This idea is based on a technique described in Dwight Swain's amazing, fantastic book: Techniques of the selling writer, which is chock full of practical advice on writing selling fiction. We also owe a debt of gratitude to The Snowflake Guy, for bringing it to our attention...

Dedications out the way - let's get to it. So, what do we mean by the Action >> Reaction Cycle?

Well, when you write, you will usually have a mix of things that are happening around your protagonist (for the purpose of this article, we'll assume the protagonist is the point of view character in any given seen), and things that your protagonist is thinking and doing.

If you don't know any better, you will switch between these things randomly, putting down whatever 'feels' right. Many talented writers will naturally put things in the Action >> Reaction Cycle that I'm about to decscribe, but some of us benefit from learning the nuts and bolt of it in a more formal fashion.

Note - It should go without saying that any technique or tool that writers use, including the Action >> Reaction Cycle, are exactly that - techniques and tools. They are not laws. As a creative, you must decide for yourself when you will stick doggedly to these concepts and when you will deviate, because you know better. Just make sure you do know better.

The Action >> Reaction Cycle

Action

In one paragraph, you should have an outward description of the action. This should be completely detached from the characters point of view or opinion on the matter. FACT only. No bias based on the protagonist. This is easier said than done.

Reaction

Reaction can be split into three parts: Gut, Instinctive, Rational. Let's look at those in more detail.

Gut - this should be a visceral, bodily emotional response to the Action that's been observed. Something like a cold chill down the spine, a tightening of the throat or a twisting in the gut. It doesn't involve any movement or controlled thought.

Instinctive - This is still controlled by the body rather than the mind, but it will be more deliberate. It might be leaping back, or reaching for a gun. How useful this action is will depend on the character and how well they deal with the Action and their gut response to it.

Rational - Finally, now we've got through all the gut, instinctive stuff (which probably only took seconds, or less), we can get to the controlled part of things, where the character gets to express themselves. They may have a thought: "Not again. Oh no. Not again.", or they may carry out a controlled, deliberate action: "She raised the gun, aimed, and fired." Or both.

When you write, you should cycle your paragraphs between Action and Reaction. The Reaction paragraph does not have to include every part (gut, instinctive, rational) every time, in fact, it would get a bit weird if it did. But it should include at least one, and they should stay in the correct order.

An Example

We'll start with an example where it's done wrong, with all the elements mixed up and in the wrong order:


Lorelei hugged her legs remained fixed in place, control stolen from her body. So this was it. She was going end up just like all the others, she thought as she watched the figure at the other end of the beach walking towards her, slowly closing the distance. She felt gripped with a mixture of fear and desolation.

You may think that reads okay, or you may not. But either way, let's compare it to what happens if we rewrite it to follow the Action >> Reaction Cycle:

There was a figure at the other end of the beach, walking towards her.

Fear gripped Lorelei, stealing control of her body, so all she could do was remain fixed in place, still hugging her legs, watching helplessly as the figure closed the distance between them.  So this was it. She was going to end up just like the others.


In this example the first paragraph is only a single line, but it is an, external, indisputable fact. There's a figure, he's at the other end of the beach, he's walking towards her.


Next we have the Reaction, first the gut (fear gripping her), then the instinct (all she could do was remain fixed in place, watching helplessly, etc), and finally her rational thoughts about the matter (deciding she's about to meet her doom).

Hopefully you'll agree that the second version is much stronger, and  plunges into the story so it feels more real, much more so than the first one.

So if you've got a scene that you feel is somehow lacking immediacy or there's just something not quite right that you can't put your finger on, try hacking it up and rewriting while religiously following the Action >> Reaction Cycle, and you should find some impressive results.

The Novel Factory - Novel writing software

If you've found this article useful, then you might be interested in reading our Novel Writing Roadmap. And if you like that - then you might be tempted to download a free trial of The Novel Factory, which is a software programme we've developed to help writers learn their craft, especially aimed at new writers completing their first novel, but also useful for established novelists in organising their notes, locations, characters and scenes.

If you agree, don't agree or have any other comments on this article, I'd love to hear them. And I'd particularly love to see before and after examples of this technique in action.

The opening of a novel is probably the hardest part - I know it certainly is for me.

Why? Well, read on...

Too much pressure!

The opening lines and chapters of your book have the most pressure heaped on them to be outstanding. This is because if they're not, nobody is ever going to see the rest. Literary agents rarely want more than the first few chapters, and anecdotal evidence says they often won't read past the first few sentences if they're not immediately gripped. So the beginning of the novel absolutely has to be mind-blowing, or you've wasted the last six months, year, decade.

