Understanding Plot and Subplots in Novels
Level up your books by adding more texture and depth in all the right places
What is Plot?
There’s no such thing as plot. Plot is the name writers and editors have labeled the story that takes place on the page. I’m going to talk about plot in a nebulous sense because it is. But I’ll also tell you how I see and use plot.
How you use plot, like everything else about your book, is up to you, though.
The simplest way a lot of writers think about plot is as a series of events. This type of writing tends to create a story where things just happen. There’s nothing much connecting them and there aren’t arcs. As a reader and writer, I’m not a fan of these types of stories.
I want to feel when I read. I want my readers to feel when they read my stories. To create emotions within our readers, we have to utilize a lot of elements all in connection with one another to create resonance throughout our work.
We can think about plot as the journey of a character(s) in relation to the theme or overall story intent. If you’re writing a story about how a dragon gets its fire, then the plot would focus on the events related to this journey.
