for The Expanse, Season 1 Episode 2, “The Big Empty.” A brief recap:
The Background: The Knight, a small, rickety life-boat sized spaceship with 5 survivors is all that’s left of the Canterbury after an attack on the larger vessel.
The Problem: The Knight’s radio is dead.
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Writing from Scratch #8
Now that we have gone over the four simple plot-problems (1, 2, 3, 4) and how they are solved through try-fail cycles, we’ll take a look at how to make complex, compound, and compound-complex plots through the same devices as sentence creation.
The first way we’ll try complicating a plot is by making the solution of the first noted plot-problem dependent on the solution of a second plot-problem, which stands in for easy solution prevention. We’re typically going to use dependent plots to strengthen audience satisfaction when the character is finally able to succeed. Or, like in the case-study we’ll look at today, they can be used to draw what appeared to be disparate plots together in longer works.
Read more on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #7: The Event Plot
The Event Plot
The problem of an Event plot is a disruption to the status quo. The solution comes either from setting everything right again or adapting to the change. The Event plot is probably what most people think of when they think “what is a plot?” Any story that deals with a life-changing or world-changing event is an Event.
The first plot I analyzed, from The Expanse television series, is an Event plot. Let’s look at another: The Princess Diaries. As we did with Lord of the Rings, we’ll look at the movie rather than books because more people will be familiar with the movie (which is a damn shame).
The Event: Mia Thermopolis’s grandmother tells Mia that she is the princess of small European kingdom Genovia, and she must take the throne.
Read More on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #3
Flash Fiction: A Simple Plot
The first writing prompts we’re going to tackle will be flash fiction pieces. Flash fiction is a complete story written in under 1,500 words. We’ll be aiming for 250-500 words at first – that is one or two pages double spaced written in Times New Roman 12 pt. font.
The type of flash fiction I’ll encourage you to write will be Eighteen Sentence Stories*, and each of these sentences will have a very specific job.
The first Three sentences will provide the main character, the setting, and the genre (which clues the audience in on what kind of story they are about to read).
The main character should be introduced via an action that reveals their attitude at the start and with one defining job or trait that relates them to the plot. For example, a character may be both a father of three and a pilot. If the problem of the plot will deal with the kidnapping of one of his daughters, then “father” or “father of three” will be the defining job; if the problem of the plot will deal with the starship he’s piloting falling under attack, then “pilot” will be the defining job.
The setting should be introduced via a grounding sensory detail. The lingering scent of cookies left to burn when the parents received the ransom note. Or the pressure of being pinned back into the pilot’s seat under g forces.
The genre should be introduced via something specific and unique to the story. A ransom note is not specific or unique; a ransom note scrawled on the back of a picture that went missing off the fridge the week before is. A space ship is not specific or unique; a living space ship with a giant brain in its core that the pilot must psychically link to via the tentacles that suction onto his temples is.
Read More on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #4
The Milieu Plot
The problem of the milieu plot involves a problem of location or setting. The character is often either in a place they need/want to escape from or not in the specific place they need/want to be in. The try-fail cycles will involve traveling away from or to the location. Gulliver’s Travels, The Great Escape, and The Hobbit contain milieu plots.
The Lord of the Rings contains one very large milieu – the problem of getting the One Ring from the Shire where its been hidden for a number of years to Mordor where it can finally be destroyed. We can further break this down into smaller milieu plots. Let’s look at one: the problem of crossing the Misty Mountains. (And we’ll use the events as they occur in the movie, since more people have watched that than read the book)
Read More on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #9
Complex Plots, Part 2: Modifying Plots
The second way we’ll try complicating a plot is through plot modifiers. This happens when a try-fail cycle not only furthers the solution of one plot-problem but spawns a new plot-problem. What these plots actually modify are the stakes. They can give far-off worst-case scenarios more immediacy, which is what the plot analysis we’ll be getting into today does. Or they can show clear examples of what’s at stake for more abstract cases (think of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings clarifies our fears for what could happen to Frodo).
How does this work? Let’s look back at the plot analysis I did for The Expanse, Season 1 Episode 2, “The Big Empty.” A brief recap:
The Background: The Knight, a small, rickety life-boat sized spaceship with 5 survivors is all that’s left of the Canterbury after an attack on the larger vessel.
