Surprising Best Tips For Plotting A Novel, A Quiet Place: Day One
Some of the best tips for plotting a novel come to me in the most uncommon situations. This is likely true for many writers. For me, one such tip came as I sat in the first row in a dark theater watching a genre I never choose to watch: horror.
Between the jump scares, tender scenes, and raw humanity taking place on screen, I had a sudden thought. Although the film, A Quiet Place: Day One, came out last month, the thought has stuck with me. In fact, as I sometimes struggle with how to get into the creative mindset, the tip I learned in the dark theater continues to help me get back into that creative headspace.
In this article, I show you the best tips for plotting a novel, including the tip I discovered while watching the recent film, A Quiet Place: Day One. (While this is not a movie review, there will be spoilers!)
Tips for plotting a novel: what you should know
How to properly plot out a novel?
There is no right way to plot a novel, simply the way that works best for you. However, most writers typically fall into two categories: they either plot their novel scene by scene or they have an idea and write the plot out as it comes to them.
The first are called plotters (those who plot) and the second are referred to as pantsers (those who write by the seat of their pants). Many writers fall into a hybrid category, which is simply a mix of the two. There are many writing tips for how to effectively plot your novel. Below are just a few.
The Snowflake Method
People attribute Randy Ingermanson for coming up with the Snowflake Method. This is a more in-depth method than many of the methods out there. To break it down simply, start with a one sentence description of your story (this could be a form of your elevator pitch). From here, move on to write a one paragraph description of your story. You’ll add in character descriptions, a longer synopsis, and so forth.
Eventually, you will break down every bit of your story into your plotting framework. From here, it’s simply writing from your outline until you complete your draft. Because the Snowflake method encapsulates so many details pertaining to your novel, if you like in-depth plotting, give it a try.
The Greyhound Bus Exercise
Jerry Jenkins uses the Greyhound Bus exercise. While this is a bit more of an exercise than a formal plotting method, it’s helped me plot and I highly recommend it.
The Greyhound Bus exercise starts with a bus stopping at an intersection. You, the writer, choose the time of year and where this intersection is located. The exercise begins when the bus’s doors open and a character exits. Jenkins walks writers through a series of questions to help them get to know this character.
Questions include details such as:
Where is this person coming from?
Are they meeting anyone? If so, who?
Are they running from someone?
What are they wearing?
Are they dressed for the weather?
Do they have any luggage?
These questions are intended to get you thinking. I prefer to minimally plot, so these questions work well for me. If I can identify who gets off the bus, where he or she is coming from and where they are headed to, I have the makings of a story.
The 3 Act Story Structure
Some writers work from a more minimalist guide: the 3 Act Story Structure. You likely studied this in school, so I’ll be brief.
This structure focuses on three key elements:
What starts the story?
What is the climax of the story?
What ends the story?
The acts are commonly referred to as the inciting incident, the rising action, and the climax/falling action. Regardless of which plotting method you use, go all in with what’s best for your specific writing style. Some writers plot best following a structured framework. Other writers thrive with minimal guidance.
I tend to fall in the middle. However, as I sat in the intensely quiet theater watching A Quiet Place: Day One, I thought of a new way to plot a novel. I call it the Dichotomy Method.
The Dichotomy Method
John Krasinski’s films, A Quiet Place (2018) and A Quiet Place Part II (2020) drew me in not just as a moviegoer but as a writer, a creative, and as someone deeply invested in creating believable characters.
You could say I fell in love with the films not because of their fantastical or horror elements, but because of the threads of family, love, and sacrifice throughout.
Michael Sarnoski directed the origin story of the series, A Quiet Place: Day One. So while I knew my favorite characters would be absent, I decided to give it a go. I’m so glad I did, because the new setting gave me a fresh idea.
If you haven’t seen it, the film starts with some brief facts about the city. The key point being, New York is so loud that walking its streets is akin to listening to a constant scream. If you followed the movies at all for the last six years, you know the rest. Making noise is a death wish. Only silence is safe.
While sitting in the theater, the thought that suddenly entered my mind was simple, but at least to me, profound: what if New York couldn’t have sound?
This is the dichotomy I mentioned above, and what started me on a new way of coming up with story ideas. Let me walk you through my thought process.
1. What is a theme, setting, or trope you love?
Writers each have different aspects of writing they return to. When you think of Nicholas Sparks, tragic love stories come to mind. Colleen Hoover is known for her romance and psychological thrillers. Victoria Aveyard loves the trope of forced proximity, and shows this by forcing heroes and villains into the same spaces.
