How to write a good story arc?

[Super Fantasy]

Im new at writing story arcs any beginner ideas?

 

[Devor]

So I just use your basic three act structure, but I try to think in four roughly equal parts. The first part is the Home part and ends with the Call to Action. The Fun and Games ends in the Midpoint. The third part is where the hero gets serious ("into the cave" or something), and ends with a false ending. The fourth part is the climax and resolution - usually it begins with the character in turmoil and then moves into the action.

My outline is really rough beyond the part I'm working on. But it's important that I have the part I'm on pretty well understood.

You can google all that, though. What's really important is to understand that your character's Call to Action needs to be... well, deeper. Harder. More conflicting. It's not about "do the thing." It's about the character having to decide "I thought I was this kind of person.... now you're asking me to be a different kind of person than I've ever been." That's why farmer orphans make such compelling heroes - it's impossible, as a writer, to miss this aspect of the story with a farmer orphan hero; the identity crisis is built into the extremes. But a more subtle approach also works. A guard may be a warrior, but not an adventurer. A knight might be an adventurer, but never before a diplomat. That identity crisis is triggered by the Call to Action and makes up a big central core of your book and its appeal. So it's important to understand it.

 

[JBCrowson]

Most readers keep reading because either they have attached to the characters and want to know what happens to them, or the plot has enough hints, twists and turns to engage as a puzzle they want to solve / see the solution to.

Which you go for leads to a character or plot based story. Because most people prefer people to puzzles, character based stories are generally more popular.

As Devor said with a character based story the character growth drives what happens. If that's your choice then start by thinking of a few scenes that can illustrate your character's starting point. These need to lead into the external struggle that will drive the character's need/reason to change.
Next you might write a couple of scenes to show how your character ends up after they've gone through the change. Then you can think about what would it take for my character to move from one to the other. It might need several steps. This then gives you the middle part of the story.
Since few people go through those kind of life and self altering events by themselves you can add in their companions.

Don't know if that makes any sense or helps.

 

[Penpilot]

Reading up on story structure will help you plan out arcs. To get you started off, here's the first of 5 videos describing the 7 point plot structure author Dan Wells uses. It has some nice examples using movies. Other than that read up on the three act structure.

 

[Foxkeyes]

A great book on story structure is Robert Mc Kee's 'Story'.

 

[Super Fantasy]

Does a story require a arc?

 

[Super Fantasy]

Are there other writing styles that I can replace a story arc with?

 

[Devor]

Are there other writing styles that I can replace a story arc with?

Yes, but also kind of no.

The story arc for a mystery or a horror or a romance story might look different, but it's still going to be there. A lengthy book like Game of Thrones might have several different arcs weaving around each other. You could even map out the arc of an isekai light novel, and while the arc may hardly look like a classic arc, it'll still be there, and help you identify where some struggle and others succeed. And the arc in a sequel book might have a different pattern.

I read somewhere that the first book of the Harry Potter series follows the classic structure to a T, except for one extra chapter that helps set up future books. But that there was the extra chapter is worth mentioning. Once you understand arcs and story structure, you can understand how to add to it, fiddle with it, change it, and break it, while keeping your story in tact.

And really, if you're confused about how to begin, then you should start with learning story structure. Even if you end up changing everything, it gives you a language for talking about how your story is laid out.

 

[Super Fantasy]

Is there such thing as a story "Dip"?

 

[Super Fantasy]

Such as a main character that becomes depressed in the middle of the book while the story becomes sad or something of the sort, as if the story took a dip?

 

[JBCrowson]

Such as a main character that becomes depressed in the middle of the book while the story becomes sad or something of the sort, as if the story took a dip?

I think the difficulty with that is that it would be hard to sustain reader interest. Depression is an inherently unpleasant state / experience hence if the whole story really felt like that it would be a miserable read.

 

[Super Fantasy]

What if it was a love novel where the main characters get a divorce or something, or cheats on his or her mate?
Would that still be considered a story arc?

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Yes, if extrapolated. An arc is really just a series of changes. So, a character could begin at Point A and end at Point A and still have a story arc, assuming something happened in between.

 

[JBCrowson]

What if it was a love novel where the main characters get a divorce or something, or cheats on his or her mate?
Would that still be considered a story arc?

Absolutely - the number of stories with a "person meets romantic interest; person screws up with romantic interest (often infidelity); person works on getting back with romantic interest, eventually succeeding" plot is vast.

 

[Penpilot]

Such as a main character that becomes depressed in the middle of the book while the story becomes sad or something of the sort, as if the story took a dip?

Yes, so at the mid-point of the story, there's what's called the midpoint climax. This is either a false victory or a false defeat, a high point or a low point. If you take it down the low point route, it can be a dip. For example, everything is working out in life for our intrepid hero. Everything is coming out Millhouse, then, they lose their job, the wife wants a divorce, and at their lowest, our hero falls into a deep depression. From this point the story is about how the hero regroups, and presses on towards their goals.

This point has an matching opposing point in the story in the third act. If your midpoint is a false defeat, there will be a false victory, where the hero thinks they've won, thinks they've gotten everything they've ever wanted, but then, they realize they haven't, and they have to take everything they've learned over the course of the story and use that to finally really succeed.

 

[Devor]

What if it was a love novel where the main characters get a divorce or something, or cheats on his or her mate?
Would that still be considered a story arc?

Right, so in that case....

The first part of the story, Home to Call to Action, might be life at home leading up to the divorce, while the divorce itself might be the Call to Action ("I have to find a new way to live and be then I ever thought I did before....").

The "Fun and Games" might be the character living in denial, or else trying to binge date, or otherwise experimenting with this new lifestyle, leading to a midpoint where a new partner drops truth bombs and leaves the character drunk and alone, needing to figure things out.

The third part, into the cave, might start with the character having a new resolve ("no dating until I've got the rest of my life in order!"), bunkering down and making progress at work, or getting their home in order, only to have the ex-spouse come back with an event that nearly destroys all that progress ("There's a joint loan I didn't tell you about that I took out while we were married, and since I haven't paid it, the bank will be taking your house....").

The final part begins with the character living in turmoil over this new information, before deciding to remarry the spouse and phone a hitman so that the insurance money will yield that happy resolution.

The End.

 

[Super Fantasy]

What are some examples of very simple story arcs?

 

[Super Fantasy]

I was thinking for my novel,

The main characters meet a royal guard who introduces them to the king and the king requires that they go on a quest.

But I cant think of quest ideas.

 

[Finchbearer]

What are some examples of very simple story arcs?

Cinderella, or any fairytale really. There are other incarnations of Cinderella such as Cap-o-Rushes and Catskin.

Noble born girl ends up in hardship.

Girl does manual work that is beneath her to get by, her beauty hidden.

Girl goes to a courtly event and dances with a Prince (or high-born eligible man).

Prince realises girl is his true love.

Girl stays hidden and doing manual labour.

Event occurs to allow the Prince to find out who she really is.

True love prevails.

This setup is a basic overcoming of hardship. There is a difficulty there that the MC needs to somehow overcome.

 

[Finchbearer]

I was thinking for my novel,

The main characters meet a royal guard who introduces them to the king and the king requires that they go on a quest.

But I cant think of quest ideas.

The problem with the any quest in any story is that it needs to be underpinned by an overarching plot, in my opinion. There needs to be other more important stuff that needs to over shadow the quest. The quest can be a fun area that the writer can play around with fantastical elements and hardships. I see the quest as a way to tell a bigger story.