Drawing from the Well
Scenes Arranged: 2
Total Scenes: 138
Just two scenes? Really? It felt like more than that. I knew I was lacking productivity yesterday, but dang! Well, when at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.
Filling the Well
That Hideous Strength: 1%
Sightwitch: 19%
Jessica Jones: S2E8 of 13
No progress here either. First day back to work after two days out of town. It was a busy one. Today will be too. I’ll be able to reset next week and get back to normal. For now, I keep on keepin’ on.
Polishing the Well
Yesterday was my son’s 17th birthday. I can’t believe it. I still remember his little voice and his smiling face from when he turned 11. It’s crazy that this is the same guy. I’m so proud of him and can’t wait to see the incredible man he’s going to finish growing into. Happy birthday, bubba.
It’s also the first anniversary of my wife’s business today. I’m so proud of her for chasing and catching her dream. She’s an incredible wedding planner, an incredible woman, and an inspiration to me daily in so many ways. Happy anniversary, my love.
Well Chat
How to Harness What Goes Wrong
Let’s talk about scene structure for a bit. I ran a series recently about story structure. This goes to a deeper, smaller-scale level. Scenes are what compose a story. The scenes build to the structural elements I discussed previously. Each scene is an encapsulated set of pieces that drive the action of the story (they also reveal character as discussed in my Vonnegut series).
The parts of the scene (that I’ll describe below) are like subatomic particles. The scene, then, is the atom which builds to molecular chapters. These feed into Eighth compounds that give rise to the organism itself: the novel.
So what is a scene?
Again, I’m taking my cues from K.M. Weiland here so check out her stuff!
Scene structure is the same every time and is composed of two halves: the scene and the sequel. Each half is a triad of components. The scene has a goal, a conflict, and a disaster. The sequel has the reaction to the disaster, a dilemma that the character has to resolve, and the choice that (at least temporarily) resolves it. All of these pieces are vitally important to avoid vacuous scenes. Many authors handle this on an unconscious level. I do not. I’m a planner through and through.
Goal and conflict seem pretty straightforward to me so I’m going to skip ahead to the disaster. This doesn’t always have to be something that goes wrong, but it typically needs to be something unexpected that happens. Some disasters ARE subjectively good, but their unexpected nature disrupts the flow of the conflict and is thus a disaster. In yWriter, this is called the Outcome, but I learned it as Disaster and prefer it that way because it reminds me that it’s not just a thing that happens, but it’s something that redirects the conflict.
I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: my prime example of a medium that serves as the epitome of the disaster is the TV show 24. Something is ALWAYS going wrong for Jack. Even when he seems to find the answer to his current conflict, something comes up that redirects him to confront something else. Things keep going wrong and getting sewn up until Jack reaches the kernel of the conflict, punches it in the face, and subdues it, often permanently.
I’m not saying that every story should be as frenetic and stressful as 24. Far from it. But something has to act on your main character’s intent to redirect them, first away from the solution and then the long way around to it. Take The Lord of the Rings, for example. Frodo’s hanging out and Bilbo disappears. Then he reappears packing to leave. He gives Frodo the ring. Gandalf shows up freaked out and says they have to get the ring out of there (this is the initial goal). Then Sam shows up. The two flee. Merry and Pippin show up (Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrine Took are still some of my favorite names of all time). The Ringwraith shows up. They take shelter and Strider shows up. Strider is mean and serious. More Ringwraiths show up. Frodo gets stabbed and sick. Ringwraiths chase them to Rivendell. Arwen saves them with a roaring river. Frodo passes out from the sickness.
All that is only halfway through the first book. See how Frodo keeps getting pushed further from his goal at first by the Ringwraiths until that same conflict is just spurring him onward to Rivendell to complete it (before the entire goal changes, that is)? This is how disasters work and drive the story on. And that’s why they’re important. Without them, Frodo just went on a walk with Sam and dropped the Ring into Elrond’s palm. Not interesting.
So when you’re writing, stick to the “Kill your darlings” idea and torture them through a series of disasters that drives them first away from and then toward their goal and shows what they’re really made of.
May the tide carry you to safer shores.
BSG