Mastering Plot Twists: How to Use Suspense, Targeted Storytelling Strategies, and Structure to Captivate Your Readers
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Mastering Plot Twists: How to Use Suspense, Targeted Storytelling Strategies, and Structure to Captivate Your Readers
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Overview
Unlock the secrets to superior plot twists!
The key to keeping people on the edge of their seat—from memoirs to thrillers and stage plays to screenplays—is filling your stories with unexpected twists and turns. By integrating Plot Twists, Plot Reversals, and Moments of Heightened Danger (TRDs) at crucial points, you can captivate your readers with I-can't-wait-to-see-what-happens-next intrigue. The quicker pace and focused action that comes from strategically placed twists form the core of the nuanced, multifaceted books that sell—and that help you find a devoted readership.
In Mastering Plot Twists, Agatha Award-winning author, Jane K. Cleland goes beyond telling writers what to do; she shows you how to do it. Within these pages, you'll find:
• A proven, five-step process for using TRDs, with detailed examples from best-selling books
• A deep dive into plotting, structure, pacing, subplots, and more to help you develop surprising yet inevitable twists.
• "Jane's Plotting Roadmap" and worksheets—essential tools for planning your plot
Building on the award-winning instruction provided in Mastering Suspense, Structure & Plot, Cleland's newest guide will help you create effective and credible twists, creating the kind of stories that will keep your readers up long into the night.
"...A master class in crafting plots that twist and turn..." ~Hallie Ephron, New York Times best-selling author of You'll Never Know, Dear
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781440352331 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Penguin Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 06/26/2018 |
| Pages: | 240 |
| Sales rank: | 204,715 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.40(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.70(d) |
About the Author
Jane also writes short stories (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine) and articles and books about the craft of writing (Writer's Digest magazine and Writer's Digest Books), including the bestselling and Agatha-winning book, Mastering Suspense, Structure, & Plot.
Jane is the chair of the Black Orchid Novella Award (www.nerowolfe.org), a mentor in Western Connecticut State University's MFA in Creative & Professional Writing program, a guest author at universities and writing conferences across the country, and a member of the fulltime faculty at Lehman College, part of the City University of New York, where she is also the director of the Program for Professional Communications. In addition, Jane was the president of the New York chapter of Mystery Writers of America and a member of the national board. More information is available at www.janecleland.com.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
HONE IN ON A CONFLICT
"The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph."
— THOMAS PAINE
CONFLICTS DRIVE YOUR PLOT
Every successful plot or storyline, no matter what the genre, needs to revolve around a conflict. You can't plan plot twists, plot reversals, or moments of heightened danger (TRDs) until you determine this singular seminal circumstance. This chapter explains how to identify meaningful and relevant conflicts and translate this abstract concept of a "conflict" into a compelling, specific, tangible situation capable of carrying your story from beginning to end. We'll examine the anatomy of conflicts, determine how characters' reactions to various conflicts dictate readers' understanding of those situations, and review a decision-making model to assist you in choosing worthy and appropriate conflicts.
Yearnings Inform Conflicts
Deciding whether a conflict is suitable for a certain story is a complex task. Broadly, a conflict refers to anything that is in opposition to something else. In order for a conflict to carry your story, though, it also has to be relatable. Readers have to be able to empathize with your chosen conflict and with the characters' reactions to that conflict. Conflicts can be physical — a war or battle, for instance. They can be emotional — bullying, for example. They can also be spiritual — a person's loss of faith, perhaps. Conflicts can be transcendent, fueling the plot of a sweeping epic or memoir; they can be of limited scope, informing the plot of a short story or the storyline of an essay.
Here's the bottom line: Your story needs to be about a conflict — and nothing else.
Characters' Reactions Dictate Action
On the face of it, it would seem that there are two kinds of conflicts: external and internal. However, it is only when an external situation is perceived as a conflict that the story moves forward. It is people's reactions to an incident, not the incident itself, that generates a conflict.
