Writing tips

40. Start with the Protagonist.

Helping Writers Become Authors

How to Plot a Book: Start With the Antagonist

K.M. Weiland

why plotting always starts with the antagonist. I hate antagonists. Not so much because they’re, you know, the bad guys. No, I hate them because 90% of the time, they bore me into catatonia. Evil plan to take over the world? Yawn. Just please do whatever you gotta do to make the hero look good.

That’s how many authors approach their antagonists–as an external force who is present in the book solely for the purpose of giving the hero a reason to do all his cool hero-y stuff.

You may have planned almost all of your story–in your head, in an outline, or in a first draft–before giving even an afterthought to the antagonistic force. This is a mistake. Why? Because the antagonist is the catalyst for everything your hero does in his story.

TL;DR: Your antagonist is the catalyst for the entire plot.

In short, if you’re struggling with how to plot a book, the answer is easy: start with your antagonist.

The Plotting Mistake Almost All Authors Make
I’ll admit it if you will: my creative inspiration for my stories is always the protagonist. I can see him so clearly in my mind. There he is: going all Jason Bourne on some faceless thug, maybe weeping touchingly over a fallen comrade, then striking a melancholy heroic pose against the sunset. Let’s start writing!

But the plot? Hrm. You mean the reason why nameless thugs are coming after him, felling his comrades, and leaving him in such a melancholic mood? You mean the antagonistic force that’s opposing him for presumably watertight reasons?

Um, yeah, that’s a little blurry.

It’s no crime to start your creative process with the protagonist. He is, after all, the hero of the story–the whole reason for the story. He’s presumably the most interesting and likable person in the entire book.

But the protagonist doesn’t drive the plot.

If you sit down to plot your story and you start with your protagonist‘s desires, goals, and plans–then you’re coming at the whole thing backwards. Seems counter-intuitive, right? After all, that’s how almost all authors start their stories. If you look at the vast majority of the outlines I’ve written, that’s certainly how I have started.

That’s why I can tell you from experience that if you approach your plot this way, you will struggle throughout the entire process to maintain a linear line of cause-and-effect scenes, to create authentic antagonist motivations, and, frankly, to keep your entire conflict from feeling extraneous.

There Is No Plot Without the Antagonist
We think of the protagonist as being the point of the story. But he’s actually not. The antagonist is the point.

Think about it. Without the antagonist, there is no story. The antagonistic force is the obstacle between your character and his goal. Without that obstacle, the protagonist gets what he wants, no problem–and remains stagnated personally because he didn’t have to struggle to get it.

Almost all authors understand this. We understand that without conflict, we have no story. However, by the time we remember it, we’re already so deep into the protagonist’s adventures, we have to start manufacturing conflict by coming up with reasons for the antagonist to want to block the protagonist’s plan.

What results is not an organic plot.

But what happens when you flip this process on its head? What happens when you start figuring out how to plot your book by first examining what the antagonist wants and why his desires are inevitably going to interfere with the protagonist’s desires?