Sometimes the coach calls timeout to lecture a player about footwork.  About mechanics.

Sometimes the coach calls timeout to say a few words about how the game is approached.  About mindset.  About how to avoid getting in your own way.  To get the most of the talent you are bringing to your game.

This is one of those times.

In this series I’ve called out several ways, and several specific instances, in which The Hunger Games, the film, is different than the book upon which it is based.  The author, Suzanne Collins, received a screenwriting credit (which may or may not mean anything in terms of who actually wrote the final shooting script, and it only very rarely signifies a collaboration), so lets assume she was in on this very deliberate departure.

Or at least signed off on it while sitting on a yacht in Cannes.

But why change anything, one might ask?  

Good question, that.

There’s always the pat answer that what plays in a novel may not play as well on the screen.  That’s almost certainly, to some extent, part of this.  But there’s more to it, which is the point of today’s post.

In fact, there’s a lesson for us storytellers — novelists and screenwriters — just itching to make us better at what we do.

Here’s a truth nobody involved will admit to, out of respect to Suzanne Collins: the movie was changed not just to optimize it for the screen, but to make the story better.

But wait, I hear you crying out.  How can you make a 30 million copy selling novel better?  Why change what has proven to be magic, what is universally loved?

Because — get ready for it… — it can be better.

As novelists, we are a creative committee of one.  

We alone get to say what stays, what goes, what changes… at least in our “final” draft.  Editors hop on the team at that point, but they’re not likely to make the type of changes the filmmakers made to HG.  Which means, the author lives and dies by their creative decisions, which are always made in light of, in context to, what they know and believe about storytelling craft.

Suzanne Collins was no rookie when she penned this story.  No matter how the filmmakers switched some things around, her decisions were stellar.  But her experience, her craft — the very qualities that empowered her to write this great story –is precisely what played into her acceptance of the changes themselves.

The point: one mind alone, especially the mind of a newer writer, or an unpublished writer, rarely optimizes each and every creative decision that must be made in the course of writing a story.  We nail some, we get by on others, a few we tank.  The real problem — and the opportunity I’m putting in italics here — is when we unknowingly, or because of ignorance, haste or blinders that fit tighter than a muzzle, settle for the first organic idea we have.

Happens all the time.  To all of us.  Even Suzanne Collins, to some extent.

Why else would the filmmakers tell her story differently, even slightly so?

To make it better.  To jack dramatic tension.  To heighten stakes.  To intensify reader empathy.  To elevate thematic resonance.

Every change in the book-to-story evolution points directly to one or more of these underlying motivations.  It’s all about story physics, the forces that make a story work… and those are always up for grabs.

We, as writers, need to do the same with our stories.

Hopefully, before you stuff it into an envelope or hit the SEND button once you get a nibble from an agent or editor.

THG was told in rigid first person.  This was Collins’ choice.  We see nothing that transpires beyond the curtain of her hero’s awareness.  Which limits the ability to fully understand the motives and Machiavellian cruelty of the folks who are pulling the strings of the Games themselves.

The more we understand that, the more emotion we’re likely to invest.  This is what the filmmakers knew, and why they changed the story.

In the book we only get a historical overview from Katniss’s POV.  We never meet President Snow or the head Gamekeeper.  We never see the machinations of folks with crazy facial hair pulling levers that result in fires and parachute deliveries and digital hounds from hell (which, while in the book were representative of dead tributes, were simply generically terrifying in the film, which took great liberties in doing so, because they created new laws of physics that push the story into the realm of fantasy).

That limited first person POV limits the story on almost all the elements of story physics cited above.  And so, the filmmakers added scenes from behind that curtain, including a subplot with its own dramatic tension that pits the President against the Gamekeeper.
If you saw the film, you know how that turned out.  But if you only read the first book in the series, you didn’t.  That dynamic and its outcome aren’t revealed until the second book, and even then, without the up-close-and-personal cache of the film.

There were other changes.  

Many of Katniss’ backstory flashbacks were combined and compressed.  Gale, who occupies Katniss’ thoughts, is given almost no airtime after she departs for the Games.  And in a major add, the film shows us a moment in which Katniss gives a sign of respect to the people of District 11, whose tribute (Rue) has just been killed and mourned by Katniss, the result being a rebellious riot.  Which connects to stakes and theme.

Imagine a room full of people wearing cool clothes sitting in front of iPads sipping designer water and lattes.

That’s the team of screenwriters, producers and even actors as they discuss the script they are about to write and shoot, based on your book.  You may or may not be there… probably not.

They must love your story, right?  Why else would someone driving an Astin Martin have optioned and then green-lighted it?  Why else would Michael Douglas and Meryl Steep be sitting in that room?

What are they up to?

They’re trying to make your story better.

They are playing with options on all fronts, asking “what if?” questions, firing off ideas.  They aren’t settling for your last and best creative decisions, even if they are in love with the general concept and arc of your story.  Even if your name is Suzanne Collins.

And then, at this same moment in time, there’s you.  Sitting in an office, alone, sipping tepid coffee while listening to the air conditioner, which you need to replace soon.

What’s the difference?

There shouldn’t be a difference.

Write your story.  Let it rip.  But then — either in the moment, or via another pass — ask yourself if your decisions, your story moments, are the best they can be.  If what you’ve written, moment by moment, optimizes dramatic tension while forwarding exposition, both at the macro-story level and the sequence and scene level.

Do your scenes and sequences have their own tension and stakes?  Are they compelling?  Will your reader be right there in those moments?

Are you maximizing point of view?  Does what happens behind the curtain enhance the story?  How are you handling that… and backstory… and foreshadowing, all within the infinitesimal subtleties of your characterizations?

