Elements of a Story:

Elements Define the following terms How is this element achieved in narrative writing?
Setting

Characters

Plot

Conflict
World building tips: Writing engaging settings

World building tips often focus on fantastical genres such as fantasy and sci-fi because they entail creating worlds wholly other to our own. Yet
it’s important to create immersive, interesting and credible setting, whatever your genre. To create an entire fictional world, one to rival Westeros,
Hogwarts (or Dickens’ London), read these world building tips and cautions:

1: Make a checklist of world building details you want to include

We believe in our favourite authors’ invented worlds because there is enough detail and specificity to make them real. Legions of younger and
older readers fell in love with Rowling’s Hogwarts, for example, because (in part) they could imagine her setting to its edges. Readers could
picture the castle from the long tables and floating candles of its dining hall to its outer, more dangerous limits. The nearby ‘Forbidden Forest’, for
example, or the menacing vegetation and grounds feature that is the unpredictable, thrashing ‘Whomping Willow’.

Great fictional worlds, like this one, have contrasts, details, atmospheres. The vaults of Rowling’s crypt-like bank, Gringotts, for example, have a
different tone and mood to her student-filled castle.

Make a checklist of details you want to include in your novel’s world, whether you’re evoking a magical setting like Hogwarts or a real one like
modern-day Paris.
 Items you can include in your checklist:

 Crucial micro locations where action takes place (e.g. a central character’s home or dorm) and broader macro locations (cities, countries, continents)
 Names and features of towns or cities your story will span
 The peoples/demographics that inhabit your world (is everyone human? Are there tensions between groups? If yes, why?)
 The social and cultural features of your world (for example, Rowling gives her wizard community shared sporting events (The Quidditch World Cup) and other shared
cultural and social landmarks, such as commonly-known wizard history)
Build a template as you draft that you can add to. As you go, you’ll create a summary of your world and its features. This becomes a handy
document you can refer to when you want to remember world building details you’ve already mentioned.

2: Give your fictional world vivid contrasts

World building tips often stick to making your world believable. Yet believable is not the same as homogeneous or ‘samey’. Every world
(including our own) has contrasts, too. There are many cities where rich and poor live in radically different circumstances, separated by only a
highway, for example.

Think about the contrasts you might create in your fictional world. What contrasts would serve your narrative? Take an imaginary novel about a
young girl who opposes an authoritarian government, for example. The side of the highway she comes from will determine, to some extent, her
means for struggle and resistance, her backstory.

Tolkien’s Middle-earth, the setting of The Hobbit as well as his The Lord of the Rings books, gives us examples of how effective contrast is in
world building. The Hobbits’ homeland, the Shire, is a world of local homeliness. Compare this to Tolkien’s un-homely Mordor, where sulfurous
pits and jagged peaks threaten unwary travelers.
The contrasts in Tolkien’s world create additional obstacles for characters as they progress from the ‘safe zone’ of the Shire to Mordor. The
closer they get to Mordor’s corrupt world, the more corruptible members of Frodo and Gandalf’s party become, too, resulting in small betrayals.

Contrasting zones in world building thus serve useful dramatic purposes, whatever your genre. In a romance novel, for example, lovers on an
exotic vacation might find an idyllic world that helps them bond. Alternatively, they might have a holiday from hell. Neither speaks the local
language, and everything goes wrong. In this version, their humour and mutual reliance could have the same bonding effect. Or the situation
could add tension, driving their relationship to a rocky place.
As you build your world, think how you can make its contrasts impact on the development of your characters and their relationships.
 3: Brainstorm convincing names for your world’s settings
A great name conveys the mood of a place. Tolkien’s world is full of names that convey the tone and mood of the places they describe. ‘The
Shire’ has a soft assonance, fitting a world of green pastures. It has echoes of ‘Ireland’ or many a British rural town. Mordor, by contrast, is
guttural sounding, using Germanic or Norse-sounding roots. It fits this part of Tolkien’s world’s more Gothic, sombre mood.

The fantasy novels of Sir Terry Pratchett yield great examples of compelling place names. For example, the name of his inventive world
(‘Discworld’) in his famous series literally describes the world’s physical features. It resembles the ‘flat Earth’ people once used to describe our
own world. Yet it is quirkier than this: Discworld is also balanced on the backs of four elephants which in turn stand on the back of a giant turtle,
the Great A’Tuin. Thus Pratchett gives a literal name to a setting that is absurd and imaginative. It’s this combining of the mundane and literal
with the wildly imaginative that gives many of his novels their sly, satirical humour.

