Plot Essentials: Climax

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It's been a while since I've written a plot essentials post, but with the Inciting Incident, Point of No Return, and Darkest Hour/Dark Night of the Soul already covered, I thought it a good time to move on to the next sequential point: the Climax.

The Climax is the moment the entire book has been leading up to: when the protagonist comes head to head with the antagonist or antagonizing force. In Speculative Fiction, this often means the hero coming against the bad guy in some kind of epic showdown; in Romance, it's the Grand Gesture, where the hero or heroine has to overcome their flaw and make up for being a jerk previously. Everything hinges on this moment: will the hero overcome insurmountable odds?

Sticking with examples from the previous posts, here are the climaxes for some popular novels (and, obviously, they contain spoilers, so skip if you haven't read them!):

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (J.K. Rowling): Surprise! Harry isn't dead after all—or at least, not permanently—and now he's back and ready to take on Voldemort once and for all, while the Battle of Hogwarts rages around them. 


• City of Bones (Cassandra Clare): Clary finds Valentine and Jace, who seems to be helping him. Valentine reveals a massive secret: in a Luke and Leia twist, he's Clary and Jace's father and they are—surprise!—siblings. Luke helps Clary fight Valentine off, but will they be able to defeat him and keep the Mortal Cup safe?


• Divergent (Veronica Roth): Tris and simulation-controlled Four come head to head. Tris needs to shut down the simulation to save her friends, but can she do so without killing Four in the process? Or getting killed herself?

The climax, for me, is the most difficult part of writing a book—and it's the part I often dread reaching while first drafting. But with the right set-up and a sequence that gives your protagonist a significant role in the outcome (as in, no one should do the hard work for them), you'll craft a climax that keeps your readers hooked.

What are your favorite climatic scenes from books or movies?

Twitter-sized bite: 

Do you struggle to write your WIP's climax? So does @Ava_Jae—but today she's talking tips and examples. (Click to tweet)

Plot Essentials: The Darkest Hour

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Okay, so maybe that plot point name is a bit dramatic, but to be honest, I can’t remember the official name of this point, and that basically sums it up. So. Anyway. 

The darkest hour is the point in your manuscript where your protagonist has reached his lowest point. This usually comes right before the climax—it’s where all hope seems lost and the worst of the worst has happened and your protagonist doesn’t know how they’re going to overcome their insurmountable odds.

Keeping with our examples from the last plot essentials posts, here are the darkest hours from some popular novels. If you haven’t read any of these, please skip over that particular example, because SPOILERS. You’ve been warned:

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (J.K. Rowling): Harry is dead. Voldemort has finally killed the boy who lived, the Battle of Hogwarts is lost and the wizarding world’s only hope is gone.
  
  Note: I chose the last Harry Potter book rather than the first in the previous examples because this is one of the best darkest hour points that I can think of in literature, period. 


• City of Bones (Cassandra Clare): Valentine has opened up the gates to demons, Jace seems to be cooperating with him and worse—Clary and Jace are siblings and definitely shouldn’t be in love with each other.


• Divergent (Veronica Roth): Tris’s parents are dead, all of her friends are under a simulation that’s turned them into mindless murderers, innocent Abnegation citizens are being killed and now Four has fallen prey to a simulation that has turned him against her. 

The darkest hour is actually one of my favorite plot points to write, because it shows our characters at their lowest point, which really allows us to get a sense of what they have to overcome and makes the eventual victory that much sweeter. Also, I’ve found that how characters (and people) behave when they’re at their lowest really says a lot about their character.

All that said, if you get the darkest hour right, then the ending and victory becomes much stronger and more powerful than it would have been otherwise.

Can you identify the darkest hour in your WIP or favorite book?

Working on a plot for your WIP? Writers @Ava_Jae discusses the importance of the darkest hour. (Click to tweet)  

Do you know your WIP’s darkest hour? Writer @Ava_Jae talks identifying this plot point, with examples. (Click to tweet)

Plot Essentials: The Point of No Return

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It's time for another plot essentials post! Now that we've talked about the inciting incident, it's time to move on to the next major plot point: The Point of No Return.