Have you asked… why will anyone care?  What level of emotion am I plucking at… at any given moment?   Can you make what you’ve written even better?  You need to make that your highest priority at some point in the process, over and above moving forward.

You are your own committee.  Your story isn’t just a novel or just a screenplay, it should be the best story it can be.

Even if it isn’t the first version that you wrote.  Especially then.

*****

A major new story review service — the most affordable anywhere — is right around the corner.  Stay tuned, there’s never been anything like this before.

Hunger Games 7 — Lessons From the Film Adaptation is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

This weekend I returned to the theater to see The Hunger Games again.  My first exposure to the story was the media… then the movie… then a casual read of the novel… then a slow analytic read-through and breakdown… and then the film again.

Every phase of this immersion illuminated something new, and taught me something more.

It occurs to me that this is precisely the way we experience our own stories as we write them. And thus, exposes a potential pitfall on that path: it’s easy to settle, to quit learning about our stories before we’ve discovered all of its inherent potential.

My Latest Observation About This Story

Sometimes, when we notice something from behind the curtain of first-look awareness, we can’t un-see it.  This is true on many fronts in life, and it’s an invaluable skill when breaking down stories for analysis.

One of those illuminations is the use and effectiveness of sequencing within a story.  Once again, The Hunger Games becomes a transparent laboratory where we can observe the narrative power of stellar craft at work… through Collins’ use of sequences as a narrative device.

A sequence is, in essence, a scene broken apart into linear blocks.  

Often those blocks use time and place shifts to segregate its scenes, which is the criteria for any scene.  But a sequence links these scenes together into a micro-story.

For example: the sequence in HG when Katniss is sleeping in the tree with the hunter pack camped below, waiting to kill her when she eventually comes down… then Rue awakens her from another tree, silently pointing out the Tracker-Jacker hive a few feet away, signaling that she could cut it loose and drop in on the others below… then Katniss climbs up and begins sawing at the branch, being stung in the process (which set-up the subseqent sequence)… then it falls and all hell breaks loose… then Katniss climbs down and claims the bow from one of the dead girls.

End of sequence.

Was this all one scene?   You could argue that it was.  But when you look closely, you see that it is just as accurately described as a series of linked scenes creating a sort of micro-story, with a beginning, middle and a great ending, one that propells the macro-story forward.

Just as with scenes, sequences are best written to fulfill a narrative mission.

This sequence, which is the mid-point of the story (both book and film), has the structural mission to evolve Katniss from her Part 2 reaction/wandering self into a Part 3 attacker/warrior self (the contextuual definition of these parts).  In a narrative sense, the mission of the scene is to have Katniss gain possession of the bow and arrows, which makes this transition happen.

When you know what your scene or mission must accomplish, perhaps before you write it, and when that mission fits structurally, contextually and narratively (as it does here), something wonderful happens for the writer: you are then free to blow it out of the water. To optimize dramatic tension, pace and empathy through vicarious experience.

Did those wasps scare the bejezzus out of you?  Did me.  Collin’s could have created anything she wanted as a means of Katniss getting the bow and arrow from the girl (who, not coincidentally, had been shown to us as sadistic and arrogant, making her demise gratifying in its violence), but she optimized the moment with this particular choice.

When we are mission-driven in our scene and sequence choices, that optimization and gratification is what can lift our stories to a higher level.  When we are searching for purpose within a scene, then optimization is harder to achieve.

Other Sequences in This Story

One of the cool things about the use of sequences is that they really fill up your pages.  In a 60 scene novel, for example, if you have six sequences of five scenes each, they become HALF of the story itself.  You don’t have to come up with 60 units of dramatic set-up and action, you can cover half of those with six micro-stories that take the overall narrative forward, and in an optimized way.

Here are some other sequences in the HG… notice how much of the story they occupy:

The reaping… the train ride… the training… the opening of the Games… Katniss fleeing… (then the Tracker-Jacker sequence described above)… Katniss reacting to the stings (where Peeta appears as her savior) … the strategy with Rue and the attack on the food… healing Peeta in the cave… the unleashing of the vicious digital dogs… the end battle at the Corucopia… the aftermath.

They’re all sequences.

In planning a story, you can begin by creating sequences and putting them in order and context to the overall arc and concept of the story.  Which is why it’s critical to KNOW the overall arc and concept, you cannot optimize until you do.

Then, sequences defined (in terms of their mission, or what they need to achieve and deliver to the reader), you can break them down into scenes.

And then you can optimize those scenes.

It’s all mission-driven, contextually empowered, and narratively seamless.

You can do it up front with planning… or you can do it in real-time with revision.

We’re not sure how Collins’ did it in terms of process, and it doesn’t matter.  What we do know is that she accomplishhed it with stellar results.  For writers, we can learn from that outcome without needing to see the process, then make our own way toward implementing these techniques in our own work.

Next up: thoughts about the book-to-film adaptation.  Much to learn there.

Hunger Games 6 — The Stealth Power of Sequencing is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

You’ve heard me say, again and again, that the First Plot Point is the most important moment in your story.  Now that we know what the FPP is (see last post), we can examine how the scenes prior to it — which comprise the entirety of the Part 1 set-up — fulfill this misson.

The contextual mission of all Part 1 scenes is to set-up two things: the forthcoming First Plot Point… and the story to follow.  The First Plot Point is the trigger, the catalyst, for the rest of your story.  Which is why, in turn, it is the most important moment in your story.

Here’s a provocative truth: the degree to which you succeed with your Part 1 set-up scenes defines how successful your story will be overall.