The Problem: The Knight’s radio is dead.
Read more on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #12: Compound Plots, Part 2
Compound Plots, Part 2: Parallel Plots
Parallel plots share a lot in common with subordinate plots. As with subordinate plots, parallel plots occur simultaneously – the individual problems and their solutions should be introduced and resolved at roughly the same time. However, parallel plots can be divided from each other and stand on their own, unlike with a subordinate plot which is dependent on the principle plot for its try-fail cycles.
“Parallel plots” is a bit of a misnomer. “Parallel” comes from the idea of parallelism in sentence construction because parallel plots often act as mirrors to one another or two sides of the same coin; they often work on each other indirectly to strengthen or emphasize the Thought of the story. What we don’t want to do is fall into the trap of thinking that the plots cannot intersect; although you should be able to separate them into their own stories, in a single story, they are meant to work together.
Superhero stories have parallel plots a plenty with the main character dealing with a plot-problem as their civilian identity and dealing with a different plot-problem as their superhero identity. We’ll look at one of these examples, Spiderman: Homecoming. Peter Parker is dealing with a Character plot in overcoming his lack of confidence to ask Liz out on a date; meanwhile Spiderman is dealing with an Inquiry plot involving the sale of alien tech weaponry on the streets. These do have points of overlap – they should for effective storytelling. However, if you take the Inquiry plot out of the story, you have a rom-com/coming-of-age story with a complete plot of no confidence to ask Liz out to yes confidence to ask Liz out. If you take the Character plot out of the story, you still have Spiderman investigating the origin of the alien tech weaponry.
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Writing from Scratch #1
Welcome to Writing from Scratch!
I’ve been writing a long time, and sometimes it feels like I lose the trees for the forest. Writing from Scratch is a chance for me (and you!) to get back to the basics of storytelling.
If you’ve never written a story before, if you’ve never felt like you could come up with one that would be worth writing, my hope is that if you follow along with me here, you will have the confidence and know-how to come up with an idea, build it into a story, and share it with the world.
These posts will be little, easy-to-digest nuggets. At the end of every post, look for a prompt and share your response in the comments!
What Is a Story?
A story can be defined by what it contains: at least one plot, character, and setting, and a style through which it is told.
Story Bits
To begin, let’s take a look at the second smallest unit of a story – the sentence. A sentence is a set of words that conveys a complete thought. And communication is fractal, meaning each part shares the same pattern as the whole. A story and its components, therefore, will also convey a Complete Thought.
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Writing from Scratch # 11: Compound Plots, Part 1
Compound Plots, Part 1: Episodes
Like complex plots, compound plots have two or more plots put together, but unlike complex plots, in compound plots, the plots can be split apart and still work as a Complete Thought.
The first way to compound plots that we’ll go over is via episodes. So, we first we need to straighten out some terminology. There is a current trend in storytelling that could be called anti-episodic (there are pockets where this is not as much the case, like crime and mystery books and television); instead what’s really popular is “serialized” storytelling. What people generally mean when they talk about episodic versus serialized storytelling is that an episodic style has a different unconnected, self-contained plot every episode or book and that a serialized style has every episode or book contributing to one very large season or series spanning plot. As with most any binary, what we’re actually looking at is a spectrum – Harry Potter has a self-contained plot with every novel, but overall, every novel contributes to the plot of Voldemort’s resurrection and final death.
Supernatural is a really interesting case study because it lasted so long and it started before the anti-episodic trend took hold. So, you can see the early seasons, especially the first season, very firmly on the episodic side of the spectrum with its monster of the week format and it slowly became more and more serialized to the point where an unrelated monster of the week was anomalous and generally warranted some kind of in episode commentary by a character.
When I talk about episodic compound plots, I’m kind of talking about this idea, but it’s squares and rectangles. Or maybe squares and quadrilaterals. What I’m talking about is that one plot-problem will be solved, and then another plot-problem will arise. What the episodic-serialized debate is talking about is the causal relationship between those plot-problems. There are some serialized series that do not have episodic compound plots, but most of them do.
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Writing from Scratch #1
Welcome to Writing from Scratch!
I’ve been writing a long time, and sometimes it feels like I lose the trees for the forest. Writing from Scratch is a chance for me (and you!) to get back to the basics of storytelling.