What you naturally gravitate toward is part of what helps you take charge of your creative passion. But let’s take it a step further. Pick a theme, setting, or trope you always find yourself coming back to. For sake of example, we will use the setting of New York City.
2. What is your theme, setting, or trope’s antithesis?
To continue drawing from our example, what do you associate with New York City? Many different thoughts likely come to mind.
For me, I think of:
Pizza
Busy crosswalks
Cafes
Broadway
Sore feet
Dingy subways
The sudden quiet of walking indoors
The sweet quiet of Central Park
With the above in mind, what is the opposite of each one? Finish the following sentence: what if New York’s…
Crosswalks were empty?
Cafes didn’t exist?
Broadway shows were free?
Streets were padded?
Subways had first class?
Buildings didn’t exist?
Central Park was more chaotic than its streets?
Now insert your own theme/setting/trope and think through your own answers.
3. What forced the antithesis of your theme/setting/trope to exist?
It’s time to consider the backstory of your theme, setting, or trope. A Quiet Place: Day One spent most of its runtime revealing the origin of why an entire city chose to live in silence. So far, we chose our setting, New York City, and found its opposite by asking, What if…?
What if New York City couldn’t have sound?
Once you settle on your dichotomy, it’s time to answer the question of why with why can’t. Why can’t New York have sound? Aliens, who are ultra-sensitive to noise, descended to earth. If you make a noise, they will find you, and they will kill you (to borrow from Liam Neeson).
But now it’s time to do the same for your own theme, setting, or trope. Answer the following:
What if…?
Why can’t…?
Once you complete these two questions, it’s time for the final one.
4. What happens as a result of this dichotomy?
In A Quiet Place: Day One, New York can’t have sound because aliens kill those who make sound. As a result, an entire city’s lifestyle must change in a matter of hours (or as long as it took for people to discover the correlation between sound and the alien attacks).
For the protagonist, Sam, the method in which she will achieve her primary goal majorly changes. Instead of simply going out to pizza with her fellow hospice patients, she must:
Journey through the wreckage of New York on foot
Stay completely silent in dangerous settings
Accept an unlikely friendship
Imagine pitching this idea to a literary agent. “A hospice patient visits a pizzeria to relive one last memory she had with her father.”
While a heartfelt premise, it lacks tension. Instead, imagine pitching it with a few changes. “After aliens invade New York City, a hospice patient journeys through the wreckage to realize her final wish—but she must do so in complete silence, or else risk an even more premature death.”
One unexpected question made all the difference. What if New York couldn’t have sound?
What makes a good plot in a novel?
Many factors go into making a good plot, but perhaps the most important element is the unexpected one. A Quiet Place is about a family’s daily life…only they must remain completely silent.
Of course, there are various elements that fill the role of unexpected. For example, Pride and Prejudice tells the story of a young woman whose primary purpose is to find security through marriage…only she despises a man of means who professes his love to her.
Then you have the classic Harry Potter. A young orphan spends his growing up years under an abusive aunt and uncle, and then finds out he’s a wizard. Take The Hunger Games. A young adult series about surviving under a dystopian government…only children go to fight, not adults. Tips for plotting a novel come in a variety of ways. Use the best ones for you, and discard the rest.
What are the 5 elements of plot structure?
The standard five elements of plot structure are the exposition, the rising action, the climax, the falling action, and the resolution. As you work your way through each element, be sure to use the above tips for plotting a novel. They will help you avoid redundancy, clichés, and writing in a way where your reader guesses what’s next.
It may help you to ask, “What does my reader expect to happen?” Then write anything but your answer. Don’t forget to use the Dichotomy Method for your climax. This method can help you create unexpected twists for your readers and ensure they stay on the edge of their seats.
How do you plan a novel effectively?
There is no way to guarantee your planning pays off, but doing your best to present a fresh angle helps tremendously. I find that combining known elements and deeply human ones with the unexpected, goes a long way.
A Quiet Place: Day One included aspects we usually expect to find in a Nicholas Sparks novel: fatal illnesses, medication, and the nuanced way individual characters deal with certain death. With these elements at the forefront, you may have expected a movie similar to The Fault In Our Stars.
However, these themes combined with elements of suspense and horror, ones you’d expect from a Stephen King novel. As you move on to your own writing, ask yourself what types of elements you can combine in order to present a fresh take on a common storyline.
Tips for plotting a novel: take your next step
Is creativity a skill? Yes, and it’s a skill that we develop over time. If you dream of writing a book and becoming an author, download my free guide. I created this guide after years of studying under a New York Times bestselling author.
In it, I include many of the tips and tricks I learned over the years. I distill them into actionable steps you can apply to your own writing. Download it today and take your first step to become an author!