These set-up scenes (usually about 10 to 18 or so) need to accomplish a critical handful of things: hook the reader…  introduce the concept of the story… show us setting, time, place and some (as necessary) backstory… introduce the main character (your story’s hero)… show us the hero’s situation, goals, world view and emotional state prior to the launch of the path that lies ahead… make us care about the hero through the establishing of stakes… and foreshadow as necessary, including the presence (perhaps implied, maybe in the reader’s face, your call) the antagonist.

With all this in place, you are ready to lower the boom, ignite the fuse, launch the journey with your FPP, which comes in context (and an emotional investment) to these same objectives.

If you do so too soon, without adequate set-up, you risk compromise to reader empathy for the hero, which is essential to success.

If you engage is too much set-up, then you risk compromising pace, which (especially at this point in the story) is also essential.

Let’s see how Collins does with this in The Hunger Games.

The narrative style and flow Collins uses in this series makes it challenging and imprecise when it comes to identifying and segregating scenes.  She uses what I call a “deep first person” voice, meaning it comes off like a stream of consciousness flow of thoughts from Katniss, during which she might reflect on something that happened in the past.  When that occurs, you could consider that flashback, as its own scene… or not.  Normally a “scene” announces itself with a shift of time, place or both… but here this becomes a fuzzy line.

That said, I identified 16 scenes in Part 1.  All of them are clearly, in terms of context, there to set-up the forthcoming FPP, as well as the rest of the story.  (See the Beat Sheet to follow along.)

Scene 1 – clearly sets up the Reaping ceremony later that day, which is in itself a means of setting up the entire story.

Scene 2 – a cutaway flashback of Katniss in the forest showcasing her hunting skills, clearly a set-up for her forthcoming experience in the forest/arena of the Games.  There is no tension at all in this scene… that’s not it’s mission.  Set-up is its mission.

Scene 3 – introducing elements and dynamics of relationships.  No tension, no stakes, just pure expositional information we’ll need later.  If this same scene happened in any other Part 0f the story (2, 3 or 4), it wouldn’t work, because of that fact.

Scene 4 – because you know (now) that Katniss will volunteer to take her sister’s place when Prim is selected in the lottery, this scene shows itself as necessary set-up by illustrating the emotional bond between Katniss and Prim, and their mother.

Scene 5 – a critical moment of exposition: the Reaping ceremony itself.  It ends with Prim being selected.  This illustrates how a set-up scene can itself be an Inciting Incident (which this clearly is), with dramatic tension and stakes (established in Scene 4).  But in context to the whole, you can  also see how the primary mission here, the requisite path, serves an even bigger moment to come… when Katniss steps up to take her place.  This is a major hook, coming on the heels of a less impactful hook (when we learn the nature of the Reaping ceremony, even without a full grasp of it).  Notice how this hook comes fairly early in the story, but how she (Collins) used that earlier hook to entice us toward this very moment.

Scene 6 —  Katniss volunteers.  If this isn’t clearly a major moment of “set-up,” I don’t know what else could be.  This is yet another Inciting Incident, right on the heels of Prim’s selection (also an Inciting Incident), that points the story in a clear direction toward Katniss’s journey.  And, toward the FPP.  But notice, too, how we don’t yet know much about her journey, especially the heart and soul of it (which is why this is not the FPP), which is her forthcoming relationship with Peeta.  That remains to be set-up.  Next, in fact.

Scene 7 — our first look at Peeta, with necessary backstory.

Scene 8 – Peeta is selected, she and Katniss are presented to the crowd.  Katniss realizes that to win the Games, she’ll have to kill the guy.  Pure set-up.

Scene 9 – family goodbyes (emotional set-up through stakes), Gale’s goodbye (foreshadowing several things, including her proficiency with a bow, her dynamic with Peeta in contrast to her feelings for Gale, and setting up Gale as a player in future books in this series).

Scene 10 — the train ride to the Capital city, with necessary b.g. on the Games, and the beginning of an unfolding contexual dynamic with Peeta, which is criticcal.  Notice that nothing happens in this scene… it’s all background and set-up.

Scene 11- more set-up of her paranoia, fear and resistence to Peeta, whom she suspects is already trying to play her.  This is, in fact, the major dynamic of the first half of the entire story, and it begins here.  Pure set-up.

Scene 12 —  more b.g. (through flashback) of her hunting and survival skills, her family story, and her independent spirit.  This deepens our understanding of the hero… which is more set-up.

Scene 13 —  on the train we see Haymitch coach them on how to survive the opening moments of the Game, at the cornucopia.  This is an important scene, because it deepens stakes, puts the danger (violence and death) right in their (and our) faces, and deepens the tension between Katniss and Peeta.  Which, in case you forgot, is the core story Collins is telling here… the Games are merely a stage upon which this dynamic will unfold.  We, the readers, are now emotionally involved and vicariously present (both being elements of underlying story physics, without which this story doens’t work as well)

Scene 14 — a transtional scene as Katniss reflects on it all, wraps her head around her situation (allowing us to do the same), and thus deepening everything in terms of stakes, our rooting for the hero, our horror at this situation, and our interest in seeing how this will play out with Peeta.

Scene 15 —  as Cinna prepares Katniss and Peeta for their introduction, Collins is establishing (setting up) the role and importance of strategy, which itself is the source of tension between Katniss and Peeta.

Scene 16 —  they are presented to the blood-thirsty crowd as a couple.  Katniss takes his hand, showing us that she’ll play along (however unwittingly) because she understands the need for strategy.  This also sets up the FPP in the next scene..

Scene 17 — … where in the afterglow of a stunning introduction where they are positioned as a couple, Katniss makes a gesture that changes the entire story: she kisses Peeta on the cheek to signal her agreement to the strategy, and perhaps to make him believe in her fondness for him.  But Collins lays in a bit of poignant foreshadowing here… she has Katniss kiss him on the cheek, right on a severe bruise.

