I also want my story to be relevant. If what’s happening in the plot doesn’t reflect my readers’ lives, there is no point in writing it. I have always enjoyed getting reader feedback and, in fact, have sought it. One comment I’ve gotten again and again from my readers is that my characters feel so real to them. They know someone just like so-and-so. Or they tell me that something similar to the situation in my book has happened to a friend of theirs. My story ideas come from everyday life, from things I’ve read or people I’ve met. Relevant.
The next one is important. I want my books to be entertaining. I don’t ever want to lose sight of the fact that when a reader purchased my book, she was also committing to a block of time to read it. I never want anyone to come away disappointed. I don’t use my books as a political platform or to show how well I’ve done my research. I write a good story, hopefully a riveting one that keeps the reader entertained. The message must be subtle.
The fourth element I strive for is creativity. I want to pour creativity into the telling—in the story itself and in the way I tell it. Probably the most creative book I’ve ever written is titled Between Friends. I used a unique storytelling device and didn’t use one word of dialogue or one word of description. The story is the tale of a lifelong friendship between two women. It’s told as if the reader is leafing through the pages of a scrapbook. With each book I strive to find a way to do something unique or different.
The final element I like to add to every story is realism or honesty. It’s far too easy to tie all the story detail up in a neat bow and write, “The End,” and leave the reader scratching her head, wondering how this or that could have possibly happened. For example, in many books a hero and heroine can argue and bicker through an entire manuscript and then in the last chapter suddenly declare their love for one another. The emotional turnaround is enough to give a reader whiplash. I’m afraid I’ve been guilty of this myself, in the early years of my writing career. The story must ring true, and the conclusion has to live up to the promise set up early in the book.
I apply those five elements to every story I write.
That’s why I spend a good deal of time plotting each book. Once I have the basic premise—the idea that sparks my attention—I begin to play with it. I start by taking a piece of paper and listing twenty to forty incidents that could happen. I do this in brainstorming fashion, because at this stage I want these ideas to be organic. I find that the less I try to orchestrate at this stage, the more inventive the ideas will be.
Once I have some story ideas, I flesh out the characters. Since I often write ensemble fiction—following multiple story lines that weave together around a common theme—I’ll usually choose three or four characters and begin to explore who they are, what they want, and what they are most afraid of. It’s important to uncover some of their underlying motivations. As I explained earlier, when I weave different plots together, it’s much like braiding hair. Although there are three strands, they make one long, unified braid.
Once I have the characters, I examine each one and decide how best to challenge them. We’re going to talk about conflict and challenge in chapter 14, but for now let me just say that nothing moves a story—a plot—along faster than giving the characters challenges.
WHAT IF . . .
Picture a Jacqueline Kennedy–like character. Let’s say her name is Jacqueline. She adores her only child, Paul—a rising star in corporate banking—for whom she has always harbored the highest hopes. Now, what happens if that son falls in love with Tammie Lee, who comes from the swamps of who-knows-where? The wedding is bad enough. Paul calls Tammie Lee his little Southern belle, but Jacqueline can’t even keep track of all of Tammie Lee’s cousins and kinfolk. She had pictured a wedding with collard greens and grits and half expected deep-fried Twinkies in place of the traditional wedding cake. Okay, it wasn’t as bad as she’d imagined, but Tammie Lee’s Southern sweetness is more than Jacqueline can stomach. Why oh why can’t Paul see that this marriage is a horrible mistake? When Jacqueline finds out Tammie Lee is pregnant within a few months of the wedding, she’s horrified. It would be easy for Jacqueline to walk away from Tammie Lee, but—here’s the rub—Jacqueline’s greatest fear is losing her son. That element is what moves the plot forward. She has to find a way to connect with Tammie Lee if she wants her son in her life. That challenge turned out to be Jacqueline Donovan’s story line in The Shop on Blossom Street.
Applying those what-if scenarios to our stories is what helps us get to the very core of what our characters want most and what they fear most. It’s almost like when we apply some worst-case scenario thinking to our own lives.
ACTION AND REACTION
In plotting, it’s not just what happens that moves the story along; it’s how the characters react to what happens. It’s the same in our own real-life stories. Good things and bad things happen to all of us. The power of the story is in how we react to them.
It’s like the story of Joseph from the Bible. He grew up in a house full of brothers—there were twelve sons in all and he was the second youngest—but hands down, he was the favorite. His father, Jacob, made no secret of his preference. In fact, while the other sons wore sturdy, serviceable clothes, Jacob had an expensive, ornate multicolored coat made for Joseph. The coat proclaimed his father’s favoritism every time Joseph put his arms into the sleeves. Apparently, Joseph had an arrogant streak to go with his most-favored-son status.
