The Dos and Don’ts of Imitating Famous Writers: My Interview with MuggleNet Academia

This week you’ll find me at MuggleNet Academia—one of the most popular educational podcasts on iTunes and nominated for four People’s Choice awards. I had a blast chatting it up with host Keith Hawk, Hogwarts Professor John Granger, and my writing buddy Christine Frazier of Better Novel Project.

In our podcast we talk about the Harry Potter series as a literary artifact and how we can use it to help aspiring writers become better at their craft.

SOME OF THE QUESTIONS WE TACKLE

What are Rowling’s three big story signatures? Should other writers try to imitate them?
Which best-selling authors have clearly borrowed from Rowling’s writing toolbox?
How much of Rowling’s success is due to her use of alchemical imagery and Christian symbolism? Do aspiring writers have to use them if they want to be successful?
Can pantsers write as well as outliners?
What specific story structure did Rowling use for scaffolding her story? How does understanding it improve an author’s chances of publishing success?

If you’re wondering what I sound like, here’s your chance to hear me talk! You can listen to the podcast at MuggleNet Academia, check it out on iTunes, or download the mp3.

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Rowling’s Life as an Author: What It Was Really Like to Write Harry Potter

Rowling has said that Harry Potter “simply fell into [her] head” and “all of the details bubbled up in [her] brain.” She “[had] never felt such a huge rush of excitement and [she] knew immediately that it was going to be such fun to write.”

Sounds like a fairy tale beginning to a fairy tale ending, right? And perhaps that’s all ordinary readers need to know about Rowling’s path to literary fame, but writers need to know more.

Writers need to know the not-so-glamorous version of what it was like to write Harry Potter. We need to appreciate how disciplined Rowling had to be to develop her little idea into seven hefty books. We have to know that she wasn’t lazily sipping mochas for two decades while jotting down a continuous stream of words like a literary Fountain of Youth.

All too often writers convince themselves that they would write more if only they were more well known, or had more money, or had more time. But in the end, none of that is what defines a writer. A writer is simply someone who writes.

Below I’ve compiled the non-fairy-tale version of the story behind the Harry Potter series.

Book One: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

Even though Harry Potter strolled into Rowling’s head fully formed, she still spent several years outlining the seven books, and then she spent another year writing the first one, Harry Potter and Sorcerer’s Stone.

Rowling rewrote chapter one of Sorcerer’s Stone so many times (upwards of fifteen discarded drafts) that her first attempts “bear no resemblance to anything in the finished book.” This was especially frustrating for Rowling because she was a single parent and her writing time was both limited and sporadic—entirely contingent on her infant daughter, Jessica.

Whenever Jessica fell asleep in her [stroller], I would dash to the nearest café and write like mad. I wrote nearly every evening. Then I had to type the whole thing out myself. Sometimes I actually hated the book, even while I loved it.

Rowling had to deal with many other time-wasting nuisances, like re-typing an entire chapter because she had changed one paragraph, and then re-typing the entire manuscript because she hadn’t double-spaced it.

Rowling also struggled with personal problems while writing the first book:

the death of her mother,
estrangement from her father,
a volatile and short-lived marriage,
a newborn child,
life on welfare,
and a battle with clinical depression.

To top it off, Rowling’s support system was pretty much nonexistent. She struggled with suicidal thoughts and eventually turned to therapy for help. Rowling once told a friend about her book idea and her friend’s response was cynical. Rowling said:

I think she thought I was deluding myself, that I was in a nasty situation and had sat down one day and thought, I know, I’ll write a novel. She probably thought it was a get-rich-quick scheme.

Once the manuscript was finally finished, Rowling went on to collect a dozen rejection letters over the span of a year before Bloomsbury Publishing agreed to pick it up.

Even with publication now on the horizon, though, Rowling was warned by her literary agent to find a job because her story wasn’t commercial enough to be successful (“You do realize, you will never make a fortune out of writing children’s books?”). In fact, Bloomsbury’s expectations of the first Potter book were so low that its initial print was only five hundred copies—three hundred of which were donated to public libraries. Rowling’s first royalty check was six hundred pounds.

A year later, she was a millionaire.

Book Two: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Both Rowling’s agent and Bloomsbury Publishing had to (happily) eat their words—Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone was so popular in the UK that Scholastica paid an unprecedented $105,000 for the American rights to the series.

Rowling, however, still faced major frustrations.

