Plot.
What exactly do we mean by plot?
When preparing for this class, it came to me that when we use the word plot, we actually mean three distinct things:
Concept or Idea
Sequence of Events
Anticipation
Concept or Idea – Godzilla vs. Alice in Wonderland on the Moon.
Sequence of Events –
Alice is bored at a party.
Alice walks down to the water’s edge.
Alice discovers that she can walk on the silvery reflection of the moon on the water.
This leads her to the moon.
The moon is peopled by living letters of the alphabet.
Baby i is particularly eerie, since its head floats above its shoulders.
The King of the Alphabet is A, who is at war with Z.
Z has stolen some monsters from Earth, in order to terrorize the rest of the alphabet.
One of these monsters turns out to be Godzilla.
Etc.
Anticipation – The reader’s ability to anticipate or fear the twists and turns of the story. For instance: Alice longs for something beyond the boredom of the everyday, so when she finds herself on a fanciful adventure, the reader doesn’t know what is coming, but they are pleased by the turn of events. Alice loves animals, but when she goes to see Z’s new animals, things take an unexpected turn.
And that is the key: “Things take an unexpected turn” – the turn cannot be unexpected unless the reader is expecting something else.
We talk more about anticipation in the class on that subject.
Sequence of Events
I am not going to talk about this in great detail, but I do want to touch on it. Donald Maass's Writing the Breakout Novel has some really good advice and exercises on this topic. One of my favorites is called:
What could make it worse?
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