Story Building Mastery 9 – Episodic Reduction
Episodic Reduction RETURN TO MENU ARTICLE If you read the previous article on Micro Stories, then grasping the concept of Episodic Reduction should be very simple. It also helps to remember the Five Stage Plot, though not necessarily required. What is Episodic Reduction? It is the reduction of the overall plot into self-contained episodes. Each episode becomes essentially a micro story, exhibiting the various sections of story development common to an entire story. In other words, each episode has exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement, per the Five Act Structure. But, the resolution of each episode should lead directly into the next episode. Episodes should build on each other and often reflect the Five Stage Plot that I mentioned above. Yet at the same time, each episode builds upon the overarching plot. Let’s outline this a bit to better explain, using the Five Stage Plot as a template.
Story Building Mastery 8 – Micro Stories
Micro Stories RETURN TO MENU ARTICLE What is a micro story? It’s a story within the story. This is more common with epics than it is with smaller, self-contained stories, but can still be used effectively when done right. The first and most important point in considering putting this into your story, is that micro stories must always work for the greater story. That is why this is so high up on the complexity list, because the foundational story must be firmly established. Each micro story should reflect or add to the foundational story, otherwise it just becomes a spin-off (self-contained unrelated stories grown out of the original). You don’t want spin-off stories, because they detract and distract from the point of the foundational story. Let micro stories work together to create a weaved tale with one common end goal. There are two major types of micro stories. POV stories and story-arcs. Some writers may equivicate the two into one definition, preferring to call them all “story-arcs.” But I think there’s an important distinction to be made.
Story Building Mastery 3 – Story Genre
Story Genre RETURN TO MENU ARTICLE So you think you know what Story Genre is, huh? It can be best understood as a story’s designation of setting, style, and audience. Other definitions include form, content, and technique. What needs to be keyed in on here is that Story Genre moves the READER through the story, or the author’s means of connecting the reader to the story. Don’t confuse this with Story Genotype, which I’ll talk about next time, which moves the MAIN CHARACTERS through the story, or is the author’s way of connecting the main characters to the story. What do I mean? In genre, setting and style are most important. The characters are unaffected by this, it is the reader that bears the impact. For instance, consider setting. A Western is characterized by a “cowboy” type setting, usually mid to late 1800’s. The characters are unaffected because it’s simply a reflection of their normal world. This setting designation is used to connect the reader to that world.
Story Building Mastery 1 – The Tri-Core Substructure
THE TRI-CORE SUBSTRUCTURE RETURN TO MENU ARTICLE This week I want to talk about the foundational layer of story building, the Tri-Core Substructure. Shiny, huh? I made that term up myself because neither my publisher nor I could think of a proper pre-existing term. What is the Tri-Core Substructure? It is the very basic most primitive form of a story: Character, Experience, Reaction. Or in other words, he came, he saw, he did. Each of these three primitive parts of a story can be reduced to the three core parts of which we will be talking about. Character (personal development), Meaning (experiential objective), Plot (action/reaction).
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