When you brainstorm names for places in your world building, think about:

 Purpose: What is purpose of this setting? For example, Rowling calls the magical London high street in the Harry Potter books ‘Diagon Alley’. This echoes with ‘diagonally’.
It’s a good name for a street that exists just slant to the average ‘muggle’ (non magical person’s) world.
 Mood: What is your place’s mood? Think about the Tolkien examples above and how the sounds of the words themselves feel apt for the place. A place name can contrast
with its mood, too. For example, a rural town called ‘Little Kenton’ could have a quaint sounding name but in reality hide a terrifying paranormal activity. In this instance,
the name adds to the sense of the unexpected
4: Avoid focusing exclusively on large-scale details
It’s all very well to create a world where a nefarious government holds sway (like Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four). Yet if you only create a sense
of the broader social and historical forces at work in your story, the lack of detail might make your characters seem like disembodied heads
floating through a void.
Remember to include small-scale details about your world and its ways, where relevant to the story. Think about what characters in the different
locations of your story wear and eat. How do their speech patterns, slang, or cultural customs differ? [Our guide to writing real characters will
help you create convincing character development and backstory. Get it here.] A naval town will likely feature seafood strongly on the menu. It’s
small details like these that reveal a world to readers as somewhere lived in and true.
5: Use the senses to show your world through characters’ eyes
One way to bring your fictional world to life and ensure that readers connect with it and imagine it clearly is to use sense description. Simply
describing what a character sees, to start with, can bring a larger setting to life.
Take, for example, David Mitchell’s protagonist Eiji Miyake, in his 2001 novel Number9dream (which was nominated for the Booker Prize). The
character is a boy who comes to Tokyo to search for his father. Here, Mitchell’s protagonist describes the view from a local Cafe, and the broader
Tokyo cityscape:
‘Tokyo is so up close you cannot always see it. No distances. Everything is over your head – dentists, kindergartens, dance studios. Even the
roads and walkways are up on murky stilts. Venice with the water drained away.’

The description effectively shows us defining features of the inner city – it’s closeness, claustrophobia and height. This sense of multiple levels is
also important for Mitchell’s world buidling. We will later see his protagonist stumble across different levels in the city, from the ‘above ground’
world of love interests and missing fathers to the dangerous mob-ridden underworld of Tokyo that Eiji is eventually drawn into on his quest.

Later, Mitchell uses other senses – sound, smell – to deepen his world. Here, for example, he describes the same scene after a typhoon:

‘One hour later and the Kita Street/Omekaido Avenue intersection is a churning confluence of lawless rivers. The rain is incredible. Even on
Yakushima, we never get rain this heavy. The holiday atmosphere has died, and the customers are doom-laden… Outside […] a family of six
huddles on a taxi roof. A baby wails and will not shut up.’

As Mitchell progresses through the story, he paints a clear sense of his character’s world by describing its changing moods, atmospheres, and
weathers.
Want to create a more compelling world for your novel? Join Now Novel and use the Idea Finder to flesh our your story’s settings and moods
Character Traits: are descriptive adjectives that tell us specific qualities of a character

• ambitious
• honest • excited • unselfish • humble
• able
• light-hearted • studious • bright • self-confident • friendly
• quiet
• leader • inventive • courageous • respectful • short
• curious
• expert • creative • serious • considerate • adventurous
• reserved
• brave • thrilling • funny • imaginative • hard-working
• pleasing
• conceited • independent • humorous • busy • timid
• bossy
• mischievous • intelligent • sad • patriotic • shy
• witty
• demanding • compassionate • poor • fun-loving • bold
• fighter
• thoughtful • gentle • rich • popular • daring
• tireless
• keen • proud • tall • successful • dainty
• energetic
• happy • wild • athletic • responsible • pitiful
• cheerful
• disagreeable • messy • handsome • lazy • cooperative
• smart
• simple • neat • pretty • dreamer • lovable
• impulsive
• fancy • joyful • selfish • helpful • prim
• loyal
• plain • strong • naive • proper
 FOLK TALE: THE LION, THE JACKAL, AND THE MAN

It so happened one day that Lion and Jackal came together to converse on affairs of land and state. Jackal, let me say, was the most important adviser to the
king of the forest, and after they had spoken about these matters for quite a while, the conversation took a more personal turn.

