Making The Connection

One glossary of writing terms defines coherence as "everything in the story working together for a profound overall effect.

Some readers call this "magic."

Some writers call it impossible.

But it's not. It's craft, and can be learned through observation and practice, like any other aspect of writing.

In her article "Story Magic" (The Writer, June 2004, p. 34) Franny Billingsley writes: "When a character struggles with a problem calibrated to test his inner nature, the decisions he makes...illuminate the heart of your story. This is what resonates."

Your job then is to build a plot that is tailor-made to test your unique protagonist, and develop a lead character that is uniquely tested by your plot. Billingsley describes this intersection of plot and character as "the pulse-points of story." If you want your piece to have a healthy heartbeat, you need to create this intersection between a story meant for the character and the character meant for the story.

Building to the crossroads of your story starts with giving your character something she wants--an inner story. When a person wants something badly enough, she will act on that desire. Action creates energy. Obstacles blocking access to that desire create tension, conflict. Hand in hand with this is the fact that people seldom change unless they're forced to do so, especially if the change requires courage, endurance or strength. A carefully orchestrated plot provides an outside motivation--the outer story--that forces her to confront internal conflicts and resolve them. Even if the character doesn't get what she wants, the discoveries and changes in self will give the story depth and will be believable.

One example of this is the character and plot of the Newbery award winning book A Single Shard by Linda Sue Parks. The story is about Tree-Ear, and orphan who wants desperately to become a potter. He finds a master potter who reluctantly agrees to allow Tree-Ear to help do the menial tasks, but who refuses to take him on as his apprentice. That's his outer struggle. Tree-Ear's inner struggle is to keep his personal dignity even though he lives under a bridge and searches trash piles for food to eat.

The plot takes Tree-Ear through a series of events that test his wits, his stamina, his courage, and his values. His outer journey and his inner journey connect in a way beyond anything Tree-Ear ever imagined. His values earn the potter's love and respect and he wins not only the privilege of being the potter's apprentice, but a member of his family.

Some questions you might consider as you build toward the pulse point of your story are:

• What does my character want? Be able to sum it up in as few words as possible.

• Why does my character want that?

• What in my character's history explains why? This contributes to motive.

• Does my character get what s/he wants?

• What is my character's crossroads? Where do the plot and character directly intersect in a climax that forces a decision under pressure and highlights the heart of the story?

Does this mean that you have to know the crossroads of the story before you begin a draft? No. But it should be in the forefront as a primary goal from the start. Keeping that goal in mind as you write will help you look for it in the layers of your story as you write. It also means that you may have to move forward to discover the connection and then when you do, move backward to fill in history or background to build the motive. When the first draft is finished, the initial questions in the revision stage should be:

• What is the character's outer story (external events faced; plot)?

• What is the character's inner story (journey of inner discovery)?

• Do they connect?

If they do not, then you should begin the revision process finding answers to those questions.

Plot events have significance beyond providing the external props when they cause a fundamental change in the lead character. Once the story issue is resolved, the protagonist will never be able to go back to the person he was before. People enjoy these stories because we've all been forced to change in a similar way in our lifetimes and sometimes there are changes we would like to make that are difficult; watching others struggle successfully gives us courage to continue trying and creates a story that stays in readers' minds long after the back cover is closed.

Recommended reading on this topic:

• "Story Magic" by Franny Billingsley in the June 2004 issue of The Writer. Billingsley discusses the advice of other writers on this subject as well as how she discovered this crossroads in her own work when it was missing.

• "Story Structure: Parts 1 and 2" by Alicia Rasley is an excellent article showing how plot and character can be tweaked to create the connection that makes a story resonate.

(c)2004Dekat

 

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©2004 Carolyn Dekat
Last Modified: September 28, 2004