Checklist for Beginning Your Story: Plot Considerations

[@bobbiebrownn]

I found you yesterday and just wanted to say you are fabulous

[@WILLIAMSBENTO-m8r]

You're the best Weiland!! I've seeing this video over and over and can't get enough of it. It's really really helping me with my writing. Thank you so much!

[@QualquerCoisa387]

Always on point! You are very clear and elucidative. One of the best around here. You help us to believe in ourselves and learn to be better. Thank you very much.

[@thorstenharms874]

I; normally dont comment on social platform, no time for it, but felt a need to say THANK YOU! ❤ In the last 7 days i developed a story with beginning, midpoint, end. Wrote an average of 3 pages (250 words each page) so now have 20 of 300 pages off my chest. Developed the habbit of writing at 5 am so days dont get bigged down timewise (got a kife to feed + fsmily), read into about 10 authors i admire, rushed through my old scripting books i accumulated the last 20 years and for the first time got a grip on 'Writing'. The characters start to talk to me, i see them, i am the csmera in their movie, snd whenever i feel i sm about to get stuck, i watch a few of your vids KMWeiland, or refer to your AWESOME books i bought on amazon. So ... Thank you again for laying out structure in a way my brain can work with. I really really apreciate this, so please excuse me now ... my hero has to fight his inner deamons and he better hurry cause the plot is moving snd hechas to keep running 😂

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

That's wonderful! So glad you've found the vids helpful. :)

[@heatherhaigh]

This has really helped me to clarify a lot of my planning. Thank you so much. x

[@writethepath8354]

Lol 😂 You say roots exactly like one of my characters, and another character even points it out in the scene, so I feel I must do the same 💜

[@tomdellaringa-scifi-author]

Hi KM! Reading through your secrets of story structure (and related) has been super helpful to my writing. I love what you are saying here, however, I write a SF series, and I am on book 4. I wonder if you could do a video about writing a series where the characters stay the same (as in they are in the story - they can still be changing and growing). This makes plotting out my books tricky. I tend to have something the main series character is dealing with that may or may not be central to the actual plot, which might center around other people. It's a crazy balancing act. I would love your perspective on it.

[@jeffj4440]

So good! Thank you!

[@kjbroadway9557]

Great video! I have a question for a character that goes through a flat arc. So, a character that has a flat arc is the “the truth the character believes in”, but can still change in some ways that doesn’t conflict with that? I feel like characters that have flat arcs still develop in some way. For example, Forest Gump never changes who he is a person and believes in the truth already, but I feel like the experiences he goes through like war and coping with loss(going from his best friend to his mom to his wife) makes him much wiser and toughened as he’s still the same character, but more refined due to his experiences. What I’m saying is that do you agree that a character that has a flat arc can still hypothetically change as long as that change(like a character becoming wiser) builds upon what they believe in?

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

Definitely. Many Flat Arc characters are not static. Doubt is a key aspect of the Flat Arc (in contrast to the outright Lie which is at the heart of the Positive Change Arc): kzbin.info/www/bejne/naOpfZ-rjJmHoKs

[@spacechampi0n]

Change arcs are ultimately about change to their wounded ego (individuating or integrating the ego). Flat arcs are about attachment issues -- to an identity, or to a context / setting, or to particular relationships, but their ego (which protects their identity) does not change, meaning their problem is not associated with how they react to conflict. If they react appropriately to conflict rather than a self-defeating way, their issue is beyond their ego. The Flat Arc protagonist can't win their battle until detaching from their identity or attaching to a new identity, while maintaining their Truth. Possibly this is all due to their Truth not being wrong, but just attached to the wrong thing / context / situation that is not changing by their efforts to do the right thing. To create change in the world the protagonist needs to be willing to walk away from that broken world, or create a new world to invest their energies in. The Lie is in the world / setting / relationship and they need to find a better situation to attach their Truth to. There are plenty of stories to tell outside the wounded ego. We can say the Flat Arc is about the broken psyche, misaligned in attachment to a resistant setting, or detached because they walked away from the resistant setting before the story began. Psyche and ego have to be dealt with differently, and we use Flat and Change arcs due to the difference. That is NOT to say characters in Flat arcs have no ego issues, and characters in Change arcs have no psyche issues. It's just that the author doesn't use those issues to define the major plot points or the resolution of the story. Often you'll see an evolution of psyche also resolve the ego issues, and vice versa.

[@bluenetmarketing]

KMW - How do we protect against legal claims from people we have used for technical or other inputs for our research for a novel? Do you always have them sign waivers before meeting with them?

[@rebeccaswinney8771]

Are you saying we should name all our teachers from birth till story lest we be sued by these people?

[@bluenetmarketing]

@@rebeccaswinney8771 That is always a possibility, but I think you know it's not exactly what I mean. People will sue over intellectual property at the drop of a hat, today.