Lion began to boast and talk big about his strength. Jackal had, perhaps, given him cause for it, because by nature he was a flatterer. But now that Lion began
to assume so many airs, Jackal said, "See here, Lion, I will show you an animal that is still more powerful than you are."

They walked along, Jackal leading the way, and met first a little boy.

"Is this the strong man?" asked Lion.

"No," answered Jackal, "he must still become a man, O king."

After a while they found an old man walking with bowed head and supporting his bent figure with a stick.

"Is this the wonderful strong man?" asked Lion.

"Not yet, O king," was Jackal's answer, "he has been a man."

Continuing their walk a short distance farther, they came across a young hunter, in the prime of youth, and accompanied by some of his dogs.

"There you have him now, O king," said Jackal. "Pit your strength against his, and if you win, then truly you are the strength of the earth."

Then Jackal made tracks to one side toward a little rocky kopje from which he would be able to see the meeting.

Growling, growling, Lion strode forward to meet the man, but when he came close the dogs beset him. He, however, paid but little attention to the dogs,
pushed and separated them on all sides with a few sweeps of his front paws. They bowled aloud, beating a hasty retreat toward the man.

Thereupon the man fired a charge of shot, biting him behind the shoulder, but even to this Lion paid but little attention. Thereupon the hunter pulled out his
steel knife, and gave him a few good jabs. Lion retreated, followed by the flying bullets of the hunter.

"Well, are you strongest now?" was Jackal's first question when Lion arrived at his side.

"No, Jackal," answered Lion, "let that fellow there keep the name and welcome. Such as he I have never before seen. In the first place he had about ten of his
bodyguard storm me. I really did not bother myself much about them, but when I attempted to turn him to chaff, he spat and blew fire at me, mostly into my
face, that burned just a little but not very badly. And when I again endeavoured to pull him to the ground he jerked out from his body one of his ribs with which
he gave me some very ugly wounds, so bad that I had to make chips fly, and as a parting he sent some warm bullets after me. No, Jackal, give him the
name."
Narrative Choices:
 how writers choose a particular viewpoint and voice for effect
 how to sequence text for effect
Narrative Viewpoint and Voice
 When we read, we “see” images in our mind and “hear” a voice in our heads.
 Writers can choose whose “eyes” we see through and whose “voice” we hear telling the story.
Writers can choose….
 First person narrative or third person narrative
 Past tense or present tense
 Writers can tell a story in the order in which events happen, through flashback to events that happened earlier, from one
viewpoint or more than one

Examples:
 Standing in the doorway, hands in pockets, he looked surprisingly relaxed. The storm raged around him but he hardly seemed to notice.
A warm orange light spilled from one of the windows.
 I watched the helicopter whirl away, buffeted by the storm. My ears rushed with the roar of water. I felt alone and afraid: how would I
survive?
 What are the differences between the two different viewpoints?

 Do their ‘voices’ sound the same or different?

 Which viewpoint is most effective for telling this story?

Dual narrative: More than one person is telling the story. The different narrators might see the same event in different ways
Match these terms:
Narrative voice story told using ‘he’, ‘she’- not directly involved
First person moves back in time to tell about something that happened before
Third person story told using “I”- directly involved
Flashbacks ‘eyes’ and ‘voice’ through which the story is told
Narrative viewpoint more than one person telling the story
Dual narrative how the speaker of the story sounds

10 Ways to Launch Strong Scenes

By: Jordan E. Rosenfeld | October 11, 2011
330

Any story or novel is, in essence, a series of scenes strung together like beads on a wire, with narrative summary adding texture and color between. A work of fiction will
comprise many scenes, and each one of these individual scenes must be built with a structure most easily described as having a beginning, middle and end. The beginning of
each scene is what we’ll address here.

The word beginning is a bit misleading, since some scenes pick up in the middle of action or continue where others left off, so I prefer the term launch, which more clearly
suggests the place where the reader’s attention is engaged anew.

Visually, in a manuscript a new scene is usually signified by the start of a chapter, by a break of four lines (called a soft hiatus) between the last paragraph of one scene and the
first paragraph of the next one, or sometimes by a symbol such as an asterisk, to let the reader know that time has passed.

