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As we progress through the step-by-step construction of a novel, I’d like to pause here and revisit the basic building blocks of a pageturner novel: action scenes and reaction scenes. In a previous post, we explored the basic structure of action/reaction scenes:

Action Scene:

• Hero strives to attain a goal
• Hero meets with conflict in his effort to achieve the goal
• Disaster: hero’s attempt to achieve his goal is frustrated

Reaction Scene:

• Hero reacts to the previous disaster (his emotions/feelings briefly explored/shown)
• Hero puzzles out how to again try for his goal
• Hero decides on an action course

Action scenes, always more interesting, are longer; reaction scenes, shorter.

But one thing to keep in mind is that the Action/Reaction scenes are not always drawn in what an artist would call “hard edges.”

Example:

In The King Must Die, Mary Renault’s 1958 bestseller about the mythical hero Theseus, Renault establishes that as a young boy, Theseus believes what his mother (who bore him out of wedlock) has told him – namely, that his father is the god Poseidon. She opens Chapter 2 with eight-year-old Theseus on one of his annual monthly visits to Poseidon’s temple, where he strives to make contact with the god he believes to be his father. (Goal)

Enter Simo, a boy pledged by his father to Poseidon’s service. Simo is a sadistic bully who mocks the notion that Theseus is of divine parentage. Simo disrespecfully shoves Theseus to the ground to underscore his point. Theseus responds by fighting with Simo. (Conflict)

Theseus wins the fight. But the doubts Simo has sewn in his mind cause Theseus to doubt himself – and the story of Poseidon being his father. (Disaster)

So, while Thesus wins the fistfight with Simo (a victory), he has not achieved his key goal: to assure himself that his origins are indeed honorable.

The Reaction scene shows how Theseus begins to compare himself with other boys born the same year he was.

Because he is slight in build, and believes Poseidon’s son should be tall and sturdy, he decides to compensate by being more daring than the others. His immediate goal now is to outdo the other boys to prove himself. This sets up the next action scene.

In the next action scene, Theseus returns to Poseidon’s temple and is again confronted by the slow-to-learn Simo about his parentage. This time, Theseus stamps his foot in anger and, just then, an earthquake shakes the temple compound. This overwhelms Simo who now believes in Theseus’s divine origins. (Conflict)

So the chapter ends with Theseus’s victory over Simo.

Does this fly in the face of what we’ve talked about – that an action scene needs to end in a disaster?

Not at all. While Theseus has triumphed over a bully in the earthquake scene, he has still not achieved his key goal: to once and for all prove to himself and to others that his father is divine.

We know, from Theseus’s earlier eagerness to exhibit his god-like origins (bravery, daring, and physical prowess), that the victory over Simo does not constitute the achievement of Theseus’s key story goal. Simo is a brutish bully. The victory over such an adversary carries little by the way of glory, which is Theseus’s true goal. Nor does convincing one person ensure Theseus that the story of his divine origins will be universally accepted.

Theseus has won another little victory in the earthquake scene. He has achieved a short-term goal. But his main goal as yet eludes him.

Renault underscores this in the next chapter which takes place four years later and has Theseus observing that people have already forgotten about the foot-stamping/earthquake incident. Once again, his origins are being questioned, and more than ever he yearns to prove himself.

So action scenes can end in a small victories, so long as the hero remains frustrated insofar as his key goal is concerned. That, after all, is what maintains the story tension – and keeps readers turning pages.

Happy writing!

After the series of new disasters the hero experience in Part 2b of Act 2 (see previous post), we come to the Second Turning Point.

This is also known as the death experience

The second turning point also is a disaster; in a dramatic reversal, the hero is yet again frustrated in achieving his goal.

But this disaster is mega.

Here’s a good way to brainstorm your second turning point: Ask yourself “what’s the worst thing that can happen to my hero?” Then make that happen.

At the second turning point, one or all of the following should hold true:

• The hero feels he has lost everything he set out to gain.
• The hero has run out of options/appears to have exhausted his last option.
• Discovers that the new information he received at the story’s midpoint (see  previous post on the Midpoint Shift) has led to dead end.
• His goal no longer seems attainable to him. (The reader may know how the hero can attain the goal – but hero doesn’t see how at this point.)
• Hero is weak, shattered, discouraged, beaten down; antagonist is going strong, appears to have victory within his/her grasp.

The second turning point ends Act 2b of your novel (the middle of your novel), and launches Act 3 (your novel’s resolution).

