Regular consumers of story, either written or film, learn to recognize the patterns that come with the rise and fall of action. Story structure models help to provide reasoning and some mathematics to what the readers know by instinct. However, many story structure models focus on the protagonist of the story. The antagonist is often treated as an afterthought or ignored completely. As such, the dynamic interplay between the protagonist and the antagonist is not leveraged to its full potential.
The Mohr Story Structure model is a model of my own devising that incorporates the antagonist and focuses on their role within story structure. This spreadsheet outlines the act structure and the beats related to the Mohr Story Structure model.
For a full discussion about the Mohr Story Structure model, refer to my book Antagonistic Beats of a Story: Understanding the Role of the Antagonist in Story Structure.
Regular consumers of story, either written or film, learn to recognize the patterns that come with the rise and fall of action. Story structure models help to provide reasoning and some mathematics to what the readers know by instinct. However, many story structure models focus on the protagonist of the story. The antagonist is often treated as an afterthought or ignored completely. As such, the dynamic interplay between the protagonist and the antagonist is not leveraged to its full potential.
The Mohr Story Structure model is a model of my own devising that incorporates the antagonist and focuses on their role within story structure. This spreadsheet outlines the act structure and the beats related to the Mohr Story Structure model.
For a full discussion about the Mohr Story Structure model, refer to my book Antagonistic Beats of a Story: Understanding the Role of the Antagonist in Story Structure.
Charts that describe the Mohr Story Structure were included in the book Antagonistic Beats of a Story: Understanding the Role of the Antagonist in Story Structure. This document is a reprint of those graphics, so readers can see those charts in more detail (beyond what they could see on their eReaders).
As writers, we follow a story structure with the instinct of knowing where the rise and fall in the action needs to be. However, when something is off in the pacing of a story, that’s when all the discussions come out about one of countless number of models for story structure and the analytical tools associated with it.
However, for some writers, fully plotting out a novel kills the joy in writing that novel. So, finding the balance between plotting and pantsing is important. (And for those who don’t know, pantsing is another term for discovery writing, where you write whatever comes to your mind, with no plan of how to move forward.)
When working through the story structure for a story, there are certain beat points that will help progress the story from start to finish. They are decision points where the main character reacts to events going on around them, driving the plot in a particular direction based on the choices they make.
This guide targets these key decision-making points within a manuscript. Working through this worksheet, you will not have a fully plotted out novel, but you will hopefully have a better understanding of certain scenes, helping you to identify the core beat points for your story.
If you would like to learn more about story structure, be sure to check out my book Antagonistic Beats of a Story: Understanding the Role of the Antagonist in Story Structure.
Stories that use deep point-of-view (POV) have become highly sought after, because the deeper perspectives allow readers to fully immerse themselves into a story. But understanding how deep POV works takes more than just showing how the character reacts to something. To truly use a deep perspective, you need to show readers how that character thinks.
The exercises in this worksheet are designed to help you get inside the head of various characters all looking at the same scene. Each character will focus on different elements, because different elements will be important to that character. Take the time to work through each exercise in turn, and start to develop an understanding of how deeper perspectives work.