For one, she did not believe her writing success was permanent, so while writing Chamber of Secrets, she worked as a full-time French teacher (and cared for her now-toddler daughter). It was during this time that she suffered from her first and only debilitating bout of writer’s block:

I had my first burst of publicity about the first book and it paralysed me. I was scared the second book wouldn’t measure up . . .

Despite Rowling’s personal skepticism, other lucrative contracts rolled in after Scholastica. The resulting money pulled her out of poverty, but it also put incredible pressure on her “to fulfill expectations,” and furthermore, her sudden financial success resulted in a “tsunami of requests.” Everyone was asking Rowling for a leg up:

I was completely overwhelmed. I suddenly felt responsible in many different ways. . . . I was downright paranoid that I would do something stupid . . .

Book Three: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

The second Potter book was even more successful than the first, and Rowling finally dove into writing full time with Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

Prisoner of Azkaban was one of Rowling’s most enjoyable Potter books to write, but she still had to work very hard. Rowling said in a letter to her editor:

I’ve read [Prisoner of Azkaban] so much I’m sick of it. I never read either of the others over and over again when editing them, but I really had to this time.

Rowling added in a later letter:

The hard work, the significant rewrites I wanted to do, are over, so if it needs more cuts after this, I’m ready to make them, speedily . . .

But if Rowling thought these rewrites for book three were difficult, she had no idea what she was heading into with book four.

Book Four: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Again Rowling churned out a book in a year, and again it was a massive best seller, but Rowling celebrated her success in a rather unexpected way:

The first thing that I did when I finished Prisoner of Azkaban was discuss repaying the advance for the [fourth] book. Yes, you can imagine. People were a little bit shaken . . . I said: I want to give the money back and then I will be free to finish in my own time rather than have to produce it for next year.

Rowling has been open about her struggle to write book four, which nearly caused her to have “a nervous breakdown”:

That was the period where I was chewing Nicorette. And then I started smoking again, but I didn’t stop the Nicorette. And I swear on my children’s lives, I was going to bed at night and having palpitations and having to get up and drink some wine to put myself into a sufficient stupor.

Rowling attributed her stress to the staggering pressure she felt to produce another Harry Potter book worthy of global adoration:

I’m sure that I’ll never have another success like Harry Potter for the rest of my life, no matter how many books I write, and no matter whether they’re good or bad. I remember very clearly that I was thinking the same thing when the excitement over the fourth Harry Potter volume literally exploded. The thought was unsettling to me at the time, and I still feel that way today.

Rowling also struggled with her plot for the first time since starting the series:

The first three books, my plan never failed me. But I should have put [this] plot under a microscope. I wrote what I thought was half the book, and “Ack!”—huge gaping hole in the middle of the plot. I missed my deadline by two months. And the whole profile of the books got so much higher since the third book; there was an edge of external pressure.

Rowling faced “some of [her] blackest moments” with book four:

At Christmas I sank to the depths: “Can I do this?” I asked myself. In the end it was just persistence, sheer bloody mindedness. It took months. I had to unpick lots of what I’d written and take a different route to the ending.

The worst rewrite for Rowling was one particular chapter in Goblet:

I hated that chapter so much; at one point, I thought of missing it out altogether and just putting in a page saying, “Chapter Nine was too difficult,” and going straight to Chapter Ten.

Not surprisingly, Rowling also struggled with burnout:

Goblet of Fire was an absolute nightmare. I literally lost the plot halfway through. My own deadline was totally unrealistic. That was my fault because I didn’t tell anyone. I just ploughed on, as I tend to do in life, and then I realised I had really got myself into hot water. I had to write like fury to make the deadline and it half killed me and I really was, oh, burnt out at the end of it. Really burnt out. And the idea of going straight into another Harry Potter book filled me with dread and horror. And that was the first time I had ever felt like that. I had been writing Harry for 10 years come 2000 and that was the first time I ever thought, Oh God, I don’t want to keep going.

Book Five: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Rowling stayed true to her word and went on vacation—kind of. She stepped away from the Harry Potter series to work on a completely unrelated book (which hasn’t been published). After a yearlong sabbatical, Rowling started on the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Rowling had written the first four books in a blisteringly fast five years, but she told her publishers she didn’t want a deadline with book five, especially after dealing with the plot problems in Goblet of Fire. Her publishers had no other choice but to agree.

Even then, though, Rowling still struggled to keep up.

