I’m going to preface this by telling you that some writers are actually Gods of Story sent down to earth from the heavens to make us mortal writers insecure about our work and provide unbelievably flawless books for those who read but don’t write. Okay?
This is intended to console the weeping writer who sees a perfect novel and entertains thoughts of becoming a bricklayer or a house painter or something that involves a lot of repetitive motion and not a whole lot of thinking.
If you’re a mortal writer, a thing you’re going to have to deal with at some point is plotting. I’m not talking like cunning, film noir plotting, i.e. “He rubbed his hands together, plotting his next move with a rarely-observed deftness of mind.”
(I can’t tell if that’s well-written or too purple prose-y. I leave it up to you. Side effect of staring at my own words for too long.)
No, I’m talking about the events that happen in your story. Event A happens, and because of this Event B happens, which causes Event C and so on. If the concept of plot is new or confusing for you, I’m going to break it down really quick.
Plot has two factors: Causation and emotion. These are incredibly broad terms and can get a little muddy sometimes, so I’m going to be very general in this description. Causation has to do with the laws of your world (not the literal don’t-steal-things laws, those are up to your fictional law enforcement), like the law of gravity, or the law that states that if you capture one of King Raffensnerk’s border towns he will conquer your country. You know. Stuff like that. Touch a trigger, something happens.
Those are the rules that you have made for yourself. Emotion, on the other hand, concerns your characters. These are rules dictated by how they are in the world, what their morals and ambitions are like. An emotion rule is “___ happens which makes Carrie feel ___,” and those feelings dictate how your character behaves. “Carrie feels _____ therefore she does _____.”
I’m going to quickly deconstruct the beginning of The Wizard of Oz to demonstrate.
Plot point 1: Tornado happens, which causes the house and Dorothy to go to Oz.
2: Dorothy wants to go home, which causes Glinda to tell her to follow the yellow brick road.
3: Dorothy’s following the yellow brick road causes her to meet the Scarecrow.
Et cetera. But there’s another plot. Remember what it is?
1: Tornado happens, which causes the house and Dorothy to go to Oz.
2: The house lands on the Wicked Witch of the East, which causes the Wicked Witch of the West to be very upset.
3: The witch’s anger causes her to pursue Dorothy.
And the Wizard of Oz revolves around these two plots and the two characters they are centered around. Both were started by what’s called the Inciting Incident, the tornado, and both are fueled by the characters’ desires: the witch’s to take revenge for her sister’s death, and Dorothy’s to get home alive. Some books have one plot or three plots or ten plots.
But usually you do need both kinds: if you have a causality plot without an emotion plot, you’re writing an action flick. If you have an emotion plot without a causality plot, you’re writing a romance novel. Which is great if that’s the goal, but if your objective is to come out with a readable story about rabbits in space, you’re going to need both kinds.
For this reason, character creation has to come before you chart out a detailed plot. If you don’t know your characters well enough to know exactly how they’ll react to your machinations, your plot will be a question mark until you figure that out. (There IS something to be said for making sure you create characters who fit the story you have in mind, but that gets into the blurry line between what is PLOT and what is STORY and I do not have the energy for that today)
If you’re building your story from scratch, start with your Inciting Incident. What’s your tornado? In my current novel the tornado happens when my protag, Radler, is six years old. He is a prince and when his father brings him into a noisy, crowded ballroom, little Radler panics and makes a scene. This causes his father to totally rationally decide to get another little boy to replace his son in public appearances and the rest of the plot unfolds from there. The Inciting Incident could also be called your premise, the foundation upon which your story is built.
Some writers get hung up on the idea that your Inciting Incident has to be TOTALLY UNIQUE or else it will be UTTERLY BORING. That is bullshit. Baum started his story with a tornado. I started mine with a panic attack. Tolkien started his with a wizard appearing where he shouldn’t (or you could argue that his incident was the dwarves losing their treasure, but I’m pretty sure at that point it’s backstory). Star Wars: The Force Awakens only happens because Poe gets himself caught in the first five minutes.
Super simple.
Once you have an incident, figure out how all your important characters react to it. And once you figure out how they react to it, figure out what happens because of their reactions. Repeat this process until your story looks like a story instead of a list of ingredients.
The thing most non-writer people don’t understand about writing is that mechanically, it’s very simple. Cause, effect, cause, effect, cause, effect, repeat ad infinitum or until satisfied. Mix well. Bake at 350° for eight minutes or until golden brown—aaaand now I’m thinking about cookies again.
Nobody cares how brilliant or innovative your Inciting Incident is. They only care about how you follow it and how well-crafted your characters are.
Careful Wordsmith 