Writing a Novel? Where to Place Plot Points
A plot point is an event that takes the story and swings it around in another direction.
It has to be something that forces the protagonist to stop and change direction.
For instance, in a mystery, the murder is the setup for the novel.
The first plot point could be when the hero discovers that the woman he is in love with has lied to him about her alibi.
This forces him to reassess his entire approach, not just to the murder but to life in general.
A complication can be a plot point but they are not necessarily the same.
The complication can lead to something which leads to a plot point.
Jenny's complication is her sister's problem with reality.
The plot point is when Jenny decides that she has to stay and help her sister out of the mess she's in.
Suddenly the situation changes.
You have your hero before you begin writing your novel.
During the beginning part of your novel, you put the protagonist(s) in conflict with either his or her own environment or the environment of others.
Before moving on to the middle part of the novel, something must happen to the hero -- a plot point -- that moves him into the middle part of the book.
After you create the sequences of scenes that comprise the middle of the book you must create another plot point which swings the action out of the middle of the book to the ending.
Of course, these are mere guidelines.
Your plot points do not have to actually appear on page 55 and 175.
But they must appear.
Otherwise, you are writing a long series of vignettes that have no purpose or focus.
If the above-listed purposes are left unfulfilled, fulfilled in a tedious way or fulfilled one by one, you will run into problems.
That is, if you decide that the sole purpose of a scene is to reveal an aspect of the heroine's personality, the scene may appear flat.
It is better to have several things happening at once.
Otherwise you will have a string of scenes that lead into each other but don't relate to each other.
Still confused? Here is a checklist that might help you.
It has to be something that forces the protagonist to stop and change direction.
For instance, in a mystery, the murder is the setup for the novel.
The first plot point could be when the hero discovers that the woman he is in love with has lied to him about her alibi.
This forces him to reassess his entire approach, not just to the murder but to life in general.
A complication can be a plot point but they are not necessarily the same.
The complication can lead to something which leads to a plot point.
Jenny's complication is her sister's problem with reality.
The plot point is when Jenny decides that she has to stay and help her sister out of the mess she's in.
Suddenly the situation changes.
You have your hero before you begin writing your novel.
During the beginning part of your novel, you put the protagonist(s) in conflict with either his or her own environment or the environment of others.
Before moving on to the middle part of the novel, something must happen to the hero -- a plot point -- that moves him into the middle part of the book.
After you create the sequences of scenes that comprise the middle of the book you must create another plot point which swings the action out of the middle of the book to the ending.
Of course, these are mere guidelines.
Your plot points do not have to actually appear on page 55 and 175.
But they must appear.
Otherwise, you are writing a long series of vignettes that have no purpose or focus.
If the above-listed purposes are left unfulfilled, fulfilled in a tedious way or fulfilled one by one, you will run into problems.
That is, if you decide that the sole purpose of a scene is to reveal an aspect of the heroine's personality, the scene may appear flat.
It is better to have several things happening at once.
Otherwise you will have a string of scenes that lead into each other but don't relate to each other.
Still confused? Here is a checklist that might help you.
- Who is the protagonist?
- What is his or her conflict with the environment?
- What is his or her chief motivating force? That is, what does he or she want out of this novel?
- What is the tangible objective? That is, what is his or her goal?
- Is the objective achieved by the end of the story?
- What are the major complications?
- What complication happens to set off the resolution to the major complication (the ante-complication)?
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