Examples of the second turning point:

• In Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget starts to like Mr. Right (Mark Darcy), but after he fights with Mr. Wrong (Daniel Cleaver), she rejects Mark as she misinterprets the reason for the fight. (She’s still after Mr. Right but now no longer is open to seeing Mark Darcy as Mr. Right.)
• In The Fellowship of the  Ring, the hero Frodo is wounded by a dark force (stabbed by a Nazgul), and his death appears imminent.
• In Jaws, one of the men seeking the shark with the hero (Chief Brody) destroys the radio with a baseball bat, revealing his madness and ensuring that the crew’s encounter with the killer shark will be a do or die venture.
• In The Fugitive, the hero discovers that the man he believes guilty of his wife’s murder is innocent, apparently leaving him once again at square one in his quest to clear himself of suspicion.

Create your second turning point, and you’re in your novel’s home stretch – for a novel of average length, that means  just 10 or 15 or so scenes to go.

Happy writing!

You will recall that we divided a novel’s story into four parts: Act 1, Act 2a, Act 2b, and Act 3.

An average novel is comprised of 60 scenes. Acts 2a and 2b are the largest section of your novel, the middle. Your novel’s middle will account for around 40 to 45 of the scenes you write.

Act 2 is divided into two parts (a and b) because, in a well-constructed story, the middle of Act 2 is split by the Midpoint Shift (see previous post).

After  the Midpoint Shift, your hero finds himself in Part 2 of Act 2 (or Act 2b).

In Act 2b, the hero endures more disasters. Remember, story tension depends upon the hero’s continuing frustration in achieving his story goal.

But the difference between prior disasters and frustrations, and those the hero encounters in Act 2b is this: now each disaster is the result of an action the hero takes to resolve the conflict between himself and the antagonist sparked by the new information or insights obtained in the Midpoint Shift.

Examples:

• In Jaws, Chief Brody hires a sharkhunter, Quint, and – together with the oceanographer, Hooper – sets out on a boat to kill the shark.
• In Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget tries to get a new job.
• In The Fugitive, Richard Kimble actively investigates the mystery of who killed his wife .

The challenge for the writer in Act 2b is to maintain story freshness and suspense. The Midpoint Shift should have revitalized your story, sending it off in a new and fascinating direction. Suspense arises as the stakes get ever higher for the heroine, and frustrations continue to mount. Reader interest also is maintained by the hero’s display of resourcefulness.

Can the hero/heroine enjoy a minor success here and there? Yes – but he/she cannot attain his key goal, and if the minor success turns out to be the opposite of a “blessing in disguise,” it is sad for the character, but adds to the impact of your story. Remember the scene in the Hunger Games, when the heroine Katniss defeats her adversaries temporarily by releasing a horde of tracker jackers (hornets on steroids) on them? Katniss succeeds temporarily in achieving safety, but the tracker jackers also sting her, causing her to grow groggy – and vulnerable again.

A resourceful hero, a tough adversary, and the hero’s unrelenting frustration in attaining the key goal – these are the elements for a successful Act 2b.

Happy Writing!

The next time you watch a movie on a Roku-type player (a player that displays minutes played and minutes remaining), do this:

After you’ve watched the entire movie, rewind to the exact middle of the movie. For example, if you’ve watched a 90-minute movie, rewind to the 45-minute point.

You’ll discover something that illustrates an important insight into creating a well-plotted novel or screenplay. What you’ll discover is a simple (but not always easy) technique that  masterful writers employ to avoid saggy middles, the bane of many novels/screenplays. It’s called the Midpoint Shift.

Here’s how:

In a well-constructed story, the hero – up to the midpoint of the story – has met continuous resistance. One thing after another has blocked him from achieving his goal.

As he reaches the middle of his story, he will continue to be frustrated. However, something big and dramatic happens at this point in the story – the Midpoint Shift.  This Something infuses the hero with fresh hope and resolution. It points him direction of resolving his conflict.

A Midpoint Shift can be:

• a reversal of fortune (good or bad)
• a revelation (a secret revealed)
• an epiphany (event causes hero to gain insight)
• new information  (new developments, or hidden information brought to light)

The Midpoint Shift usually turns the story around at at 45-degree, if not a 180-degree, angle. The hero was traveling from Point A to Point B. Now he aims for Point C or D.