In other words, all conflicts are internal. If someone doesn't care about a situation, you don't have a conflict. This means, of course, that we need to understand what makes people care. Figure 1.2 analyzes several authors' thoughts about the nature of effective conflicts.
Plotting is a process of choosing a series of incidents that move your story from its beginning to its end. However, this definition, while accurate, is an oversimplification, understating the complexity of storytelling. Selecting incidents that tell your story comes later in the plotting process, aft er you've homed in on a weighty conflict. Think about it — until you know your overarching conflict, you can't know what to write, and you risk selecting incidents that will take your story off course.
This begs the question — how do you choose a conflict? One sensible approach to making this decision is to take a look at the most enduringly popular and best-selling examples in your chosen genre and determine what kinds of conflicts drive those stories. Your goal in analyzing exemplars is not to replicate what other authors have done, of course; rather, like all good researchers, your goal is to identify patterns that allow you to predict success. You want your stories read — so give your readers what they want, and what they want is a conflict that speaks to something deep inside them. These conflicts tend to be genre specific. Figure 1.3 displays examples of the kinds of genre-specific information you might find useful when developing your own conflicts — and ultimately, your own plots or storylines.
It's important to systemize the exemplar analysis process so you can be certain you're comparing apples to apples. The three-question model explained below is designed to assist you in drilling down to essentials.
ANALYZE EXEMPLARS: WHO LONGS FOR WHAT?
As you review your selections, pay attention to everything. In addition to discovering seminal conflicts, for instance, you're also likely to identify other key factors, such as archetypical characters and familiar settings. Since you're going to be looking at bestsellers and enduring examples within your genre, you have a rare opportunity to develop a profile based on reader expectations. Further, your research will enable you to prevent false starts, avoid drifting off onto random tangents, and eliminate saggy middles. Overall, you'll become a more efficient and productive writer.
A Three-Question Assessment Model Delves into People's Longings
Ask yourself these three questions about the most enduringly popular and best-selling stories in your chosen genre. Track your answers by category of response to optimize the assessment process's value. The three questions are as follows:
1. Who longs for what?
2. What are those people willing to do to satisfy their longings?
3. Who or what opposes them?
Here are some examples from a variety of genres to demonstrate how these questions lead to a deep understanding of compelling conflicts. As you read through these examples, note how the conflict is inherent in the situation.
• Nine Wrong Answers, John Dickson Carr, 1952, crime fiction: Larry will do whatever it takes to please his unlovable Uncle Gaylord so he can inherit his uncle's fortune. Uncle Gaylord is sadistic, and he despises Larry, so he plans to kill him by winning a depraved challenge: If you win, you inherit; if you lose, you die. Uncle Gaylord longs to be the last man standing, superior to all. Larry longs for money and revenge. Uncle Gaylord can't win if Larry exacts revenge and inherits his wealth.
• West with the Night, Beryl Markham, 1942, memoir: Beryl Markham was determined to become the first woman to complete an east to west, nonstop, solo flight across the Atlantic. Known as a nonconformist, Markham pushed the boundaries of society's expectations for women, and the story focuses on her fight for recognition and respect. If Markham receives the accolades she feels she's earned, and that would be freely given to any man who completed her flight plan, society is vanquished.
• "Night Flight to Bali," Jane K. Cleland, 2017, short story: Sabrina will do anything to marry her soul mate, Sam. Sam will do anything to get rich. Sabrina longs for love, to belong to a man; Sam longs for independence, for the freedom that only money can buy.
Since Sam doesn't want anything Sabrina has to offer except money, she's doomed to fail.
• The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon, David Grann, 2009, literary nonfiction: Grann dedicated himself to solving the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Captain Percy Fawcett. Fawcett and his son vanished in the unforgiving Amazon in 1925. Grann longs for answers and is willing to risk his life by following in their footsteps. By taking on the Amazon, Grann pits his skills against a hostile environment — if he succeeds, the Amazon's reputation as a killer diminishes.