Their game is on.  This is the FPP, because it defines their journey going forward, and does so in context to known stakes and opposition.  Katniss has made a shift that launches the core spine of this story, which is what makes it (along with location, on Page 72, right at about the 20th percentile mark).

The Learning

No matter what happens expositonally in your Part 1 scenes — action, backstory, subtle dynamics, foreshadowing — the CONTEXT OF SET-UP applies .  You can’t short-cut it, and you can’t over-lay it.

Which illustrates how the metrics of story structure don’t constrict us.  Rather, they keep us from writing outselves into a corner… or over a cliff.

Next up: a closer look at Part 2, the response to what the FPP has put in motion.

Hunger Games 5) — Examining the Part 1 Set-up Scenes is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

The word “deconstruction” best leads to learning when we tear into story structure.  Which is happening here, and will continue.  But when we look at softer essences such as concept, character and theme, the better descriptors of the intention are “observation” and “analysis.”

We can look at Suzanne Collins’ structure — or the structure of any bestseller — and learn from it.  See the moving parts at work. Juxtapose it against the principles of mission-driven, four-part, milestone-reliant exposition and sequencing. 

But when we look at concept, what is there to learn? 

It is what it is.  And in the case of The Hunger Games, the concept in play is huge and compelling.  As they tend to be in most bestsellers (exceptions include more literary works, like those of John Irving and Jonathan Franzen).

But why?  What makes this concept the platform for a great story?  That’s what we can learn from analyzing it.

Concept is like an engine.  In fact, you should think of concept as the engine of your story.   But withoot wheels, a transmission, an undercarriage, a seat to sit in, a steering wheel and some pedals, the vehicle doesn’t function.  It just sits there making a lot of noise while emitting toxic fumes.

Then again, the vehicle goes nowhere without one.

Did Suzanne Collins begin with Concept?

You came for the Games.  You stayed — you gasped, you kept turning pages — because you cared.  And that was because of the love story and the horrific thematic resonance.

It doesn’t matter where Suzanne Collins started.  Stories almost always begin with one of three story elements: a concept.. a character… or a theme.  Sometimes, especially in the case of “based on a true story” projects, it begins with structure, or a sequence of events.

But in each case this is also true: it doesn’t become a great story, or even an effective one, until all of those are in place.  Which means, it doesn’t matter where you begin your story development, as long as you eventually nail all six core competencies (which include those four, plus scene execution and writing voice).

Even then, though, you’ll need more than those to elevate the story to greatness. More on that — and how Collins did it — in a moment.

Rumor holds that Collins was watching television one night, switching back and forth between a war documentary and a reality show.  Both of which, it seems, pushed her buttons. 

And thus the concept for The Hunger Games was hatched: What if a reality television program pitts children against each other, fighting to the death, as a means of asserting power and control within a futuristic dystopian society?

That wasn’t Collin’s first idea.  No, the first idea, whatever it was, was what led her to this concept.

While perhaps implied, that “what if?” statement does not introduce a character, or even a theme.  Those had to be added into, wrapped around and melted into the concept (this stirring process being the art of storytelling), which is certainly what Collins did.  Neither that concept nor these elements arrived fully realized, they were both products of an evolving process of development, the incubation of elements, the heat eventually building until the elements melded into one another.

You can engage in the process through story planning, or through story drafting.  Both can get you there.

The learning: don’t be impatient, and don’t settle.

Don’t jump the gun, or the shark (which is easy to do, especially if you are a drafter, because, a) it’s harder to see the elements working within a draft, as opposed to an outline, and b) it’s daunting to re-do or revise a draft that shows itself to be deficient in mid-stream, making it oh-so-tempting to settle). 

Whatever element you begin with (and it is often concept), play with it, poke it, fertilize it, until is grows into something more, something with character and theme emerging in a completely logical and compelling way.

The mistake — the common shortfall of unpublished manuscripts — is to write almost exclusively about your concept without the visible, visceral presence of the other elements.

In The Hunger Games, while Collins almost certainly began with this concept, the story ended up being about a love story at its core.  The exterior drama unfolding within the arena of the Games is, in essence, the tapestry upon which the stitches of this love story emerge.  The First Plot Point, in fact, is driven by the love story.  Call it an “A Plot and a  B Plot” if you wish (how we label these things is less important than how we understand and implement them), but their sum is vastly in excess of their individual parts.

Without the love story, the Games become nothing more than a weekly episode of Survivor with knives.

Without the Games, the love story is just another afternoon soap opera.

Without the heinous Gameskeepers and the dystopian society they serve, none of this has much weight.  This is what gives the story it’s powerful themes.  And thus, how it emotionally engages (which rhymes with enrages in this case) the reader… perhaps the strongest aspect of this story.

Relating this to Story Physics

Story physics, or forces, are the powers of narrative that move the reader toward engagement and response.  They are essential to an effective story.  They include: inherent conceptual appeal… dramatic tension… pace… reader empathy… a vicarious reading experience (you’re so there with Katniss as you read this story)… and some sort of undefinable “X-factor,” best described as executional excellence.

The Hunger Games nails all of these. 

And that’s part of the learning here: you need to nail them, as well.  No matter how strong your concept, it doesn’t rise to this level without all of those story physics in play.  And that can’t happen unless you bring strong characters, powerful themes and solid structure to the execution of your concept.

Powerful story physics is what you’re going for.  The Six Core Competencies are how you get there.

Without the Games, this love story has little dramatic tension and absolutely no stakes (they key to reader empathy).  In fact, it doesn’t exist.

Without the love story, we have less reader empathy and a more shallow vicarious experience.  In fact, without the love story this book plays more like a video game.

Without the dystopian society (which is killing these children), there is less reader empathy.

