To be successful, any new story has to be built around an idea, or concept that makes it new and exciting. A school for wizards is an idea or concept, but it's not a story premise. A story premise needs both a character (for example, Harry Potter) and a central conflict or problem that drives …
Save the cat writes a novel
One of the first books I read on screenwriting was the late Blake Synder's Save the Cat. I liked it so much I also bought and read Save the Cat! Goes to the Movies and Save the Cat Strikes Back, both of which are great books on story and genre structure. I therefore wondered what more I …
New Years resolutions for writers
Christmas has come and gone and soon it will be New year. It's a time to reflect on what we have achieved over the last year and make plans for the new year. In 2018, I published my third novel, AndroDigm Park 2067. It's a darker story than my previous sci-fi novels and in a …
Reading as a writer reads
I sometimes wonder why we get so excited about holidays. For me holidays are not about lying in the sun or sun tans. It's about reconnecting with family, getting away from the pressures of current day life, dining out, some healthy walking and ... catching up on my reading. So on my recent holiday to …
Plot patterns
Recently I was looking through my blue-ray collection to find a movie to watch with my family. King Arthur: Legend of the sword (2017) caught my eye. The movie directed by Guy Richie, grossed $148m on a budget of $175m, which was pretty much a financial disaster for the producers, and the critics complained it ignored …
The Eight-Sequence Method
For those who have been following my blog you may have rightly surmised that I have a fascination with story structure and story patterns. I believe fiction writers can learn a lot from studying the story telling techniques of the movie industry where story telling has almost become a science. And while novels and movies …
Plot points and pinch points
If you are a writer, there's a lot you can learn from the techniques used by scriptwriters in story design. The media are different; but they are both about storytelling. In previous blogs I have discussed the three-act structure, sequences, and the mythic structure. All these approaches use plot points in one way or another. …
Story structure
Recently I started to map out the key scenes for my next novel using a three-act framework. I used a software program that's designed for screenwriters called Control Writer. It uses a horizontal map of the key elements of a three-act structure to put scene cards under each caption in a natural time order pattern …
Hero Goal Sequences
Since I started writing fiction in 2011, I have always been fascinated with the subject of story structure. I have read most of the key texts written by the screenwriting masters like Syd Field, John Truby, Michael Hauge, Robert McKee, Christopher Vogler, and some of Frank Daniel's followers, as well as many more less known …
Story Drivers
Last month I published my third novel, AndroDigm Park 2067. Much of my time since has been taken up with marketing with little time left for writing. But now it's time to start thinking again about the next novel. I have two very different ideas I am currently exploring and it's difficult to choose which. …
JMJ Williamson 