Writers Tricks of the Trade Issue 6, Volume 6 | Page 30
BUILDING A BELIEVABLE CHAIN OF EVENTS IN
YOUR NOVEL
JANE FRIEDMAN
JANE FRIEDMAN
WRITER AND PROFESSOR JANE FRIEDMAN (@JANEFRIEDMAN) HAS MORE THAN 20 YEARS OF
EXPERIENCE IN THE PUBLISHING INDUSTRY, WITH EXPERTISE IN DIGITAL MEDIA STRATEGY FOR AUTHORS
AND PUBLISHERS.
MANY THANKS TO JANE FOR GIVING ME PERMISSION TO PERIODICALLY REPRINT SOME OF HER
ARTICLES. YOU CAN READ MORE OF HER WORK AT WWW.JANEFRIEDMAN.COM. SHE HAS SPOKEN
ABOUT WRITING, PUBLISHING, AND THE FUTURE OF MEDIA AT MORE THAN 200 EVENTS SINCE 2001,
INCLUDING SOUTH BY SOUTHWEST, BOOKEXPO AMERICA, AND THE ASSOCIATION OF WRITERS AND
WRITING PROGRAMS. HER ARTICLES AND CREATIVE WORK HAVE APPEARED IN PRESTIGIOUS
MAGAZINES LIKE WRITER’S MARKET AND WRITER’S DIGEST.
Jane writes on her blog: This post is an excerpt
from Troubleshooting Your Novel by Steven
James (@readstevenjames), from Writer’s Digest Books.
A game of billiards begins with the cue ball striking the racked balls, which
then scatter across the pool table. After that, the players take turns trying to
clear the table by pocketing another ball (either stripes or solids), all while
keeping the cue ball out of the pockets.
We all understand that the game must start somehow. Normally that
happens when one player hits that cue ball to break the triangle of racked balls.
And from then on, every time a ball hits another, that contact results in an
effect.
It’s the same with a story.
One opening event causes things to splinter apart for the main character in
your novel. After that, there’s a chain of events that are all linked and caused by
the ones that precede them.
A story moves from choice to consequences, from stimulus to response,
from cause to effect. This happens on the macro-level, as the results of each
scene set the stage for the next, and on the micro-level, as every action and
every line of dialogue affects what comes next.
NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2016
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WRITERS’ TRICKS OF THE TRADE