Plotting and Editing a Snap with the Guide
© Roxianne Moore
Some of us are seat-of-the-pants writers who can just sit down at the keyboard every day and let the writing flow until our story is finished. Plot details and characterization take care of themselves, often with surprises for the author.
Most of us, though, have to do some plotting if we're going to write a novel-length work that has a dynamic beginning, doesn't sag in the middle, and ends logically and satisfyingly. And, despite what our readers may believe, plotting can be hard work.
For a reader, a novel is a few hours of enjoyment and escape. All the hard work, the sweating and the swearing, are invisible. If a writer does her job well, the plot points and characterization are interwoven seamlessly into a richly detailed background.
But how do you get all those pieces to fit together? The first two novels I finished (never viewed by any readers other than family) were written without any thought to plot. I had some good characters, and I wanted to tell their story. But reading it later, I realized that there was no logic to the story, and I wasn't really sure if it had a turning point. I tried again, with the same results. Actually, the second attempt was worse than the first; it rambled on and went off in all different directions. In part, that was due to a protagonist who was spent the first half of the book too high to be logical.
When I sat down to give novel-writing another try, I realized I had to develop at least a skeleton of a plot. But I had no idea how to go about it.
Sherry-Anne Jacobs (a.k.a. Anna Jacobs and Shannah Jay) has written an excellent guide to plotting that will take you from the first glimmer of an idea to a finished plot that holds together from beginning to end. Plotting and Editing is a workbook, with exercises each step of the way, leading you through the process of developing your story idea into a well–plotted tale.
Sherry-Anne is the author of nine historical novels, six science fiction novels (writing as Shannah Jay), a contemporary romance, and two nonfiction books, so she knows how to plot a good story, and Plotting and Editing gives us the benefit of her experience.
Part One deals strictly with plotting, from idea to detailed outline. But plotting isn't necessarily the linear process you learned in English Composition. Jacobs offers four plotting concerns:
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