She has said numerous times that she wished she had better edited Order of the Phoenix:

I think [it] could have been shorter. I knew that, and I ran out of time and energy toward the end.

And it’s no wonder. During the two years Rowling wrote the 870-page Phoenix, she also:

got married,
had another baby,
fought a bogus plagiarism lawsuit,
started several charity organizations,
consulted for the new Potter films,
and ran around fulfilling her endless PR obligations.

Worst of all, Rowling was drowning in a never-ending deluge of paparazzi.

Rowling’s fame had grown to such bewildering heights that the attention had become relentless. This was quite a shock for her, especially since she had thought that her Harry Potter story would only appeal to “a handful of people”:

Everything changed so rapidly, so strangely. I knew no one who’d ever been in the public eye. I didn’t know anyone—anyone—to whom I could turn and say, “What do you do?” So it was incredibly disorientating.

The paparazzi were digging through her garbage, hiding in her hedges, and camping out in front of her house. One reporter even slipped a note into her daughter’s backpack at school.

It’s very difficult to say . . . how angry I felt that my 5-year-old daughter’s school was no longer a place of . . . complete security from journalists.

Rowling was “racing to catch up with the situation” and “couldn’t cope” with the loss of her private life:

I couldn’t grasp what had happened. And I don’t think many people could have done.

Among the uproar, Rowling was expected to pull off yet another Harry Potter home run.

Book Six: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Again Rowling exceeded all expectations, smashing publishing records left and right, but no time to celebrate—it was on to book six.

Rowling was pregnant with her third child while writing Half-Blood Prince, but she wasn’t nearly as stressed as she had been with book five. In fact, she was so laissez-faire about it, she probably put some fans in a panic:

I’m in a very lovely position. Contractually, I don’t even have to write any more books at all. So no one can possibly write that I have missed a deadline, because I actually don’t have a contractual deadline for Six and Seven.

Of course Rowling did write book six, which was “an enjoyable experience from start to finish.” Rowling’s critics, however, were now growing as vocal as her fans:

I found death threats to myself on the net . . . I found, well, people being advised to shoot me, basically.

The paparazzi problem was also spinning out of control. After the birth of two more children, Rowling couldn’t even step out of her house without being stalked by photographers—she was “completely trapped” and felt like she was “under siege or like a hostage.”

Rowling went so far as to sell her house and move her family, and again she had to turn to therapy, as she had years ago when her Harry Potter idea was in its infancy:

Sometimes I think I’m temperamentally suited to being a moderately successful writer, with the focus of attention on the books rather than on me.

Book Seven: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Even with enormously high expectations, book six was a success, and Rowling immediately began working on the seventh.

Deathly Hallows was the series finale, but Rowling had many other responsibilities to fulfill besides writing: being a mother to three children, giving interviews, overseeing the Harry Potter movies, and running her charities, to name only a few.

Ironically, Rowling’s notoriety and wealth had cut her writing time in half—from five days a week to two and a half:

There are times—and I don’t want to sound ungrateful—when I would gladly give back some of the money in exchange for time and peace to write.

The media marathon hadn’t slowed down either, which was exceptionally draining for her:

Fame is a very odd and very isolating experience. And I know some people crave it. A lot of people crave it. I find that very hard to understand. Really. It is incredibly isolating and it puts a great strain on your relationships.

One of the media’s particular criticisms of Rowling was her appearance:

I found it very difficult, when I first became well known, to read criticism about how I look, how messy my hair was, and how generally unkempt I look.

Rowling worried about how such criticisms might affect her children:

Is “fat” really the worst thing a human being can be? Is “fat” worse than “vindictive,” “jealous,” “shallow,” “vain,” “boring” or “cruel'”? Not to me.

I’ve got two daughters who will have to make their way in this skinny-obsessed world, and it worries me, because I don’t want them to be empty-headed, self-obsessed, emaciated clones; I’d rather they were independent, interesting, idealistic, kind, opinionated, original, funny—a thousand things, before “thin.”

Somehow, in the middle of all this cacophony, Rowling finished her seven-book Harry Potter series. After nearly two decades, it was over. Rowling said:

I cried as I’ve only ever cried once before in my life, and that was when my mother died. It was uncontrollable . . .

Embracing the Journey

You just have to accept that it takes a phenomenal amount of perseverance.

—J. K. Rowling [Tweet This]

This post is not about glorifying Rowling or pitying her. This post is about learning to appreciate wherever you are in your writing journey.