The outcome of your understanding of all this — as demonstrated so ably in The Hunger Games — leads to a checklist against which to vet and improve your story.  How are you dealing with each of the six core competencies?  How do your story elements optimize the major modes of story physics?

You can plan for and command them, or you can wrestle your story toward them as you write.  But in the end, what will make your story more effective is never a mystery.

How you get there is your call.  If you’re willing to look closely and recognize the inner machinations in play, stories like The Hunger Games become a clinic on how to do so.

*****

Want more Hunger Games?  This the 4th installment in a series of posts deconstructing both the novel and the movie.  Check them out, and come back for more posts as we go deep into both the structure and the narrative forces that make htis story great… all in context to our goal: to learn how Collins did it, and how we can do it, too.

If you’d like more on the Six Core Competencies, click HERE to see what my book is all about.  And… big news about the book is forthcoming within the next couple of weeks.

Hunger Games (4) — From Concept to Compulsion is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

One of my mantras is that the most important moment in a story is the First Plot Point. 

So let’s review, then apply this to The Hunger Games.

Why is the FPP the most important moment in a story? 

Because it fully launches the hero’s story-specific journey.  Everything prior to the FPP has been part of a set-up for this moment.

I say “story-specific” because your hero may indeed be on a compelling path prior to the FPP (a good thing), and the actual “plot” of the story may already be in play, as well.  The FPP is when it all suddenly more fully (or initially) defines the forthcoming hero’s quest, need, problem, journey (pick your description) in context to two things: stakes and antagonistic opposition. 

The job of your Part 1 set-up scenes is to put all this in play while investing the reader in your hero on an emtional level.

No small feat, that. 

If your FPP is soft, in the wrong place or non-existent, it plays havoc with the story’s underlying story physics.  You won’t hear an editor tell you your novel or screenplay is being rejected because of first plot point issues… but if they bother to tell you at all (rare), the reason will connect to those very same compromised story physics that your mishandled FPP caused.  Guaranteed.

Takes too long to get going.  Didn’t care about the hero.  Stakes are weak.  Story treading water.  Just not compelling enough. 

In The Hunger Games, the FPP is masked behind a series of prior Inciting Incidents (yes, they can and often do pop into your Part 1 prior to the FPP).  It doesn’t matter that Collin’s uses (or not) this terminology, but her story sensibilities absolutely do put a textbook FPP right where it should be (page 72 of the trade paperback, as reflected on the beat sheet).

Some have challenged this.  It doesn’t look like an FPP… if you’re looking for the wrong thing, which is easy to do in this story.  The key to finding an FPP in a story — and more importantly, to writing one properly – is to understand what the core story is.  

And in HG it may not be what you think it is.

The Hunger Games is very much like Titanic in this regard.  In Titanic, the story isn”t about a sinking ship, that is merely the highly dramatic backdrop for an unfolding love story.  Same goes for The Hunger Games.  Both stories have highly dramatic plot turns that deal with that dramatic landscape… but in both stories – even though there are twists that are specific to the more obvious danger to the characters – the core structure revolves around the hero and the love story.

Those sinking ship-related – and Games related - twists and transitions are catalysts for the core story: in the case of HG, the relationship between Katniss and Peeta.

Whoa.  That changes everything. 

At least if you were looking for obvious story transitions to be the plot point… which isn’t the case here.  Those transitions are terrific, they do forward the plot.  But those aren’t evolutions of the love story.  The core story.

Point: you have to know what story is the core of your novel or screenplay.  And then build your plot points and milestones around it.

When something massively transitional happens in the story prior to the FPP, that’s an Inciting Incident.  In HG, there are a bunch of them: Prim gets picked… Katniss volunteers… Peeta gets picked… they leave their home for the Capital city and nearly certain death… and (this is a big one), they are set up to be a couple as a strategy to win favor with sponsors and the audience.

None of those are the FPP.  All of those are Inciting Incidents. 

All of them contribute to the effectivess of this story… they hook us… they make us feel it… they allow us to see deep into Katniss and really root for her…  and (here’s an issue of story physics in play) we begin to take this journey with them in a vicarious way.

So why aren’t any of these the FPP?  Two reasons.

One: placement.  They all come too early to be the milestone FPP.  They do change the story, they do help define the forthcoming hero’s quest… but only as a building block within a set-up context.  None of them define the core journey… they all merely help set it up.  The real journey (and it’s NOT the beginning of the Games themselves) is about to come. 

Because the REAL core of this story, and thus the hero’s core journey, is the love story.

On Page 72 Katniss rolls over on what she’s been fighting off: the strategy of them being a couple.  She’s suspicous of it, and she’s suspicious of Peeta.  That he’s playing her, making her vulnverable to an opening where he can put a knife in her heart.  She doesn’t know what to do with this, it conflicts her.

Until Page 72.  When she buys in, accepts it and begins to engage with it, at least from outward appearances.  When she declares to us (through her actions) that she’ll play Peeta’s dark game, and beat him at it. 

When she kisses his cheek as his partner, she does so on an existing bruise.  From that action, from the way it’s set up and written, the story changes right there.  It begins her journey.  It defines her core quest: survive not only the Games, but the deception of her closest ally and supposed partner.  It does so in context to those two things: stakes, and the opposition.

The brilliance of Collins here is that the exterior plot, the Games themselves, is so strong and compelling on a story physics level, that this core love story disappears into it yet remains the spine of it.  A reader has two emotional tracks available, and their melding exceeds the sum of their parts.

Want more HG structure?  Download the HG beat sheet HERE.

Want more baseline schooling on these terms and principles?  Please consider my book, “Story Engineering: Mastering the Six Core Competencies of Successful Storytelling.”

