Story Arcs — The Djuna Shellam Podcast S2 E8

Riffing off last week’s episode, this week I’ve set my sights on the story arcs. I’m using an excellent article by Joe Bunting on The Write Practice website as a reference, but there are scads of others if you feel compelled to explore further.

I won’t try and reinvent the wheel here, but I will touch on a couple of points I think every fiction writer might find useful in some way.

Story Plots, Story Arcs, or Story Shapes

Essentially, there are about six different story plots, story arcs, or story shapes (shapes referring to the shape of the particular arc) that can be tools for writing your story. Some say there are seven, some say six, others say twelve; and, yes, there are even those who believe there are endless story plots. I’m going to go with six here in order to jive with Bunting’s article:

1-Rags to Riches (rise from the bottom)

2-Riches to Rags (fall to the bottom)

3-Man in a Hole (fall, then rise) (also, Double Man in a Hole)

4-Icarus/Freytag’s Pyramid (rise then fall)

5-Cinderella (rise, then fall, then rise)

6-Oedipus (fall, then rise, then fall)

Dramatic Structure

Within the story arcs, one can integrate dramatic structure:

1-Exposition (acclimate the reader to the story world and characters)

2-Inciting Incident (what kicks the story into gear)

3-Rising Action/Progressive Complications

4-Dilemma

5-Climax

6-Denouement (tying up loose ends)

A story can certainly have several story arcs, and each plot must have its own arc.

A fellow by the name of Christopher Booker published a book in 2004 called The Seven Basic Plots—Why We Tell Stories. Also known as story archetypes (not to be confused with tropes or clichés as they are more iconic), they are:

1- Rags to Riches

2-The Quest

3-Rebirth

4-Overcoming the Monster

5-Comedy

6-Tragedy

7-Voyage and Return

There’s so much info available on story structure, I can only scratch the surface here. My main intention is to introduce writers and readers to a couple of different processes writers can use to create their stories. As I mentioned, there are scads and scads of articles on this particular subject matter.

I go over the. above information in more detail in this week’s podcast episode. I encourage you to check out Joe Bunting’s article (link above). It’s pretty good.

PODCAST

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WIP

My work in progress, A Woman Like Eve—The Em Suite Series—Book 5, is so close to completion. It’s off to my first Beta-reader this weekend. I’m both excited and scared to death! If you’d like to learn more about my books or catch up for Book 5’s release, please go HERE.

Thank you so much for your time. I do appreciate you!