Not warmed up yet

A lot of people take a bit of time to warm up, to get into the flow of things so their prose comes naturally, and skips along at a good pace. Often, the first few pages of writing are clunky, or even rambling. Once the writer finds their mojo though, the words fly from their fingers and onto the page, snappy dialogue, gripping action, all the good stuff.

Wanting to set the scene with too much backstory

A lot of new writers feel that they need to firmly set the scene at the beginning of a book, to let their readers know what's going on and make sure they're aware of the important plot points, where the story is going and why the lead character is acting how they are. Unfortunately, this usually has the effect of making the introduction feel like tedious exposition, where readers would rather get straight into the action.

So what can you do about it?

Start before the start

By this, I mean once you've decided where your story is going to begin, actually start writing from a scene or two earlier than that. These scenes will be cut in the end, but you will write them with full commitment as if they were staying.

By doing this, you can help avoid two of the problems described above.

Firstly, it will give you a chance to warm up and get into the flow of things.

Secondly, you will do all the exposition and backstory that your readers don't need (because they will pick everything up from context anyway, as long as your story telling is good enough).

What about reducing pressure?

Ah, yes. We haven't come up with a solution to that one yet - if anybody has any ideas - please let us know!

Your draft should be in pretty good shape now, and you really are nearing the finish line.

However, eager though you may be to show your masterpiece toagents in order for them to snap it up, you don’t want to rush things and shoot yourself in the foot.

Take another break – at least a week if possible, and then come back for a final fine tuning.

You need to be really ruthless now, seek out clichés, telling instead of showing, lazy description, meandering prose. Cut it out. Cut it down. Look for inconsistencies and iron them out.

Here are a few more areas you can fine tune:

 

Dialogue Mechanics

Dialogue is important. It brings the reader into the moment, it feels alive and happening. When is the first dialogue on your story? If it’s not in the first few pages, you could consider moving it forward.

Many new writers overuse replacements to the word said, resulting in something like this:

“You look depressed.” observed Jennifer.

“I am,” answered Barry.

 “You should just cheer up,” concluded Jennifer.

“Whatever,” grumbled Barry.

These colourful replacements border on the cardinal sin of telling not showing, and are obtrusive, dulling the pace.

Instead of relying on words like this, use description of the action to keep things moving and keep the reader right in the action. Also, don’t forget that ‘said’ tends to be invisible to readers when they’re in the flow (unless there are really a lot in a row), and often you don’t need anything to describe who’s speaking, as it ought to be obvious from context.

“You look depressed,” said Jennifer.

Barry picked at his nails and sighed.  “I am.”

“You should just cheer up,” Jennifer put a bright look on her face.

“Whatever.”

 

Paragraphing

You may think that paragraphing is not really a central part of writing. Words and sentences, that’s real writing – paragraphing is what happens inbetween.

Well, how dense or open your prose is will make a big difference to how pacy it feels and whether your reader feels like they’re wading through or skipping along.

When you scan over your work, is most of the page filled with words? If so, it may benefit from more whitespace, giving your story space to breathe. Shortening paragraphs is an extremely effective way to tweak the pace and atmosphere of your novel.

 

Don’t labour the point

This means don’t repeat yourself, and don’t keep trying to get the same point across in too many different ways. One well thought out way will be stronger on its own than several obvious or weak ways.

For example.

Celine eyed the bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon on the shelf and her mouth watered. She loved red wine. It was the colour, like liquid rubies, and the sharp delicious taste. Her desire for it ached. The way it warmed the back of her throat. She loved it so much. Her fingers twitched towards it.

In this example we are told three times that she loves wine, and by the last time you just want to scream ‘Yes, I know!’

It’s much stronger with the second two removed:

Celine eyed the bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon on the shelf and her mouth watered. She loved red wine. It was the colour, like liquid rubies, and the sharp delicious taste. The way it warmed the back of her throat. Her fingers twitched towards it.

However, if you want the prose to be really tight, we shouldn’t be telling at all and in fact we can do without any of them, and get the same impression from the description alone:

Celine eyed the bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon on the shelf and her mouth watered. It was the colour, like liquid rubies, and the sharp delicious taste. The way it warmed the back of her throat. Her fingers twitched towards it.

You've done it! You've written your novel! Congratulations, you are now a member of a relatively elite club. So now your adoring audiences will be beating down your door to buy your novel and make you rich.