In ancient Canaan there was little more important than receiving a father’s blessing. Joseph’s standing with his father as the favorite became the envy of all his brothers. Even if Joseph had never uttered a word, his brothers would have been consumed with jealousy. The Bible tells us they hated him. Now, hate is a very strong word.
But Joseph possessed an unusual gift. He dreamed dreams that were prophetic, and he had the ability to understand what those dreams meant. One particular morning he woke from a vivid dream. He relayed it to his brothers, since it concerned them. He said:
“Listen to this dream I had: We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.”
His brothers said to him, “Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said.
Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”
When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, “What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?” His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind.
—GENESIS 37:5–10
Those dreams were the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back when it came to Joseph’s relationship with his brothers. The ten hatched a plan to kill him, but at the last minute decided instead to sell him to a nomadic tribe for a handful of silver shekels.
The brothers kept his offending coat, ripped it, and smeared it with blood to make it look as if wild animals had attacked Joseph. In the meantime, Joseph was resold to a captain of the Pharaoh’s guard in Egypt. The Bible says that the Lord prospered everything Joseph did. The plot took several twists and turns and Joseph saw trouble as well as redemption. Remember what I mentioned earlier in talking about the book of Ruth, how the Hebrew word wayehi literally means, “Trouble is on the horizon but redemption is coming”? That was true for the story of Joseph’s captivity and eventual promotion to the pharaoh’s second-in-command.
This is one of those edge-of-the-seat stories. (You can read it for yourself in Genesis, chapters 37–50.) The most important part of the story is Joseph’s reaction to his brothers’ treachery and to all the trouble he encountered. His youthful arrogance was replaced by maturity, courage, and mercy. Rather than grow bitter, Josep
h saw God’s hand in the story. In Genesis 50:20, speaking to his brothers, he sums it up: “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.”
That’s the kind of reaction that marks a hero who sees his story as a journey with an ultimate purpose. And it’s a powerful example of how God wants us to view the plot points of our own lives. What may have been intended for harm, God used for good.
TENSION AND PACING
When I’m plotting a novel, I pay close attention to the pacing. A storyteller knows about keeping listeners or readers on the edge of their seats. We do this by keeping tension in the story. One of the tricks of our trade is to end each chapter with a cliffhanger. I want my books to be so compelling that readers are tempted to stay up all night simply because they find the story so entertaining they can’t stop until they reach the end of the book.
It reminds me of the letter I received from a loyal reader who said she loved my books. “They put me to sleep every night.” I’m glad I understood what she meant, or her words might have given me pause.
But most readers will look at the clock and promise themselves they’ll only read to the end of the chapter. Picture us writers with a twinkle in our collective eyes as we plan to make it almost impossible to put that book down at the end of a chapter.
My goal as a writer is to leave the reader wanting more.
As we tell our own stories, the tension will come naturally if we don’t sanitize the telling. Trouble will come. We just need to keep in mind that redemption isn’t far behind, although it might not seem that way.
OUT OF NOWHERE
Another important part of plot is the twist, an unexpected detour. As I told the Joseph story above, I left out some of the twists that make the story even more compelling. But add in a treacherous woman’s false accusation; an unwarranted fall from grace, including a prison stint; and a miraculous restoration by Pharaoh—and all the honors that go with it—and you’ll have some of the twists and turns in Joseph’s story.
You won’t have to look hard to find those unexpected detours in stories or in your own life. As I write this, neighborhoods all across this country have homes in foreclosure due to the housing crisis. Families have had the financial rug pulled out from under them. I’m praying that in time, when those stories are told, the people who suffered this unexpected twist will be able to say what Joseph said: “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good.”
STORY ARC
The plot of a story does not look like a timeline—like a straight horizontal line. We call it a story arc because the story usually starts in one place, swells in tension and conflict (sometimes called rising action), comes to a climax, and then tapers back down (descending action). In my stories, as we near the end, all the different story lines begin to intertwine. I think of it almost like knitting a sweater. All the pieces are there, and then comes the time when they are joined. If you first looked at the sleeve and then the side, you might wonder how the two pieces would ever come together, but once all the pieces are laid out it’s easy to see.
I opened this chapter with Philippians 3:13–14 because the verse mirrors that arc, that journey. We press on toward the end, toward the prize. The tension is there as we strain forward to capture the promised treasure. We’re pressing toward the happily ever after.
All of that may seem like more information about plot than you ever wanted to know, but the reason I share each part is that the story of our lives involves an intricate plot as well. I think that understanding how story moves forward gives us an insight into how God is plotting our own stories. It helps us recognize the pacing, tension, twists, and turns in our lives as more than catastrophes. Each event—disaster or delight—is part of the plot, moving our story along.
Storytelling Prompt
If you were to plot your life out from beginning to end on a timeline, list what would be some of the high points and low points. If you feel ambitious, create the actual timeline. Have there been times when your life became too complicated? Describe those times. Can you identify the arcs? How did you get through those thickly plotted seasons?