• Startup: A Novel, Doree Shafrir, 2017, satire: In this novel, three characters each have a conflict to overcome. Mack is determined to take his startup to the next level, but his efforts are complicated by his affair with a co-worker. Katya, a social media maven, needs content to raise her profile; without it, she's just a wannabe drone. Sabrina finds herself trapped in the middle, needing to control a story that can't be controlled. The novel examines what ambitious people will do for the love and money they long to possess. The three characters in Startup are at odds from the start — only one can triumph.
You'll notice that in all these examples, the situation is static until the people and what they yearn for come into play. It's people who generate a conflict.
Actions and Reactions Propel Your Plot
Incidents exist in a vacuum until the people involved react. Once people care about a situation, though, an otherwise benign incident transforms from ho-hum to captivating. If people don't care, a conflict is averted, but you have no story. If they feel passionate about an issue, the opportunities to create conflict abound. Figure 1.5 shows you several examples of how conflicts grow out of people's reactions to events — not from the event itself.
As you read through the scenarios, reflect on this question about your own work: Who wants what and what are they willing to do to get it, and what will the other guy do to stop them?
This principle — that it's people's reactions to situations, not the situations, per se — is a core element in plotting. Let's take a deeper look at our pivotal question: Who wants what and what are they willing to do to get it, and what will the other guy do to stop them?
By taking a granular look at the components that contribute to the relationship between a situational conflict and characters' perceptions, we're in a good position to understand what drives the plot. Figure 1.7 examines the anatomy of the conflicts that propel the plot of the Edgar award-winning novel, The Long and Faraway Gone.
Think about your own project. As you answer the questions posed in the exercise below (see Figure 1.8), remember that this is not a timed exercise. The goal is to think of as many options as you can, and appraise each one. Experiment with different kinds of longings. Try combinations. There are likely to be many possible answers, each one of which will take your story in a different direction. Spending time thinking about possible conflicts rather than simply jumping in is a surefire way to start your project on strong footing.
How did this approach work for you? Did you experiment with different alternatives? Did you find a singular conflict that resonates with you? Were you able to identify a conflict that taps into strong emotions? Once you're clear on your primary conflict, you're ready to gauge people's reactions to the situation underlying your conflict and to the conflict itself. This is easier said than done, of course, because in order to do so, you have to know how those people will react.
Since conflicts are emotion driven, it makes sense to delve deeper into how people feel. Understanding what motivates people to act as they do is central to developing believable conflicts, and that's the subject of chapter two.
CHAPTER 2ALIGN YOUR PEOPLE WITH YOUR CONFLICTS
"When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people, not characters. A character is a caricature."
— ERNEST HEMINGWAY
DETERMINE BEHAVIOR USING "PRIME MOTIVATORS"
Take a second look at the quote introducing this chapter — as Hemingway so astutely noted, we need to know our people, not our characters. Once you've settled on the underlying conflict that will inform your story, you need to know enough about your people to understand how they will react to the situation at hand.
There are two ways to approach plotting: Lay out the incidents, then develop characters who would do those things; or develop characters who face a conflict, and determine which incidents logically flow from that pivotal moment. Both approaches are sound. Regardless of the one you choose, in order to plot, you need to know the shape and makeup of your conflict and the drivers leading your people to act as they do.
People Feel as They Feel
People differ from one another in both superficial and deep-seated ways. I know this probably isn't news to you, but fully assimilating this fact is key to developing believable characters. For example, the sarcasm that angers one person won't bother someone else at all. A third person finds the sarcastic comment funny, and a fourth is hurt. Likewise what leads one king to shout "Off with his head!" irritates another only mildly. A third king might feel sad, and a fourth, bored. You need to know, with needlelike precision, how your people will react to your incidents. If you don't, their conversations, actions, and thoughts will feel false or fall flat. If you do, these things will resonate with truth and propel your story forward. As you work with this concept, it's crucial to avoid assuming you can gauge other people's feelings by identifying your own. We have to work to separate ourselves from our characters, to let them stand on their own.