Or... you can go to Step 15. Submitting your novel to an agent.

The Novel Formula - A Novel Writing Method: Step Eight

Head Scenes and Tail Scenes

Now we're really going to get into the nitty-gritty technics of writing a plot that is compelling, while feeling natural and balanced to the reader.

And we're going to do it with the cunning use of Head and Tail scenes. This method is based on Dwight Swain's 'scenes' and 'sequels'.

Roughly speaking, Head scenes are where your character is being active, doing stuff, hopefully getting into trouble, getting into people's faces, that sort of thing. But a character can't do that relentlessly throughout the whole book or both they and the reader will be exhausted, not to mention they're unlikely to develop much as characters.

So, inbetween Head scenes you have Tail scenes, which are where your character pauses to take stock, reflect, regroup and plan their next move.

Now, it doesn't have to be 50/50. The balance decides what sort of story you have. If it's 80% Head scenes, you've got a fast-paced, action type story. If it's 80% Tail scenes, it's a more reflective, thoughtful story.

As a general rule, Head scenes should be immediate, happening right here and now, with the action described in detail. Whereas, in tail scenes it's possible to compress time more, even skipping over weeks, months or even years in a few sentences or pages.

Head Scenes

Head scenes can be broken down into three parts:

• Goal
• Conflict
• Disaster

At the beginning of a Head scene, your character should have some kind of goal, something they want to achieve. Otherwise it's possible for them to spend the whole scene mooching about, and very few people want to read about that.

So your character should go for their goal and get it, right? Wrong. Boring. You're character should go for their goal and -bam!  Conflict. Something stops them achieving their goal. Now your reader is interested. They want to know if the character is going to overcome this obstacle to achieve their goal. If you're good, you'll come up with a series of mounting obstacles. Then...

Disaster! Not only does your character not achieve their goal, but they're in a much worse situation than before. After all that excitement, they're spent. In fact, the disaster was so great, they may even be locked up. It's time for a Tail scene.

Tail Scenes

Tail scenes can also be broken down into three parts:

• Reaction
• Dilemma
• Decision

The first bit is their reaction to the disaster. It should be an emotional reaction rather than an active one (we'll get to the active one later). Are they furious? Despairing? They've been through a lot, they ought to be feeling something.

Once the emotions have had a chance to settle, they're going to start assessing the situation. What are they going to do next? They should have at least two options, though they may have more. At a most basic level, the two options are sit there and do nothing, or take action. Ideally, there will be no good options. Having good options makes things too easy, and readers don't want to read about someone waltzing through the story easily - they want to see them struggle and strive, so they can root for them, and genuinely worry that they'll the thwarted.

Having weighed up all the options, the character settles on one of the options. The least bad one. Though it's risky, it's worth it, in order to stick to their principles. Now they've got a goal, and the cycle is ready to turn once more.

And repeat

By applying this pattern skilfully to all of your scenes, your story will keep gaining momentum and will feel balanced and real to the reader. You'll avoid having a character that seems to just leap to conclusions out of nowhere, or meandering scenes with no direction.

Of course, you may really need a scene where your character sets out to do something, and achieves it, or something similar which doesn't fit into the structure above. That's fine - you can insert Supporting scenes in where you need them. Just try to avoid having too many of them, or you may find that your story has lost the plot.

Next step: 9a. Settings Part One: mood, atmosphere, character development and foreshadowing

The Novel Formula - A Novel Writing Method: Step Six

Extended Synopsis

It's time to expand on your short synopsis. This is a really fun time, because you can let your imagination loose and start adding the detail that will make your story delicious and compelling.

Take your short synopsis and expand it into about four or five pages - but don't worry about being too dogmatic, give yourself a free rein. If it turns out to be ten pages, so be it.

The combination of your short synopsis and character synopses mean you'll probably be bursting with ideas, and getting new ones faster than you can get them down - but these ideas can be fitted into a robust structure, rather than just being an incoherent spaghetti mess.

You'll probably find that you need to keep going back and making small adjustments as you realise this or that needs to have happened, been foreshadowed or mentioned, in order for something later to work.

Having this high level overview but beginning to work the character and story threads together, and seeing the scenes unfold allows you to spot plot holes and inconsistencies early, and iron them our before you've written ten chapters that will all need binning because of the flaw.

This synopsis will not only give you a great grounding for writing a great story with the minimum rambling and wasted effort, but is also what publishers will be asking you for when you want to submit your novel. It's likely to be the deal maker or breaker, before they even read the first line of your manuscript - so you want to make sure it doesn't let you down!