[@rebeccaswinney8771]

@@bluenetmarketing Do yourself a favor and look up the definition of “intellectual property”.

[@bluenetmarketing]

@@rebeccaswinney8771 No thanks. Do you communicate with everyone in this sort of adversarial manner? Bye bye.

[@rebeccaswinney8771]

@@bluenetmarketing I enjoy learning, sorry if you can’t handle truth.

[@ReinhardvonHolst]

Thank you for this. My next (among many) novel is about an 8-year-old girl growing up to adulthood, yet the first chapter is all about her loving mum but criminal father. She is blissfully unaware of what her parents are like. She only begins to find out after her mother is killed by her father a few chapters in. The young girl is not the main character at the start but becomes one. It's tricky to write but I'm enjoying the challenge. Peace and thank you.

[@GibbletonsBennet]

I love when family members play a crucial role in the story. Not only because that makes it feel far more realistic, but also because the whole story just feels way more interwoven and personally impactful to the main character. There's a lot of interesting internal conflict, tension, and complicated dynamics that can stem from that when it's woven in with the plot.

[@eniloicypela]

Thank you for posting this how do I support your channel financially?

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

Thank you! That's very kind of you. :) You can support me on Patreon: www.patreon.com/KMWeiland Or by buying my books: kmweilandstore.com/

[@eniloicypela]

@@KMWeilandAuthor do you do consultations?

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

@@eniloicypela Not at this time.

[@valeriegriffith5409]

I want to write a novel like Neil Gaiman's American Gods or 1001 Arabian Nights. Stories inside of a novel. I'm writing a pseudo "paranormal detective " novel. MC is actually a bounty hunter. I'm trying to incorporate African mythology, African folktales, and African American folktales within the novel. I thought I could use dreams of the MC and a storytelling Gods in the guise of a Ma & Pa owned Soul food restaurant. The way Neil did it was with a character that is Anubis but known as A. Nubis. He's an mortician and runs a funeral home. He's writing a journal about how people who came to American brought their Gods with them. These interludes appeared seamless. How do my I keep my interludes seamless?

[@clara2768]

I feel my novel is a little more complex that this. I has a prolugue of things that will set up the mystery. Are you offereing mentorship or something to that nature?

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

No, not at this time.

[@clara2768]

There´s a lot of good info here but it goes by fast, I would recommend using visuals, like lists of the points you´re mentioning. It would helpful for people like me who are more visual than auditive.

[@KMWeilandAuthor]

You can find a full transcript of the episode, which may be helpful: www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/checklist-for-beginning-your-story-plot-considerations/ Transcripts are always linked in the description section.

[@abeardandglasses]

On the audio version that is published, there is a few false takes before it continues into this video. Just thought you may want to know!

[@OlettaLiano]

Starting a story isn't difficult; it revolves around internal conflict. Simply apply Disney's five-minute rule: in successful Disney films, protagonists express their internal struggles, often through a song within the initial five minutes. Disney also introduces backstory early on, illustrating the origins of their internal conflict.

[@LeVosgienLVHLS]

Yep. Although if kicking up a story isn't difficult, it's another one to do it well, and when aiming to divert an audience expecting more subtilty than they could get from watching yet another Disney' tale.

[@rokualvin6428]

I've written maybe a million words in my saga. I have gone down more dead-end scenarios than I care to mention. I love reading what I write, and a couple of other people enjoy it as well. But it doesn't have an end point. It is "pantsing" gone to full seed. I have versions of my stuff on my Kindle and go to sleep listening to it being read to me by the text-to-speech function. I love my characters and have even made videos on my KZbin channel where I discuss the loss of my wife with a highly intelligent and very introverted one of them on a planet ten galaxies away in an unfortunately vain attempt to help me deal with the loss of my best friend, soulmate, and wife of 45 years. My story consumes me with purpose, but I am struggling to find an ending. Instead, I find new fun things that the characters do on their alien planet, and some of the conflicts they run into. I am currently reading your book about outlining the novel, which is what I need to do to pull it together, if I ever do. :-) I'm 72 years old, and the one thing that has kept me connected to life on this planet is my story. I miss my soulmate more than words can ever express. But I have my alien planet, my characters, and the story to give me purpose in my final years. I have found that most writing videos are devoid of understanding simple grammar where a plural pronoun is used for a singular antecedent, and I simply can't deal with hearing that over and over again in short videos. In your book, you correctly use a singular pronoun to describe a singular antecedent. I couldn't read your material otherwise. I noticed in this video you failed to do that, but at least it isn't in sentence after sentence in your monologue like most of them do. Them, they, and their do not properly describe a single character in real English. He, his, and him do. Even "he or she" does, but not they or their. This is basic grammar. I do love your content, and I think that your advice may help me pull my book/books together into something the general public might enjoy reading before I die. Thank you for your work!