Your Guide to Writing the Perfect Story

Finding the Plot

Plot is the essence of your story. Without plot, you have no story — period. Before you start writing, you need to discover what your story is about. There is your main plot and then many sub-plots in addition to it. For instance, I'm going to take a common known story. The plot of "The Hunger Games" is that Katniss must fight in a battle to the death against twenty-three other tributes. A sub-plot is her gradually falling in love with Peeta. 

The sub-plot should be connected to the story and often changes it or creates a new problem. Katniss and Peeta being in love creates a new conflict because they can't both live in the end. It changes the ending because if Katniss and Peeta had not been in love, they probably wouldn't have helped each other out and one, or both, of them would have died. Katniss never would have become the symbol of the rebellion and the Hunger Games may never have ended.

Sub-plots are important! Why? They often speed up character development and change the outcome of the story. Without them, the hero's journey is predictable and, therefore, boring. By creating many different sub-plots, you will keep your readers turning the pages. Don't think that just when you have found the point of your story, it's an easy road from there. Be creative!

How can I do this, you may ask. It isn't easy. Nothing about being a writer is easy. So suck it up and work! Look around. You can find inspiration all around you if you keep your mind open and pay attention to detail. Here are some things that might help you come up with a plot for your story.

1. Dreams

Dreams don't often make sense. Sometimes they are violent, adventurous, horrific, fun, or sweet. Often you forget them thirty seconds after you wake up and before you manage to grab on to it, it's already slipped out of your grasp. If you still haven't come up with your next killer book idea, record all of your dreams the moment you wake up and reflect on them later. 

Maybe you dreamt you were fighting a great white. This might give you the inspiration to write about twenty survivors of a plane crash in the Pacific Ocean. One of their main obstacles is the shark-infested water. You'll be surprised at what your unconscious mind will think up.

2. Experience

Often times, the easiest things to write about are written from your very own experience. So you were caught in an avalanche and survived. Write about it! I realize that this doesn't happen to everyone, but you never know what could. You were zip lining in the rainforest in Costa Rica. Perhaps you can come up with a story of people who inhabit the forests and are fighting for the survival of their people. Their way of travelling may be by zip lining.

3. What if...

Look around you. The world is full of "what if"'s. Say you almost got hit by a car on your way home from school. Think, what if I actually got hit? What if I died and my spirit moved on to live in another form, but I remembered everything of my previous life? What if I told someone and everyone thought I was crazy? You can think up some pretty interesting scenarios. What if every time a book is written, a new realm is opened up where they really exist? (By the way, I hold a right to that book idea so please don't steal it.) Sometimes you can't look around and wonder what you can do with what you've got, but what you can do with what isn't supposed to be possible.

4. Talk to People

Whenever someone speaks to you, they tell you a story. Whether it's why they like their crush so much or that they are moving to California, the storytelling is there. Some people are good at recognizing a good story when they hear one. Others don't even see the connection at all. Next time one of your friends really pulls you in, ask yourself why it was so interesting. 

My friend recently told me a story of a boy she met in Maui that she's been texting with. He confessed that he really liked her and thought she was beautiful. He's older than her and "weird" as she said and doesn't want anything more to do with him. As an idea to get rid of him, she told him she was a lesbian. (I know, I know. A white lie never hurt anybody.) You're probably thinking, "Okay, so why is this important?" I'll tell you why.

Can you see the conflict? A girl with a boy she doesn't have feelings for who won't leave her alone. Now let's call him a stalker. To protect herself, she tells him a lie. What if he asked her for proof? Now she's in a pickle. She has to ask a friend to pretend to be her lesbian lover. So many things could go wrong. How will she fix the mess? (Feel free to take that idea, if you're up to it.) The moral of this story is that even the friends who don't read or write can share some pretty brilliant stories.

5. Movies and Books

You can't steal an idea, but let's be honest; every story idea has been influenced by another. Books and movies are often the source of our inspiration, and that's okay. I'll be writing a chapter on this later so I won't get into originality. The key is to take only bits and pieces of other people's stories. You may have adored "The Maze Runner". You can find inspiration in elements of another story. After reading the books or watching the movie, you decide to write a story involving a maze. Good! You have a starting point. These starting points will quickly develop into a plot.

6. Music

Much like movies and books, music also tells a story. And where there's a story, there's the potential for inspiration. Plus, the great thing about music is that you can literally take all the events from a song and write a book about it and no one can pin any plagiarism on you because they are completely different arts. I'm not saying you should do that, but that you technically can. Not to mention that music gets some people into a certain mood which can help you think of different scenarios. Don't disregard music; try listening the lyrics more carefully from now on.

7. School

You learn many things in school, including science and history. After learning about how Australia became a country, maybe you decide to write a story about a pirate in that time period. If you are more scientifically oriented, you might learn about the ban of nuclear weapons after what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and decide to write a futuristic story about what happened when one country disregarded the rule and used it on another. There are lots of ideas hiding away, waiting for you to find them, in your school, no matter how boring it often is. You just need to search a little.

Those are just a few things that might help give you the inspiration you need for your next novel idea. I hope that this helped you!