The Hero’s Journey
We can’t talk about plot and story without exploring the hero’s journey. Storytellers have long known there is a natural pattern for telling a story, but in 1946 mythologist Joseph Campbell first described the model of the hero’s journey and assigned progressive steps to it in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. From ancient mythic tales like Homer’s Odyssey to modern Hollywood’s Star Wars or Lord of the Rings, most stories follow this familiar archetype. For natural storytellers like me, it’s something we’ve instinctively understood and incorporated into our stories. If you’re like me and grew up reading, you’ll recognize this pattern.
Since Campbell first identified this monomyth—or cyclical journey—there have been a number of variations on the steps used to describe the journey. Often it’s divided into eight steps:
1. The call—the invitation offered to the hero to enter the adventure.
2. The threshold—the jumping-off point for the adventure. The hero will encounter guardians who may block his path, stepping aside only when the hero is prepared to meet the challenge of the journey.
3. The challenges—the hero faces a series of challenges or temptations. These often become more difficult along the way. This step requires the hero to figure out who may try to lead him astray. Much of a book is made up of this step—challenge after challenge. And much of our lives seems taken up by this step.
4. The abyss—here is where the challenge is so great that the hero must surrender completely to the adventure, usually to face his greatest fear.
5. The transformation—the hero has conquered the abyss and overcome his fears.
6. The revelation—a sudden, dramatic change in the way the hero thinks or views life. Change is crucial in order for him to become a new person.
7. The atonement—the hero accepts his new identity.
8. The return—upon his return, the hero may have discovered his gifts, skills, or a new awareness.
Joseph Campbell believed that the hero’s journey allowed everyday people to identify their own heroic adventure, their strengths and their weaknesses. He observed that all human beings face a series of trials that allow us to grow and to find our place in this world.
Sound familiar? We can track much of our journey through life in terms of the archetypal hero’s journey, especially our spiritual journey. Or we can look to the life journey of other family members—our parents or grandparents. We can examine what happened when they conquered life’s trials, or how they developed confidence and perspective. Their journeys transformed them and us, changing us all through the adversity that they faced.
If you’ve plotted your life, or even created a timeline, it might be an interesting exercise to examine what you find in the light of the hero’s journey—from the first call to the return.
Eight
HE TUCKED THE TREASURE DEEP IN HIS SACK . . .
Then He said to them, “Therefore every scribe instructed concerning the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out of his treasure things new and old.”
—MATTHEW 13:52 (KJV)
Isn’t it strange that our treasures—our stuff—can say so much about us? When I’m writing a book and I describe rooms or possessions, those are always clues to the character. Like the fireplace in the three-sided shed in The Inn at Rose Harbor, where Jo Marie finds refuge with her knitting, or the knitted baby blanket representing each character’s struggle in the book The Shop on Blossom Street.
These telling treasures are not limited to my fiction. If you were to walk through my office and take the stairs up to my writing loft, you’d learn several things about me on the journey. I have an autograph collection arranged on the walls leading up to the space where I do the majority of my writing. Each day I’m inspired by authors whose work I’ve admired my entir
e life. The fact that the carpet is slightly worn in the center of the steps speaks to my commitment to spending time nearly every day doing what I love and am so grateful to be able to do—that is, writing my own books. Even more of my autograph collection is on display in my home. There’s a yarn room and a big, sunny kitchen. So much of what I love is part of my everyday environment—family, Christmas, my faith, food, knitting, writing.
If you visited that home in Port Orchard at Christmastime, you’d learn even more about me. I have several decorated Christmas trees. We gather gifts for each of my children’s families under their own tree. You’ll find multiple nativity scenes in every room. I’m guessing you are the same way: if you look around your own home you too will discover tangible hints of who you are and what you love.
When we are telling our stories, we need to look at the treasures of our lives and find a way to wind them into the telling. They usually speak volumes about us. These treasures come in many forms. Perhaps they are the symbols of our lives, or actual things—artifacts—or letters, lists, or journals. Let’s take a look at some of those elements.
SYMBOLS
Remember back in your high school and college literature classes when you had to analyze symbolism in stories? Light and dark in The Scarlet Letter. Ralph and his conch shell in Lord of the Flies. Blood in Macbeth. We writers often use symbolism to add a layer of complexity to our stories. For instance, in my books, knitting is often the symbolic coming together of characters.
The Bible is filled with symbolism. That’s what makes it such a fascinating read, whether it is your first time to read through it or your thirtieth time. I’m always learning something new. The stones piled as an altar to mark God’s mighty works. The blood sacrifices of the Old Testament foreshadowing Christ and the ultimate sacrifice. The feasts. It would take more than one lifetime to unravel all the symbolism and richness.
Once Upon a Time: Discovering Our Forever After Story Page 7