Click here for the next step - full character questionnaires.

A good first line does not a good novel make, but a bad opening could kill a great novel before it's had a chance.

So what makes a good first line?

There are a few key points:

Change - if this is a day like any other, why are you writing about it? All stories are about change, so if you want to get your reader hooked right away, get straight into it!

Question - you need your reader wanting more. If you can make your first line raise questions that they cannot live without knowing the answer to, you can be pretty sure they'll keep reading. Of course, what constitutes a gripping question will vary depending on your readership. A computer geek is unlikely to care if the question is the heroine wondering how she'll ever find love - equally, a romance buff cares little why the Republic of Somewhere Alien is about to implode.

Surprise - for extra flavour and style, if you can surprise your reader in so few words, with something unexpected or out of the ordinary, they will want to read on to explain the mystery.

Some examples of awesome opening lines:

It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
George Orwell, 1984

Mira was hiding in the ladies' room.
Fay Weldon, The Women's Room


My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973.
Alice Sebold, The Lovely Bones


We slept in what had once been the gymnasium.
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale
 

Think about which of the key points above each of these meet. It's a great exercise to randomly pick books off your shelf and read their first lines.

Like writing? Like software? check out the features of the Novel Factory.

On a basic level, there are two kinds of pace. On a small scale, there's the pace of a particular paragraph. This is the pace controlled by things like the sentence length and individual word choices. On the larger scale there is story pace. This is controlled more by the balance of different types of prose sections in the larger story structure.

Let's start with the big picture

Story pacing

Direct Action vs. Summary

A key indicator is the balance of direct action prose and summary prose. Direct action tends to be at faster pace than summary even though, on a word for word basis, much less happens.

Direct action is where the reader is with a character and seeing the world through that characters eyes. Something happens, the character reacts. Something else happens, the character reacts. A continuous thread of cause and effect moving the story forward. Dialog is pretty much always direct action, and therefore will almost increase the pace of a section.

Summary sections involve the abstract description of events that the reader doesn't get to witness first hand. This is the place where characters reflect on past experiences, wonder about the future and go through events that are too long or unimportant to be shown in full. Months and years can pass in a single sentence. You can cross the sea, travel to a distant star or just sit on the bed and worry about your mortgage. Whatever is happening, the reader is not there in the moment and so it can feel slower.

Changes of direction

Changes of direction increase the pace. Each zig or zag, where new information takes the character in a new direction is like a pulse beat. If they come close together the heart beats faster, the feeling of pace is increased.

A slow, moody story may contain no abrupt changes of direction. Atmosphere built slowly over a number of seemingly straightforward events can be used to slowly bring the narrative round like a ocean liner changing heading. Inevitable change can be very powerful. Watching the ship turn, painfully slowly, never knowing if it will be enough to avoid the rocks.

A thriller may change direction like a wasp trapped in a box. Quick! To the university! Oh, no! It's a red herring! Quick! To the beach house! Oh, wait! A double cross! Quick! To the morgue! The mad-dash approach keeps the reader hooked by constantly wondering "What can possibly happen next?!" Of course, it's easy to overdo this and end up leaving the reader confused and lost.


Prose Pacing

The pace within a section of prose is controlled by the words and sentences you choose. It's possible to make scenes full of action and mayhem feel slow and tedious and moments of quiet reflection feel rushed and thin.

Description vs. Action

As a general rule, the more description and related information that a section of prose contains, the slower it will read. Long detailed descriptions of the window frames, curtains and sideboard or wordy asides about the choice of carpet all take up words that could be used to have something actually happening.

Sentence Length

It is often the case that short, sharp sentences read faster than longer sentences. This is not to say that fast sections of prose should contain exclusively short sentences nor that slower sections should only contain long sentences. It is just that a tendency towards the shorter, on average, has the effect of speeding up the section.

Word use

Fast paced writing requires simple words. Quick, easy to read words. Obvious words. Slower sections of prose can linger on big and clever words but unusual words, like opprobrium, tend to trip up a reader who is moving quickly. Tripping up can slow you down.


So which is better, fast pace or slow pace? Well - that depends on your story. It usually a good idea to carefully vary your pacing depending on the section of the story you're working on. Some stories are very faced paced throughout, others are slower with sharp rushes of action.
A story that is always slow paced throughout may become dull, but pace is relative. Even small variations in pacing can be enough to keep a leviathan of a story flowing along.