Each new scene still has a responsibility to the idea or plot you started with, and that is to communicate your idea in a way that is vivifying for the reader and that provides an
experience, not a lecture. Scene launches, therefore, pave the way for all the robust consequences of the idea or plot to unfurl. Each scene launch is a reintroduction, capturing
your reader’s attention all over again. Start each scene by asking yourself two key questions:

 Where are my characters in the plot? Where did I leave them and what are they doing now?
 What is the most important piece of information that needs to be revealed in this scene?

Only you and the course of your narrative can decide which kinds of launches will work best for each scene, and choosing the right launch often takes some experimentation.
Here we’ll cover 10 key techniques for launching scenes in three main ways: with action, narrative summary or setting.

ACTION LAUNCHES
The sooner you start the action in a scene, the more momentum it has to carry the reader forward. If you find yourself explaining an action, then you’re not demonstrating the
action any longer; you’re floating in a distant star system known as Nebulous Intellectulus—more commonly known as your head—and so is the reader.
Keep in mind the key elements of action: time and momentum. It takes time to plan a murder over late-night whispers; to cause an embarrassing scene by drunkenly dropping
a jar at the grocery; to blackmail a betraying spouse; or to haul off and kick a wall in anger. These things don’t happen spontaneously, they happen over a period of time. They
are sometimes quick, sometimes slow, but once started, they unfold until finished.
The key to creating strong momentum is to start an action without explaining anything:
Albert leads them all into the dining room and everyone drifts around the large teak table, studying the busily constructed salads at each place setting—salads, which, with
their knobs of cheese, jutting chives and little folios of frisée, resemble small Easter hats.

“Do we wear these or eat them?” asks Jack. In his mouth is a piece of gray chewing gum like a rat’s brain.

Lorrie Moore plunges her reader into the above scene in the story “Beautiful Grade.” Although the action is quiet, there is physical movement and a sense of real time. The lack
of explanation for what is happening forces the reader to press on to learn more. The action gives clues to the reader: The characters are led into a room full of wildly
decorated salads that one character is uncertain whether he should eat or wear, which gives a sense of the environment—probably chic. We get a feeling for Jack—he’s got a
good sense of humor. Clearly something more is going to happen in this environment, and judging from the tone of the paragraph, we can probably expect irony and humor.

Action launches tend to energize the reader’s physical senses. To create an action launch:

1. GET STRAIGHT TO THE ACTION. Don’t drag your feet here. “Jimmy jumped off the cliff” rather than “Jimmy stared at the water, imagining how cold it would feel when he
jumped.”

2. HOOK THE READER WITH BIG OR SURPRISING ACTIONS. An outburst, car crash, violent heart attack or public fight at the launch of a scene allows for more possibilities
within it.

3. BE SURE THAT THE ACTION IS TRUE TO YOUR CHARACTER. Don’t have a shy character choose to become suddenly uninhibited at the launch of a scene. Do have a bossy
character belittle another character in a way that creates conflict.

4. ACT FIRST, THINK LATER. If a character is going to think in your action opening, let the action come first, as in, “Elizabeth slapped the Prince. When his face turned pink,
horror filled her. What have I done? she thought.”

NARRATIVE LAUNCHES
Writers often try to include narrative summary, such as descriptions of the history of a place or the backstory of characters, right at the launch of a scene, believing that the
reader will not be patient enough to allow actions and dialogue to tell the story. In large doses, narrative summaries are to scenes what voice-overs are to movies—distractions
and interruptions.

Yet a scene launch is actually one of the easier places to use a judicious amount of narrative summary, so long as you don’t keep the reader captive too long. Take the opening
of this scene in Amanda Eyre Ward’s novel How to Be Lost:

The afternoon before, I planned how I would tell her. I would begin with my age and maturity, allude to a new lover, and finish with a bouquet of promises: grandchildren,
handwritten letters, boxes from Tiffany sent in time to beat the rush. I sat in my apartment drinking Scotch and planning the words.

