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Story Middles - Plot Development - Part One

© Janet Kay Blaylock

The last three articles were about story beginnings. By now, you should know who your characters are, your setting, and how to start out with suspense. Next comes the plot development.

Plot Development - Outlining Your Book

Sometimes this is the hardest to develop. I have found that it is easier to develop a plot if you start out with an outline of your book.

When I wrote my outline, I first wrote the title of the book. Then, I wrote down each chapter and gave it a title. After that, I took a separate sheet of paper and started writing a synopsis of each chapter. You can write your synopsis in a paragraph or in a list of sentences.

I've written a synopsis using both ways. For the book I am writing now, I just wrote down some sentences for each chapter. I basically wrote down the action of each chapter so I could see where the story was headed. I continued this way throughout the outline. When I first started writing the synopsis outline, I had no idea where I was headed with the plot. I just wrote down what came to my mind.

After that, I was ready to sit down and write the book. I had my sprial journal along with my notebook where I wrote the book. It was easy to follow the outline of each chapter. However, once I started writing the book, things started to change in the synopsis, especially toward the end of the book. As a result, my synopsis and outline changed to fit the book. That will happen to you at times. It's exciting when it does happen. You, as a writer, are kept in suspense while writing your book.

If something came to my mind that I wanted to include in the chapter outline, I would write it on post-it notes and stick it on the page with the chapter.

Sometimes, I would come up with another story idea. I would do the same thing with that idea.

Writing the plot outline did help guide me in the writing process of my book. Now, with the plot outline, I will take it and write it in paragraph form so that it will be ready to send to publishers.

Exercise

First, you have your setting, then your characters. Now, you have some idea of what you want these characters to go through. Try writing your first chapter outline and see what happens.