If you’ve never written a story before, if you’ve never felt like you could come up with one that would be worth writing, my hope is that if you follow along with me here, you will have the confidence and know-how to come up with an idea, build it into a story, and share it with the world.
These posts will be little, easy-to-digest nuggets. At the end of every post, look for a prompt and share your response in the comments!
What Is a Story?
A story can be defined by what it contains: at least one plot, character, and setting, and a style through which it is told.
Story Bits
To begin, let’s take a look at the second smallest unit of a story – the sentence. A sentence is a set of words that conveys a complete thought. And communication is fractal, meaning each part shares the same pattern as the whole. A story and its components, therefore, will also convey a Complete Thought.
Continue Reading on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #12: Compound Plots, Part 2
Compound Plots, Part 2: Parallel Plots
Parallel plots share a lot in common with subordinate plots. As with subordinate plots, parallel plots occur simultaneously – the individual problems and their solutions should be introduced and resolved at roughly the same time. However, parallel plots can be divided from each other and stand on their own, unlike with a subordinate plot which is dependent on the principle plot for its try-fail cycles.
“Parallel plots” is a bit of a misnomer. “Parallel” comes from the idea of parallelism in sentence construction because parallel plots often act as mirrors to one another or two sides of the same coin; they often work on each other indirectly to strengthen or emphasize the Thought of the story. What we don’t want to do is fall into the trap of thinking that the plots cannot intersect; although you should be able to separate them into their own stories, in a single story, they are meant to work together.
Superhero stories have parallel plots a plenty with the main character dealing with a plot-problem as their civilian identity and dealing with a different plot-problem as their superhero identity. We’ll look at one of these examples, Spiderman: Homecoming. Peter Parker is dealing with a Character plot in overcoming his lack of confidence to ask Liz out on a date; meanwhile Spiderman is dealing with an Inquiry plot involving the sale of alien tech weaponry on the streets. These do have points of overlap – they should for effective storytelling. However, if you take the Inquiry plot out of the story, you have a rom-com/coming-of-age story with a complete plot of no confidence to ask Liz out to yes confidence to ask Liz out. If you take the Character plot out of the story, you still have Spiderman investigating the origin of the alien tech weaponry.
Continue Reading on WordPress
Writing from Scratch #1
Welcome to Writing from Scratch!
I’ve been writing a long time, and sometimes it feels like I lose the trees for the forest. Writing from Scratch is a chance for me (and you!) to get back to the basics of storytelling.
If you’ve never written a story before, if you’ve never felt like you could come up with one that would be worth writing, my hope is that if you follow along with me here, you will have the confidence and know-how to come up with an idea, build it into a story, and share it with the world.
These posts will be little, easy-to-digest nuggets. At the end of every post, look for a prompt and share your response in the comments!
What Is a Story?
A story can be defined by what it contains: at least one plot, character, and setting, and a style through which it is told.
Story Bits
To begin, let’s take a look at the second smallest unit of a story – the sentence. A sentence is a set of words that conveys a complete thought. And communication is fractal, meaning each part shares the same pattern as the whole. A story and its components, therefore, will also convey a Complete Thought.
A simple sentence is an independent clause, containing a subject and a predicate. It may have any number of phrases attached to it, but in its simplest form, a sentence can be as short as two words.
A complex sentence is a sentence containing an independent clause and at least one dependent or subordinate clause (a set of words containing a subject and predicate but that is dependent on another clause for a complete understanding of its meaning).
A compound sentence is a sentence containing at least two independent clauses.
And a compound-complex sentence is a sentence containing at least two independent clauses and at least one dependent or subordinate clause.
Plots are exactly the same as sentences. A simple plot can be broken into two parts, a subject and a predicate, or, better, a problem and a solution. It can then be complicated or compounded with additional plots.
Next week, we’ll look at what exactly we’re talking about when we’re talking about plots.
Share in the comments:
How else have you heard “story” defined? What aspects of storytelling are you most interested in? What makes a story worthwhile to you?
If you want to read more, you can check out the over 80 posts on my website, theferalcollection.com
Writing from Scratch #2:
What is a Plot?
Different people mean different things when they use the word “plot,” and they are all correct, if not as descriptive as they could be.
