#plotting help

[thewriteadviceforwriters]

What To Do When You Know Your Ending but Have No Clue How to Get There

congrats. you’ve unlocked the most ✨ cursed ✨ form of storytelling: knowing the destination but having zero map, no snacks, and one emotionally unstable protagonist riding shotgun.

aka: you know how your book ends. maybe even the Last Line™. but the middle? the plot? the scenes required to get there?

🦗🦗🦗

welcome to liminal writing hell. here’s what to do about it:

🚨 STEP 1: Write the ending anyway.

yes. even if you’re only on chapter three. write the ending now. not perfectly. not canon. just get it down while it’s burning in your brain.

this does 2 things:

gets you emotionally invested in where you’re headed

gives you a north star to align your scenes to

future-you will thank you when you're knee-deep in act 2, spiraling, and you need to remember what this mess was for.

🧩 STEP 2: Backwards logic it like a feral detective.

ask: what has to happen right before this ending can exist? then ask that question again. and again. until you’ve accidentally built a whole reverse-outline.

like:

✨ final scene: heroine stabs the love interest to save the world → she needs to know he’s the villain → she needs to see him do something unforgivable → she needs a reason to be in the same room as him when it happens → she needs to go to the city where he’s hiding → she needs to choose betrayal over loyalty

now reverse those like breadcrumbs through the forest of chaos.

🎯 STEP 3: Identify your mid-point emotional switch.

the best middles aren’t just “stuff happening.” they’re a turning point. a reversal. a Big Choice. often it’s the opposite of the ending.

ending = character sacrifices love midpoint = character believes love will fix everything

this sets up contrast + emotional stakes. the midpoint shows how wrong they are. the ending proves how far they’ve come.

no midpoint? no tension. build the middle to break them, then rebuild toward the finale.

🧱 STEP 4: Stack up your themes like Jenga blocks.

what are you actually saying with this ending?

if the ending is: “freedom comes at a price” then the story needs to explore:

what freedom means

who pays that price

how people deny the cost

how your protagonist learns to accept it

if your middle scenes aren’t touching these ideas? they’re just filler. start weaving the theme early, subtly, and repeatedly. make it hurt a little.

📦 STEP 5: Write “junk scenes” in the blank spaces.

not sure how they get from castle to climax? write a fake scene. not canon. no pressure. just vibes. let the characters mess around in the setting. argue. kiss. kill. eat soup. whatever.

you’ll learn what they want, what secrets they’re hiding, what tensions spark.

some of these junk scenes will turn out to be real. others will guide you to what needs to happen next. use them as scaffolding.

🧃 STEP 6: Accept that messy = forward.

you won’t always see the whole road. write the next landmark. write the next mistake. write the next bad scene and figure out why it doesn’t work.

knowing your ending is a gift. the rest? that’s the part where you dig.

you don’t need a perfect bridge. you just need enough planks to get across without falling into the river of I’ll-Fix-It-Later.

now go. write the scene where everything breaks.

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[prophetic-writer]

Hello!! Different anon but, if it is not a problem, I would like to read about how you make the flowchart/bullet points!

No problem at all!

Basically, for a flow chart I list out everything that is supposed to happen, in order. It looks like this:

The point is to have a visual representation of what happens in what order. Of course, if you have multiple plotlines going on simultaneously, it might look a bit more like this:

Or, if your plot is REALLY complicated, like this:

Again, the point is just to make a visual representation of how the events that take place in your story flow from one to the next.

As for the bullet points, I stick to a method that looks like this:

There are probably countless other ways to organize your information, I just personally like to use these two methods. I’ll typically start with a flow chart when I’m first getting an idea and then when I’m ready to get more in depth with the fine details of what happens, I’ll use my boxes from the flow chart as “big plot point” bullets and break them down from there.

I hope this helps! Plotting is a funny thing because it’s not something that most writers spend a lot of time on. Once you start writing, I find that plotting things out becomes less and less vital. It’s a great thing to have a system for, though. If anyone else has any other methods they like, feel free to comment them or reblog, I’m always interested to hear how other people are doing things.

Good luck and happy plotting/writing!

[verynichewritingadvice]

Hey, do you have any advice for overcoming perfectionism with writing?

I think the key is to just realize that the first iteration of a story is like the base of a recipe. If you obsess over all of the little details before you lay down the foundation, the story isn't going to be edible. If writing is a cupcake, it's like adding the sprinkles to the batter instead of adding the milk or eggs, then looking at your half-formed sludge of a creation and going "god this looks terrible'" and shoving into the crucible.

Putting it in the oven of your criticism before it's ready. When you take it out, it's not going to be an intact cupcake, and you'll feel even worse.

