It’s Tuesday morning and I’m cozying up with my coffee cup. Morning’s are so hard, but after a couple more cups of coffee, I’ll have this thing in hand…
Ok, so I promised part 2 of my outline process would be about structure. And I always do my best to live up to my promises…
Structure!
Outlining gets me through the writing progress, but as I stated in my last post, there needs to be structure, the bones to the writing.
Now, this is the way I structure my writing process. It works for me and I hope it works for you.
- Start your book by introducing your main character. Don’t overdo the backstory, but let your reader know who the main character is all about, what they are looking for, or what they need to happen. Maybe it’s looking for Mr. Right or solving a mystery.
- Then, of course, things can’t go exactly right with your character, that would be boring. So, something needs to happen that changes their course, maybe setting them up for an exciting change. Maybe it’s an obstacle that’s put in front of their goal.
- At this point, the character will want to give up, but they press forward.
- In the middle or somewhere near it, your character should be at their breaking point. Your reader should be asking, what will happen next? I call this the top of the hill.
- As you start to let things happen that go right for the character, you need to toss in one last zinger. Your reader has started to feel like they know how it will end, but then…
- Now, and only now do you let your character have victory. This is when they slay the dragon, win the love, or find the killer.
- This is the closing out of your story. Your character marries their love, sees the killer put in prison, or whatever their turmoil was, ends and they see the rainbow, so to speak. Then they walk into the sunset, or fall off a cliff, if it’s a cliffhanger for the next book in the series…
Now, I now this was a very relaxed explanation, but that’s how I roll. I don’t get into fancy words, because that just confuses the situation. This is how I do it and it may or may not work for you. It works for me!
As always, good writing and May God Bless You….
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Stephanie Hurt - Romance Author 