Next up: a discussion of the Concept that drives this story.

Hunger Games 3): A Slippery First Plot Point is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

Many readers contacted me requesting the Beat Sheet be distributed up front, to be used as reference and context as the deconstruction moves forward.  (The link is to explain the form and function of a “beat sheet” as a story development and analysis tool.)

Done.  You will find it — the full Hunger Games Beat Sheet — HERE. 

I recommend you print it out.  It’s not short.  This beat sheet is an expanded version of what usually appears at a first pass in the story development cycle. 

As one plans a story, the beat sheet contains a lot of simple bare-bones bullets (like, “intro hero here, showing her in her crappy day job“), and then as the scene crystalizes in the author’s mind, the bullet expands into a description of not only the mission of the scene, but of the content and treatment (the means of fulfilling the mission), as well.

This latter version — because I was working backwards from a fully realized story — is very much the latter.

It does include identification of the HOOK… PLOT POINTS… PINCH POINTS… MID-POINT… and associated underlying story physics/forces in play.  I’ll be elaborating more on all this in the series, but it’s called out clearly in this Beat Sheet.

If you’re into this, if you loved the book and/or the film, and you want to go deep, I encourage you to make some time to check this out.  You’ll want to reference it as we go forward, too.

More soon.

Hunger Games 2) — The Beat Sheet is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

Wherein We Reveal How Suzanne Collins Pulled This Off

Just got Randy Ingermanson’s monster newsletter today, and he’s doing an analysis of The Hunger Games.  Good stuff.

I’ve seen at least four others out there, too.  There is certainly more to be found and more on the way.

They’re all good, all valuable.  Please read them all.

I don’t find this intimidating, nor do I consider it a competition. 

But it does get my attention.  I want my contribution to this discussion to be worthwhile and illuminating in a way that isn’t redundant or obvious.  That empowers writers in a way that furthers their craft, not just their admiration for the story.

I need a unique focus, a theme and an objective to fulfill that need. 

And it needs to come from a hardcore, strategic story engineering perspective, rather than softer concepts such as, “it works because we, the reader, have an emotional resonance with Katniss’ soul.”

True.  Important.  Also obvious. 

What isn’t obvious is how you, as an author, can achieve the same effectiveness in your story through the strategic, informed choices you make along the journey.

Focus, Theme and Objectives: Got ‘em all.

The focus will be on the relationship between the story’ structure – and it’s not giving anything away to tell you up front that HG totally nails the classic 4-part paradigm that I advocate – I’ll even give you page numbers for the milestones –  as well as the underlying story forces (or physics, as I like to call them) that render a story effective. 

Effective enough to sell nearly 30 million books and become a juggernaut film, with two more down the pike, and a Harry Potter like cultural fascination and tchotchke industry to go with it. 

The theme will be to illuminate why the book works, why it has become a near religion for some readers, and why that isn’t an accident or pure luck. What were the choices Collins made, and why do they work? 

That said, there is some of both – accidental kismet and pure luck – in Suzanne Collin’s home run.  Other novels, past and present, are just as good and never get a fraction of this attention, some don’t even get published.  This thing we do as writers is not an exact science, and while we all plan for and seek to create a monster outcome, please understand that we as authors are not anywhere close to having complete or even significant control over getting there.

But we can try.  We must try.  Having the tools and certain fundamental understandings at our command will send a little of that kismet and luck our way, absolutely.

The only thing we have control over is the story. 

The manuscript.  From there, we throw it out there, and we wait.  We take our chances.

This deconstruction seeks to use The Hunger Games as a model for how to improve our chances of success.  Not by imitating Suzanne Collins in any way, but rather, by applying the craft this story demonstrated and harnessing the story physics it optimizes. 

We have complete control over that.

The objective is to show you things you may not have noticed, to recognize them as powerful and effective – validate the principles through a credible show and tell – and to move you towards putting these truths and skills into your quiver as a storyteller.

First Glance Learning

Collins makes some challenging choices in her narrative strategy. 

Collins mashes her scenes together like a skillet breakfast at Denny’s (don’t mistake scenes for Chapters… they are very different in this book).  This is a function of time-spanning first person narrative, wherein the narrator flashes back to things and then returns to the present, moving through her journey as a memory told over coffee (at Denny’s) to a long lost friend.  You have to pay close attention to the scene strategy, but it’s there, and it works.

First person was the best and only real choice for a story like this. 

Notice how (unlike the movie), the book remains true to the hero/narrator’s (Katniss) point of view for the entire journey.  This limits you, as an author, but it also empowers a deeper dive into what things mean, what they could mean, and a sense of fear, anger, paranoia and hope that is as much subtextual as it is sometimes on the nose.

Subtext is critical to the success of this story. 

The Hunger Games is a clinic in subtext.  The subtext – very much by design – infiltrates and informs virtually every scene, elevating dramatic moments into something more than eating on a train or sleeping in a tree and schmoozing with a freaky television host as part of the Game’s pageantry.

There is always impending darkness, death, distrust and terror right below the surface of everything.  Always the unspoken.  That alone imbues this story with one of the key elements of story physics: reader empathy.  We are scared for Katniss from the moment she steps forward at a Tribute.

And thus, because she deserves our empathy because of who she is (through other narrative means, such as her instantly stepping forward to save her sister), we root for her.  This alone can empower a story to greatness.

Katniss is, in all probability, going to die.  Horribly.  She knows it, everybody else knows it.  She’s going to kill, too.  She will kill children who, like her, don’t deserve to die, before her turn comes. 

One of the most creepy elements of subtext is that this very fact – her killing, her being killed – is precisely the point, it is the delicious inevitability and largely hopeless stakes of the Games.  It sates the lust and fascination of a society that is – this being yet another genius dose of subtext at a thematic level – just like us.