Examples:

• The Midpoint Shift in Jaws occurs when Chief Brody’s son is almost attacked by the Shark. The event is an epiphany, literally bringing home to Chief Brody the need to protect the people of Amity Island. He will no longer let the Mayor bully him into ignoring his duty. (epiphany)
• In The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Frodo risks his life to get the ring of power to a place he believes can contain its evil influence – Rivendell. At the Midpoint Shift, he learns that Rivendell cannot safely harbor the ring, and that he will need to take it on an even more perilous journey to Mordor. (new information)
• In Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget discovers that her boss and romantic interest Daniel is cheating on her and, as a result, quits her job and resolves to reinvent herself. (revelation)
• In The Fugitive, Richard Kimble infiltrates a hospital’s records room and finds a vital clue to the identity of his wife’s murder. (new information)

A well-thought-out Midpoint Shift shakes up the snow globe of the story, and in doing so it advances the narrative, refocuses a viewer’s/reader’s interest, heightens suspense, and – importantly – keeps readers turning pages.

In our last blog post on How to Write a Pageturner Novel– “How the ‘Okay, I’m in’ Scene Advances Your Novel” –we discussed how to wrap up the introductory chapters of your novel most effectively.

That brings us to the Midsection of your novel. In a screenplay, this would be called Act 2. For our purposes, we can call it Act 2-A because–as you’ll see–the Midsection of a well-constructed novel (or screenplay) is divided into two distinct sections.

In the first half of the Midsection, your hero struggles to reach his goal. But his efforts lead only to frustration.

Odysseus’s ship battles two monsters–Scylla and Charibdes

Think about Odysseus, the prototypical novelistic hero. His goal was to return home but he was frustrated at every turn–by shipwreck, the failings of his companions, monsters, a lovelorn nymph, and cannibals on the warpath. Whew! (It was the Raiders of the Lost Ark of its day.)

All of this frustration, this effort against overwhelming odds, creates tension. These Act 2-A plot complications–with the hero needing to resourcefully deal with all manner of opposition–mean a huge amount of stress for the  character – and that’s great for story.

This is why it’s helpful to develop an author persona that is comfortable with being unkind to your hero. “Nice guy” authors often want to let their literary creations enjoy only mild opposing forces.  In real life, it’s great to be kind: you’re the kind of friend I want! Seated in the writer’s chair, let your characters struggle!

Why?  Because it’s unfair to your readers to give your characters a life on Easy Street. Happy characters facing only the mildest of challenges make for a boring reading experience. By the same token, it’s also unfair to your splendid fictional creations–because you don’t let them flex all of their resourceful muscles.

As your reader works through Act 2-A, he will–identifying with the hero–constantly hope the hero’s plan to resolve his challenges works. But the hero’s plan cannot work in the Midsection–at least, it cannot work for very long, or flawlessly. That’s because, once it works in a way that resolves the hero’s main concern, the story tension is dissipated, and the reader will have no compelling reason to read further.

That’s why authors who are too kind to their heroes do readers a disservice.

Your reader wants to lose himself/herself vicariously in the hero’s struggle, and to grow with the hero as he learns what it takes to win on the hard road to victory–a victory that will be all the sweeter if hard won. Don’t deprive your reader of this delightful journey by providing shortcuts that bypass “insightful moments” and “realizations of how to be resourceful”–those surprise and delight moments that make a book buzz-able!

Next post on writing:  how the above works in some famous novels.

Happy Writing!

Continuing our discussion of what you need to accomplish in Section 1 of your novel:

Here’s what you achieve with your “Okay, I’m in” Scene (also known as Plot Point One, or, the Scene in which the Hero squares off against the Antagonist).

The “Okay, I’m in” Scene accomplishes the following for your Story:

• Changes the Hero’s life in an interesting/compelling way that demands reader attention.
• Hero decisively takes first significant action to confront the Antagonist. (Examples: In Star Wars, Luke find his family killed; he joins the rebels. In Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget has a terrible day and decides to turn her life around – to stop smoking and drinking, to find Mr. Right, and to start a diary that will, hopefully, record her success.
• Escalates the Conflict in a way that turns the story in new and unexpected direction and raises the stakes for the hero.

So by the end of the “Okay, I’m in” Scene, the Hero is poised to take off. He isn’t about to sit on the sidelines any longer. He has to make a choice. He makes that choice. He’s going to take action.

The outcome, of course, is uncertain. The odds are not in his favor, by any means. If you have successfully constructed the “Okay, I’m in” Scene and the other key components of Section 1 of your novel, your readers will be compelled to keep on reading in order to find out what happens to the Hero in the next major segment of your Story: Section 2.

Happy Writing!