The above bit is almost entirely narrative summary, and the only action—drinking Scotch—is described, not demonstrated. There is no real setting, and the only visual cues the
reader has are vague and abstract. However, the narrative summary does demonstrate the nature of the character, Caroline—she feels she must butter her mother up, bribe
her even, in order to ask for something she needs, which turns out to be a relatively small thing. It reflects Caroline’s tendency to live in her head, and shows us she’s the kind
of person who must prepare herself mentally for difficult things—a theme that recurs throughout the book. It’s also useful because Caroline spends a lot of time by herself,
cutting herself off from her relationships, and, therefore, it is very true to her personality. In just one short paragraph of narrative summary, the reader learns a lot about
Caroline, and Ward gets to action in the next paragraph:

Georgette stretched lazily on the balcony. Below, an ambulance wailed. A man with a shopping cart stood underneath my apartment building, eating chicken wings and
whistling.
If the entire scene had continued in narrative summary, it would have had a sedative effect on the reader, and the scene’s momentum would have been lost.

A narrative approach is best used with the following launch strategies:

5. SAVE TIME BY BEGINNING WITH SUMMARY. Sometimes actions will simply take up more time and space in the scene than you would like. A scene beginning needs to move
fairly quickly and, on occasion, summary will get the reader there faster.

6. COMMUNICATE NECESSARY INFORMATION TO THE READER BEFORE THE ACTION KICKS IN.Sometimes information needs to be imparted simply in order to set action in
motion later in the scene. Opening sentences such as, “My mother was dead before I arrived,” “The war had begun” and, “The storm left half of the city underwater,” could
easily lead to action.

7. REVEAL A CHARACTER’S THOUGHTS OR INTENTIONS THAT CANNOT BE SHOWN THROUGH ACTION.Coma victims, elderly characters, small children and other
characters sometimes cannot speak or act for physical, mental or emotional reasons; therefore the scene may need to launch with narration to let the reader know what they
think and feel.

SETTING LAUNCHES
Sometimes setting details—like a jungle on fire, or moonlight sparkling on a lake—are so important to plot or character development that it’s appropriate to include visual
setting at the launch of a scene. This is often the case in books set in unusual, exotic or challenging locations such as snowy Himalayan mountains, lush islands or brutal
desert climates. If the setting is going to bear dramatically on the characters and the plot, then there is every reason to let it lead into the scene that will follow.

John Fowles’ novel The Magus is set mostly on a Greek island that leaves an indelible imprint on the main character, Nicholas. He becomes involved with an eccentric man
whose isolated villa in the Greek countryside becomes the stage upon which the major drama of the novel unfolds. Therefore, it makes sense for him to launch a scene in this
manner:

It was a Sunday in late May, blue as a bird’s wing. I climbed up the goat-paths to the island’s ridge-back, from where the green froth of the pine-tops rolled two miles down to
the coast. The sea stretched like a silk carpet across to the shadowy wall of mountains on the mainland to the west. … It was an azure world, stupendously pure, and as always
when I stood on the central ridge of the island and saw it before me, I forgot most of my troubles.

The reader needs to be able to see in detail the empty Greek countryside in which Nicholas becomes so isolated. It sets the scene for something beautiful and strange to
happen, and Fowles does not disappoint.
These final three methods can create an effective scenic launch:

8. ENGAGE WITH SPECIFIC VISUAL DETAILS. If your character is deserted on an island, the reader needs to know the lay of the land. Any fruit trees in sight? What color sand?
Are there rocks, shelter or wild, roaming beasts?

9. USE SCENERY TO SET THE TONE OF THE SCENE. Say your scene opens in a jungle where your character is going to face danger; you can describe the scenery in language
that conveys darkness, fear and mystery.

10. REFLECT A CHARACTER’S FEELINGS THROUGH SETTING. Say you have a sad character walking through a residential neighborhood. The descriptions of the homes can
reflect that sadness—houses can be in disrepair, with rotting wood and untended yards. You can use weather in the same way. A bright, powerfully sunny day can reflect a
mood of great cheer in a character.

Scene launches happen so quickly and are so soon forgotten that it’s easy to rush through them, figuring it doesn’t really matter how you get it started. Don’t fall prey to that
thinking. Take your time with each scene launch. Craft it as carefully and strategically as you would any other aspect of your scene. Remember that a scene launch is
an invitation to the reader, beckoning him to come further along with you. Make your invitation as alluring as possible.
 This article was written by Jordan E. Rosenfeld.

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 Setting the Tangible and the Enduring: Writing Southern Fiction
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 Write What You Know: Fiction, Brought to You by Real Life

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