For instance, how do you feel about your mother? If you love her, it may be hard for you to imagine that other people don't love their mothers. Yet there are plenty of people who have a difficult or tense relationship with their moms, and some who have no relationship at all. Based on this reality, how can you describe a mother's love for her child until you know the facts of this particular mother and that specific child?
In Jessica Strawser's 2017 novel (women's suspense), Almost Missed You, for example, a mother, Violet, is devastated when her husband kidnaps their son, Bear. The conflict is inherent in the situation, but it only drives the plot because Violet cares so much. She sleeps in Bear's bed to inhale the lingering smell of him, for instance. Contrast Violet's passion for Bear with Francie's indifference toward her children in Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney's 2016 literary novel, The Nest. Francie, who has four children, is described as "disengaged," and later, as "a little mean." Because of Violet's devotion, Bear knows his mother adores him and will do everything she can to protect him. Francie's children know they're on their own. These two women perceive motherhood in profoundly different ways, and each plot develops organically from this one core difference.
To plot well, you need to know what people care about, and why.
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Still Resonates
In the 1940s, Dr. Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist, developed his Hierarchy of Human Needs. He found that until your basic physical needs (clean water, fresh air, et al) are satisfied, you can't think of anything else. Once your physiological needs are satisfied, however, you can move on to other things. According to Dr. Maslow, aft er your physical needs are met, and you're confident you're in a stable and secure situation, you seek belonging (or love), esteem, and self-actualization, in that order.
Interestingly, this hierarchy aligns with John D. MacDonald's comment that conflicts fall into three categories: physical, mental, and spiritual (or some combination thereof). This idea that longings (needs) cross category lines is crucial. People are complex, and so are their yearnings. As baseball legend Yogi Berra said, "Baseball is ninety percent mental. The other half is physical." Life is a vacillating combination of physical, mental, and spiritual challenges; your stories should embrace this real-world complexity. By looking at how people's longings lead to conflicts, and how those conflicts reflect prime motivators, you'll be able to write the emotional truth that readers crave.
UNPACK THE DEEPER MEANING
You can add tantalizing twists by capitalizing on readers' expectations. Some of those expectations stem from their own experiences, values, attitudes, and beliefs. Others originate from perceptions you cultivate. If you lay the groundwork for a plot twist at the beginning of your book, for example, when readers come to the payoff in the middle, it packs an exhilarating wallop. Because you planted the seed, what happens feels natural — it feels real.
Whether you're relying on people's pre-existing beliefs or anticipating that they'll follow your lead, it's dangerously easy for us to assume we know how people will react to any given incident. Even in situations where the motivation seems apparent, we should be "from Missouri" (see Figure 2.1). The importance of perception and perception gaps is discussed in chapter three. People do things for both predictable and unpredictable reasons. We need to peel back the layers of what we think or feel or believe or wish were true to get to the bald truth.
Everyone Lies
Sometimes what we see is exactly what we think we see. Other times, it's feigned. People wear "masks" to appear normal when they really aren't, or to fit in when they really don't.
Masking who you really are is a type of lie, or at the least, it's hiding the authentic you. Why would a character do such a thing? Researchers tell us that everyone lies — in fact, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz wrote a book about it: 2017's Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us about Who We Really Are. People lie for reasons large and small.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Mastering Plot Twists"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Jane K. Cleland.
Excerpted by permission of F+W Media, Inc..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Foreword 2
Introduction 6
Part 1 Pre-Plotting
1 Hone in on a Conflict 11
2 Align Your People with Your Conflicts 31
3 The Power of Perception 55
4 Generate Compelling Narrative Questions 91
Part 2 Plotting
5 Plot Your Course 109
6 Use TRDs to Control Pace 127
7 Find Fire in Ice 151
8 Choose Two Subplots 183
9 End With a Wallop 207
Afterword 223
Index 231
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