Convoluted food metaphors aside, a good thing to keep in mind is that good writing isn't what is perfect, which is something that can never be achieved.

Good writing is what works.

You're never going to able to articulture the exact picture you have in your head into words. Nor has any author in the history of ever. We were human, and our communication with each other and the outer world is limited.

If you are a perfectionist, your art is never going to live up to your expectations, because it can't. The emotional scene you write on paper might feel inferior to the majesty you've envisioned in your head. You might feel like there's something missing, that's it doesn't perfectly encapsulate what you imagined, and you might be frustrated by that.

But that doesn't mean its bad at all, just human. Most people underestimate how impactful their words are. Just because it's not an impossibly perfect replica, doesn't mean that the emotions and thoughts won't register with the readers. Oftentimes, we're biased against ourselves.

Remember that.

[alfiesolcmons-blog]

could you give some tips on what you do to outline/plan your plots for fics??

I sure can jellybean! I’m just gonna give you an entire run down of what I do when I attempt to plot.

So, I first start off with a concept, can be as broad or narrow as you like. For MS the concept was this, ‘Luca and Tommy plan to stop bloodshed and vendetta through marriage between one of their sisters.’ Silver Spoon’s concept line was, 'Mancunian female gangster causes problems for the Peaky Blinders in Birmingham and the Jewish gang in Camden town’. Once you have concept write or type this at this top of your page.

Notice how the tag lines are very open ended? This gives you space to come up with any OCs if you want too. Imagine an MS AU where Tommy marries Bianca instead, the concept is broad enough for this.

So come up with your characters and who you want interacting in your fic, write or type it all down so its saved for later.

Now you start with plot points, which are any events or moments you want to happen in your story. But you need to do this chronological order. So you start where you plan the story to start and you keep going until you resolve a problem (or even complete a whole timeline for your fic.) Write them in bullet point form so its easier to read.

In this part you can include dialogue or completed scenes. You’ll definitely be rewriting this part anyway as you change your mind about certain things.

When your timeline/plotline is done, all you have to do now is write! follow your bullet points from your timeline, which will guide your chapters or episodes. You can write a few bullet points in each chapter, MS currently takes between 4-6 bullet points for each chapter while Silver Spoon, based off the one chapter has taken only 3. It is your choice on this part. You could do 10 bullet points if you wanted to. Do what feels right.

So, this is how I plot. I hope it was helpful!- V, alfiesolcmons/sleepyblinders

[jay-eddy]

Something For Writers to Keep In Mind: THINGS CHANGE AS YOU WRITE

Sometimes your story doesn’t want to heed to your plan, sometimes you get half way into your story and you feel it going somewhere else. Let it! Let your story guide you where it needs to go. Because if you force it back into the plot you’ve planned, you risk making it harder for you to write and that takes away the richness of your story.

Sometimes your characters end up doing a full 180 degrees on their characteristics. That’s okay! Your villains can find redemption. Your heroes can fall from grace. Your characters can lose their optimism, they can become corrupted and immoral, or they find hope. You characters can change, they can develop and grow!

Sometimes things change, sometimes your story evolves as you write. That’s okay. Don’t let it stress you out.

[verynichewritingadvice]

I'm writing a fic, and it kind of feels like they're going somewhere and then nowhere at the same time? Where do i go from here

They're makes me think you're referring to a relationship of some sort, and the phrasing implies that you know where they're going, or least, they're following the steps you want them to follow, but you're not feeling it.

It sounds like you need some inspiration!

What inspired you to write about those two idiots in the first place? Maybe try looking at the source material again. What sometimes works for me is my hype-up music which consists of Star Wars/John Willaims-esque like orchestra type stuff, and then I usually get some motivation back and i vomit all the exciting details on the page and then I write the actual story in one burst of excitement before I grow disillusioned. Of course, what works for me doesn't necessarily work for you. I have ADHD, I'm writing for silly little ha-has and not the serious bill-survival grind, and I'm a very music-oriented person. Just do what inspires you.

If you're feeling bad about the quality of your fafic up till now, don't! This is a hobby, you're doing it for your own personal enjoyment and learning! Just write what you wanna write.

Also I saw your next ask and I'll answer it in time! Good luck!

[thearchangelwrites]

5! (-@em-dashes)

5. Do you know how your story ends before you start writing?

When I first come up with the concept? No. But, before I get too deep into the story, I create a W-Plot with 7 major events: 

the starting point 

inciting incident

first dip

climax

the big black moment 

creating the new normal

resolution

And then I just build bridges between each major event. I call it my dumbest version plotting tool.