But the real killer subtext in this narrative, alongside the more thematic ones, is her unfolding relationship with Peeta.  In fact, this is actually the expositional spine of the structure – you may be surprised to hear that, but I’ll show you – and thus becomes the heart and soul of the story itself.

Titanic was more about a relationship than a sinking ship. 

The ship and the situation was pure subtext. The outcome of that was never in doubt.

Same with The Hunger Games.  This story is also more about a relationship than an impending disaster or situation.  In both cases it is the danger, the proximity of death and the impact of fear, that becomes the driving empathetic essence (an element of story physics), and in Collin’s case, the primary source of dramatic tension. 

The danger is primarily a catalyst for an unfolding relationship.

Really?  You think not?  I didn’t say the only source of tension… just the narrative focus of the story’s structural pacing through conflict.

I ask you, did you ever for a moment consider that Katniss might die?  No.  It’s a trilogy, and the hero never dies in a story like this.  So that’s not the primary source of tension… leaving… what?  Answer: how she’ll survive, which is completely linked to Peeta.  Because he is positioned as the subtextual danger to Katniss – especially in her own mind – from the moment his name was called to stand alongside her as a Tribute.

Maybe subtext isn’t something you’ve noticed as a reader, but it is certainly something you need to understand and command as an author.  It is all-powerful in storytelling, and in The Hunger Games it is the very thing that sparks reader empathy.

And as a result, showcases a masterpiece of reader manipulation.

*****

Food for thought: what is the subtext of your story?  Are you in command of it?  Are you using it to deepen your story physics?

Next up: Part 2 of this deconstruction: concept vs. theme in this story.

Coming soon: a beat sheet of the novel… a generic beat sheet of the scenes and their purpose/mission… the macro-structure of the story… the hook and why it works… the story’s Part 1 quartile… the First Plot Point, and why it isn’t what you think it is… and the rest of the structure, piece by gloriously effective piece.

Deconstructing The Hunger Games, Part 1: is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

It’s been a while since I’ve done a thorough story deconstruction on this website.  I can’t think of a better lab rat than the iconic bestseller “The Hunger Games” for this project, which provides us with a glowing example of each of the six core competencies in play, as well as the underlying story physics that energize a story — any story – toward greatness.

Like the Harry Potter stories, Suzanne Collins’ “The Hunger Games” trilogy broke out from a YA niche to crossover into mainstream juggernaut territory, selling over 26 million copies thus far and inspiring the latest blockbuster film, which is a very true adapation of the first book in the series.  I will be deconstructing both the first book and the film, and will come back to the second and third books at a later date.

Now would be a good time to get involved. 

You may not have read the book or seen the movie at this point.  And the series will work for you if you haven’t, though it’ll work better if you’ve consumed at least one of those versions of this story.  I encourage you to do both, if nothing else than to root yourself deeper in the story in preparation. 

You won’t hear me claim that this story is “perfect. ”

Anytime a genre book reaches these heights, somebody always steps up to slam the writing.  I’ve heard that — I don’t agree, by the way, it’s well written in my view — but that level of analysis isn’t what this is about.  This is about story building craft, and on that count it is, if not a perfect story, at least a perfect specimen and learning tool.

It hasn’t blown up because it sucks, folks.  It’s compelling and disturbing, as well as vicariously delicious.

Aesthetics are a taste thing, many won’t care for the violence and the fantasy elements.  Reading outside our own writing niche can be very helpful, though, especially when a story hits all the notes relative to craft, as “The Hunger Games” certainly does. 

Here are a few things to look for as you experience this story.

Notice how context and sub-text play a huge role in the reader/audience experience. 

Part 1 (pre-plot point one) especially is driven by the context of impending and nearly certain death of the hero, who realizes it from square one.  This informs and colors everything – every scene, every nuance, every line of dialogue — with a certain irony and a creepy flavor of fear, and its one of the things that emotionally penetrates early in the story. 

Collins makes it easy to root for her protagonist.

This young hero (Katniss) emerges from the chute as a strong, rootable yet vulnerable character, which is another strong reason why this story has resonated so strongly, particularly with younger audiences.

You may not notice it at first (small spoiler alert here; then again, we’re in post mortem mode, and we’re all in the anatomy lab together), but at it’s heart this is a sort of love story. 

Really.

In fact, that particular sub-text becomes the backbone of the entire structure, over and above the exterior plot (romance writers, take note)… this alone might make this series something that might pop a few story development light bulb for you as we go through it.

“The Hunger Games” is no Harry Potter, however, even though both stories take us on a trip to the dark side with elements of fantasy and, in the former case, science fiction (Hunger has both).  Harry’s vicarious juice was enchantment and wonder, while Hunger is pure terror and creepy sense of cultural hopelessness that comes a little too close to our reality television-loving selves.

Tell your Hunger loving friends — writers or not — to join you for this.

If you’ve been struggling with the concepts of story structure, the vocabulary of it that I (and other writing teachers) use to explain it, and most of all the underlying forces of storytelling that are too often ignored yet, once you know them are impossible to not see in any stellar story… if you want a clinic in all this stuff, then stay tuned.

The deconstruction of “The Hunger Games” begins later this week with a series of posts that will expose and analyze it all, and from the perspective of the writer’s hungry eye for craft.

*****

Have you visited the Peer Review page lately?  There’s a new story for us from Derek Tumacder, check it out HERE.  Derek tells us this is his first public outing for his writing, so let’s reward his courage — we all remember that moment for ourselves, no? — with our helpful support.

There is a wealth of material here for the analytic writer to learn from, and just as importantly, a chance to offer feedback to the writers who have braved this territory.  Learn more about the Peer Review service HERE.