Whereas the inciting incident kicks the story off that dominos scene after scene into a novel, the point of no return is the moment in the book in which the protagonist must embrace the journey he or she's about to take and move forward, knowing full well that they will never be able to return to their normal life.

Keeping with our examples from the last plot essentials post, here are the points of no return from a couple popular novels:

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (J.K. Rowling): There seems to be some debate online on the PoNR, but I tend to agree with the most popular answer—when Harry boards the Hogwarts Express for the first time. Up until the point, he could have hypothetically returned to Privet Drive and continued to live as he did—but after boarding the Hogwarts Express, there's no turning back. He's on his way to wizarding school, where he'll start on a new phase of his life. 


• City of Bones (Cassandra Clare): When Clary's mother is abducted and Clary herself is attacked by a demon, her life irrevocably changes. She can't go on as a normal teenager—her mother is missing, her life is in danger and she can no longer deny that the things she's been seeing (the demons and Shadowhunters) are indeed real. 


• Divergent (Veronica Roth): When Tris chooses to become Dauntless, she can't go back. She's made a decision that has altered the course of her life—she can't change her mind and go back to Abnegation, and even if she fails Dauntless initiation, there's no returning home. 

Similarly to the inciting incident, the PoNR isn't a plot point you should skip, either. Of course, I wouldn't list it as a plot essential if including it wasn't important. :)

Can you identify the point of no return in your WIP or favorite book? 

Twitter-sized bites: 

Working on a plot for your WIP? Writer @Ava_Jae discusses the importance of the point of no return. (Click to tweet)  

Do you know your WIP's point of no return? Writer @Ava_Jae talks identifying this plot point, with examples. (Click to tweet)

Plot Essentials: Inciting Incident

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As over the years I’ve become a definite plotter, I thought now was as good a time as ever to write about some plot essentials, starting with my favorite: the inciting incident.

The inciting incident is the moment or event that changes your character’s life and sets them on the journey that is the rest of the book. It’s when Harry begins receiving acceptance letters to Hogwarts, when Clary sees the Shadowhunters kill a demon in a club, and when Tris’s faction test results are inconclusive, making her divergent.

The reason I love the inciting incident so much is two-fold—firstly, it’s the very first thing I figure out when plotting. Usually the inciting incident is where my story idea comes from—it’s the spark that sets off the rest of the brainstorming that uncovers the rest of the book. Second, the inciting incident is the first real taste of what to expect from the rest of the book.

The inciting incident is, by no means, an optional plot point. Without a life-altering event to catapult our characters in one direction or another, there isn’t a story. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look at the examples above.

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (J.K. Rowling): If Harry was never accepted into Hogwarts, he would have continued to live in the cupboard under the stairs at Privet Drive, hidden from the rest of the world, in a rather boring, depressing life. Hogwarts-free Harry, as it turns out, isn’t really epic seven-book series fodder. 


• City of Bones (Cassandra Clare): Had Clary never seen the Shadowhunters, she never would have begun to question the reality she knew, nor would she have encountered the hidden, paranormal world of Shadowhunters and angels and demons and werewolves and vampires and mages and all of that exciting stuff that makes The Mortal Instruments series so interesting. 


• Divergent (Veronica Roth): Had Tris’s test shown expected results (that is, that she belongs in Abnegation, or another single faction), she would have chosen a faction and lived a normal life in whatever faction she chose. The end. 

As you can see, without their respective inciting incidents, the above stories aren’t really novel-worthy stories. But with the incident that changes the protagonist’s life comes the fascinating stories that we all love and adore. And that’s the power of the inciting incident.

What examples of inciting incidents can you think of from your favorite books, movies or TV shows? 

Twitter-sized bites: 

Working on a plot for your WIP? Writer @Ava_Jae discusses the importance of the inciting incident. (Click to tweet) 

Do you know your WIP's inciting incident? Here's why it's so important to identify early on. (Click to tweet)