Writing Filters to Use: The Big Picture Filters Part 1

Okay, so the initial first draft of your short story or novel is completed. Congratulations! Throw a big party. Pat yourself on the back. That was a lot of hard work. Then things calm down, and you decide to sit down to work on draft number two. You take a gander at your masterpiece to discover it isn’t as glamorous as you first thought. Sure, you knew it needed work, but not that much! Where to begin? What to do? The text before you becomes blurred. It gets hard to breath, and you wonder if maybe this might be what insanity feel like. But before you commit yourself to an insane asylum, there’s hope, and it’s as simple as just a little focus.

Plot

Questions to ask…

• Was the main plot clear and believable?
• Was the plot interesting and engrossing?
• Is there enough to sustain the story through the final page?
• If it is a short story, were there too many subplots?
• If it is part of a novel, could it be improved by more attention to subplots?
• Or should the novel have more subplots?
• If nonfiction, was the work organized clearly and succinctly?
• Are major plot issues resolved?
• Is the plot introduced in an engaging way?
• Are there hooks; are they logical; are they related to the rest of the plot?
• Is the premise right for the story that’s been written?
• Has reader expectation been whetted and then satisfied?
• Is there focus or is the plot scattered?
• Is the story presented in the right sequence of events?
• What questions were raised in the story?
• How are the question(s) answered or left unanswered?
• Are the right questioned answered?
• Does the story start in the right place? Does it start too late? Too early?
• Did the story end where it should?
  

Things that can be done to enhance plot…

• Weed out coincidence
• Maintain forward movement
• Include surprises
• Move logically from point to point
• Resolve plot threads
• Root out author intrusion (make sure it’s the characters talking and not the author)
• Whether you consider the opening event or the protagonist’s acceptance of his call to action the inciting incident, make sure you have both
• Make sure the ending is sufficient in terms of length and depth for the story
• Make sure the ending is inevitable
• Make sure the ending doesn’t drag; make it satisfy the reader
• Make sure the black moment and climax are strong enough for the story
• Use back story sparingly and blend it so it doesn’t stop story momentum

Character

Questions to ask…

• Did the people seem real?
• What did the writer do to make them come alive?
• If the characters appeared shallow, what might the writer do to more fully develop a character(s)?
• Is too much time spent inside the/a character’s head? Excessive internalization slows the story. If the character is thinking or wondering about every action, the writer foreshadows the plot and alienates the readers desire to continue reading.
• Are the characters interesting enough for the story?
• Do the lead characters have sufficient motivation to move through the plot?
• Which characters are grounding the story or leading it?
• Are the characters consistent?
• If they aren’t consistent, does it work?
• Is character motivation appropriate for the story that developed from it?
• Is the antagonist strong enough, a good complement to the protagonist?
• Do characters have strengths and weaknesses?
• Are character goals clear?
• Are characters well-rounded?
• Are all featured characters vital to the plot?

Things that can be done to enhance Character…

• Make sure there are enough characters to carry the plot
• Make sure there are no unnecessary characters
• Give the main character secondary characters to support him
• Give the main character other characters strong enough to challenge him
• Fit characters to genre and era
• Give characters appropriate and sufficient habits, quirks, favorite words, speech patterns, dreams, goals and motivations, and hot buttons that other characters can push
• Make characters three-dimensional—include thoughts, actions, and reactions
• Take into consideration the characters job and, even name, and how it portrays them to the reader
  

Conflict

Questions to ask…

• Did the conflict and tension in the fictional plot(s) and subplot(s) come to a reasonable conclusion?
• Were you left hanging still unsure of how or what happened?
• Was the resolution appropriate for the character development?
• Is there sufficient conflict in each scene and between characters?
• Does conflict escalate?
• Did the writer use an appropriate denouncement (if the story has one)?

Things that can be done to enhance Conflict…

• Create tension
• Make characters and readers uncomfortable
• Increase conflict as the story progresses
• Ensure conflict between characters and between protagonist and himself and within the antagonist
• Ask yourself what is the worst thing that could happen to your characters within the story and then do it.

Since this is a very big list, I broke this post into a three post series. Part 2 will go into dialogue, scenes, and point of view. And Part 3 will talk about pace, setting, continuity, and balance.