Some people mean a story structure, like the 3-Act Structure; some people mean a plot archetype, like an underdog sports plot or a heist plot; some people mean the negative to positive or positive to negative trajectory of the main character, like Rags to Riches; and some people mean “to plot” as in “to outline.”
Throughout Writing from Scratch, when I say “plot,” I’ll be referring to the definition I’ve already hinted at: a plot is a problem and its solution. Plots of this nature can be very long if the solution takes a while for the character to arrive at or very short if the solution is solved without much trouble. In a story with multiple plots of this type, the plot that has its problem first introduced and last solved is what I will call the Long Plot.
Plot-Problems
There are four umbrella types that plots of this kind fall under – all based on the type of problem the plot has. And these are called the MICE* plot-problems.
Milieu
Inquiry
Character
Event
Over the next few posts, I will be diving into each in turn.
*The MICE Quotient was developed by Orson Scott Card, but I do deviate in my approach from the way Scott Card developed it and from the way most other writers teach it.
Plot-Solutions
A plot’s solution comes through what are referred to as the Try-Fail Cycles. The character is introduced to the problem, tries to solve it, and succeeds or fails. Most plots are solved after the character has failed to solve it at least once.
The Try-Fail typically goes in one of two directions: “Yes, but…” or “No, and…”
The “Yes, but” failure follows the character trying something with “yes, that technically worked, but now a new aspect of the same problem has been revealed.”
Obi-Wan and Luke hire Han and Chewie to take them and the droids to Alderaan. Yes, Han and Chewie get them to where Alderaan should be in orbit, but the Death Star got there first and blew the planet up.
The “No, and” failure follows the character trying something with “no, that didn’t work, and now the situation has worsened as a result.”
Harry and Ron run off to warn Hermione that there is a troll loose in the castle and get her to come back with them to the Gryffindor Common Room. No, they do not get a chance to warn Hermione about the troll, and they have locked the troll in the girls’ bathroom with Hermione.
“No, and” can also be a final – fatal – plot-solution, but this is not usually very satisfying. The ultimate plot solutions are typically either “Yes, and…” or “No, but…”
Prompt: Analyze a plot (that is a problem (subject) and solution with try-fail cycles (predicate)) in a favorite book, movie, or TV episode. I'll be posting my analysis this Sunday; if you're from the future, check it out here!
If you want to read more, you can check out my over 80 WfS posts on my website theferalcollection.com
Writing from Scratch #4: The Milieu Plot
The Milieu Plot
The problem of the milieu plot involves a problem of location or setting. The character is often either in a place they need/want to escape from or not in the specific place they need/want to be in. The try-fail cycles will involve traveling away from or to the location. Gulliver’s Travels, The Great Escape, and The Hobbit contain milieu plots.
The Lord of the Rings contains one very large milieu – the problem of getting the One Ring from the Shire where its been hidden for a number of years to Mordor where it can finally be destroyed. We can further break this down into smaller milieu plots. Let’s look at one: the problem of crossing the Misty Mountains. (And we’ll use the events as they occur in the movie, since more people have watched that than read the book)
A few solutions they could try are not considered because they already know they are too dangerous, such as the northern route, which is swarming with orcs and goblins, and the Gap of Rohan, which gets too close to Isengard for comfort.
First try: take the Pass of Caradhras. Fail: No, they can’t cross this way, and Saruman is actively attacking them.
Second try: enter the Mines of Moria. Fail: Yes, they are able to enter, but the Dwarven reception committee they were expecting to lead them through is not there.
Third try: search Moria for the Dwarves and a guide through. Fail: No, there are no Dwarves to guide them, and goblins have now been alerted to their presence and are attacking.
Fourth try: run like hell away from the goblins. Fail: Yes, they are able to run across a chasm to escape the goblins, but a Balrog takes out Gandalf.
Final try: follow Gandalf’s instructions to flee (or “fly”). Solution: they get out of the Mines of Moria, and are on the other side of the Misty Mountains, ready to continue with another micro-milieu.
Prompt: write a flash fiction with a Milieu in which your character’s plot-problem is that they need to go to their grandmother’s house for Sunday dinner. The character, setting, genre, and stakes, as well as what is preventing them from simply going to Grandma’s is up to you. This simple plot can create a story that is anything from family drama to international spy thriller.
If you want to read more of my 80+ posts, you can check them out on my website theferalcollection.com