Prologue: Deconstructing “The Hunger Games” is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

And hopefully, an answer that will empower you.

I make a lot of noise (both in my book and here) about “mission-driven” storytelling.  Especially “mission-driven” scene development.

The bottom line is this: every scene should have an expositional mission.  Meaning, it delivers one piece of story that propells the narrative forward.  Think of your story as a puzzle… that moment of exposition in a scene is a piece of that puzzle.

If you have too many expositional pieces in a scene — two is often too many — the scene isn’t optimized.

Storyfix reader Gary MacLoud wasn’t exactly confused about the concept… but he did ask a very reasonable and important question about how this mission-driven context relates to characterization… which also a goal of every scene.

A bit of a can of worms.  So let’s discuss.

Here’s how Gary positioned the question:

I have been reading your Story Engineering book, and I am finding it a fascinating read. It’s great to see you expand on things I have read on your site over the last few years. However, one thing I am having difficulty with is understanding mission-driven scene writing. I understand that you want to always just have one mission you are working towards with each particular scene, but when you brought characterization into the mix and started talking about primary and secondary missions of a scene, I began to get confused.

I think I understand that we should always have two things in mind when crafting a scene – advancing plot and advancing characterization. More often than not we are simply advancing plot and the particular piece of plot information that is uncovered during the scene is the thing we have been ‘driving towards’, but should we still ensure characterization is maintained or advanced alongside this? If we are showing the reader something about the character, such as in DeMille’s The Lion second scene, does that mean we can’t uncover a particularly important piece of plot information in the same scene?

If we have an important point to make about the character, and an important piece of plot information to uncover, we can’t have them in the same scene because we would be driving towards two missions for that scene. Is that correct?

Or is it always a case of there is a primary mission and a secondary mission, either one being plot related or character related, but sometimes the characterization is stronger than the plot and that is obvious to the reader, so character is primary, and sometimes plot is stronger than the characterization, therefore plot becomes primary. Therefore, it becomes a case of which mission, primary or secondary, we want to apply more weight to in a scene, but both are most definitely needed. If this is the case, could you provide a brief example of primary and secondary missions in this manner in a scene.

This was my response:

Hi Gary — great questions.  And your take in the final paragraph is very solid.  The fact that you even notice a sense of flexibility in these principles (which I admit were put out there, or could be perceived, as rather inflexible) is a great sign that your inner storyteller is flexing.
 
At a professional level of anything, fundamentals are largely inflexible.  We should teach beginners about principles with this as context.  Michael Jordan can shoot a free throw with his eyes closed, Josh Groban can “speak” a lyric without holding to the melody, a painter can throw in a secret message… but one must earn one’s stripes to make this work.  It’s not about ”having a right” to do something out of the box (because this is “art” after all), but rather, having the skill and sensiblity to allow it to work within the sequence of the narrative, without becoming  disruption, a break in the rhythm or otherwise taking one’s eye off the expositional ball.

In other words, there are “general fundamentals” that become default contexts.  In scene writing, they are: always be true to (or further) characterization, and deliver a piece of story exposition that moves the story forward.
 
If a moment of characterization does, in fact, move the story forward, then THAT becomes the scene’s mission.  If it simply illustrates characterization that is already in place, then without an expositional revelation the scene becomes moot.  You can get away with this once or twice in story, but a pattern of character-only scenes quickly becomes a deal killer.
 
These decisions are the art of it all.  Characterization is like interior decorating in a fine restauant… it only goes so far if the food isn’t right.  But it can also define and differentiate.  People come for both reasons, and you need to serve both.
 
Sorry my answer isn’t more precise, but the question is bigger than that.  Thanks for asking, hope this helps.

Feel free to chime in on this.

If you haven’t subscribed to my newsletter yet, here’s at peek at the April issue, which contains a little ‘insider discount” with only a few days left to opt-in.  The May edition is brewing as we speak.

An Insightful Question from a Storyfix Reader is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com

All writing tips are not created equal. 

Or, among us writers, equally.

Some are so huge, so obvious, that they don’t resonate.  This one is like that. 

Nobody is above it.  Which means, if you missed it, you’ve missed the point.

As someone who reads unpublished manuscripts for a living, and seen the results of this truth not being honored as it should be, I believe it should be a daily manta.  I recommend you write it backwards and staple it to your forehead, so that every time you look in the mirror you are reminded of this massively huge, diabolically subtle storytelling OMG truth.

I’ll settle for you pasting it right above your monitor.  Read this, notice this, every day you sit down to write.

You may recognize your own dance with this issue right off.  If you can’t see the wisdom in it, then you need to pay attention and discover what it means.  Because on the list of things that will tank a story, this one is right at the top.

It’s all in the italics.

If you don’t connect to the sub-text of the italics in the next three paragraphs, you’ll miss the point, And the point is career-changing.  Here it is, one of the most important writing tips you will ever hear, rendered in three parts:

The objective of storytelling, the point of it all, isn’t to write about something.

The idea isn’t even to write about something.

The highest goal of your storytelling is to write about something happening.

When you can execute the last one and still make your story about something… then and only then will you have elevated your story to the level of art.

At any given moment in your story… in each and every scene of your story… ask yourself: what is happening here?  Right now?  How does it connect to what’s come before… how does it relate to what will happen next, and thereafter?

You should begin with that last piece as your goal.  And then evolve your story to allow it to embrace the first two.

So rather than asking (or answering, when asked) “what’s the story about?”… ask and answer this instead: “what happens in your story?”

When you know the difference, you’ll have crossed a threshold that will empower your stories, and perhaps your writing career, to greatness.

Staple This To Your Forehead is a post from: Larry Brooks at storyfix.com