It’s only human to think that the grass is greener on the other side, to think that if only you had a certain amount of money or a certain kind of life, you’d finally get down to writing. But books aren’t written in a vacuum. Life doesn’t stop moving even for the most famous and successful. The best time to write is now—because that’s the only time you’ve truly got.

My feeling is, if you really want to [write], you will do it. You will find the time. And it might not be much time, but you’ll make it.

—J. K. Rowling [Tweet This]

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The Best Advice for a Beginning Writer

If you could give a budding writer only one piece of advice, what would it be? Below are some of the most well-known and talented writers of our time who tackled the question.

Writing Advice from the Greats

The most important thing is to read as much as you can, like I did. It will give you an understanding of what makes good writing and it will enlarge your vocabulary.

—J. K. Rowling

You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so. It’s hard for me to believe that people who read very little (or not at all in some cases) should presume to write and expect people to like what they have written . . . Can I be blunt on this subject? If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that. Reading is the creative center of a writer’s life.

—Stephen King

Above all else, the writer has to be a good reader. The kind that sticks to academic texts and does not read what others write (and here I’m not just talking about books but also blogs, newspaper columns and so on) will never know his own qualities and defects.

—Paul Coelho

If you ask me what I am reading on any given day, it is most likely going to be a work from a great author from long ago. Every writer stands on the shoulders of the old authors who have shaped and refined language and storytelling.

—Laura Hillenbrand

A Different Perspective: You Don’t Have to Write Every Day

If you’ve had a bad writing day, or if you’ve been struggling with your writing recently, I found this article by Cal Newport to be a reassuring read. I think Newport’s point of view is an important counter to Stephen King’s (who says you absolutely have to write every day).

In the end, the goal of advice should be to help you figure out what works for you, not what works for someone else.

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How Rowling Revised ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’

Rowling’s goal as a writer is surprisingly simple: “[Write] better than yesterday.” When Rowling sent her editor an email about the third Potter book, she wrote:

I am so sick of re-reading [Prisoner of Azkaban] that I’ll be hard put to smile when it comes to doing public readings from it. But perhaps the feeling will have worn off by next summer. . .

Rowling has also said:

You have to resign yourself to the fact that you waste a lot of trees before you write anything you really like, and that’s just the way it is. It’s like learning an instrument, you’ve got to be prepared for hitting wrong notes occasionally, or quite a lot, cause I wrote an awful lot before I wrote anything I was really happy with. [Tweet This]

‘You Have to Plan’

Even when Rowling was nearly finished with the Potter series, she still extensively outlined her work. While writing the sixth book, Half-Blood Prince, Rowling said:

I have a large and complicated chart propped on the desk in front of me to remind me what happens where, how, to whom and which bits of crucial information need to be slipped into which innocent-looking chapters.

Rowling later added in an interview:

I plan; I really plan quite meticulously. I know it is sometimes quite boring because when people say to me, “I write stories at school and what advice would you give me to make my stories better?” And I always say (and people’s faces often fall when I say), “You have to plan,” and they say, “Oh, I prefer just writing and seeing where it takes me.” Sometimes writing and seeing where it takes you will lead you to some really good ideas, but I would say nearly always it won’t be as good as if you sat down first and thought, Where do I want to go, what end am I working towards, what would be good—a good start?

Rowling’s Outline for Order of the Phoenix

Rowling not only plans, she’s also not afraid to revise her plan—and revise it and revise it and revise it. Back in 2006 Rowling posted on her website a snippet of her series grid for the fifth Potter book, Order of the Phoenix.

Below is my transcription of the outline, which I created for Stuart Horwitz’s Book Architecture: How to Plot and Outline Without Using a Formula. (I also cleaned up the outline by writing out abbreviations and completing sentences.)

Transcribed Rowling Outline

When Rowling shared her outline, she said that it was an “umpteenth revision” of Order of the Phoenix—but she still went on to revise the outline even more.

In the grid below I’ve tracked all of Rowling’s changes between her outline and the final Order of the Phoenix. Red is what Rowling deletes from the story; yellow is what she swaps around; and green is everything she adds after the outline. Very little is left untouched.

As William Zinsser said:

Rewriting is the essence of writing well—where the game is won or lost. [Tweet This]

Rowling’s Revisions

I won’t discuss every change, but the majority of Rowling’s revisions fit into two broad categories:

1. Eliminating Needless Repetition

2. Increasing Suspense

At times these two categories overlap: If you eliminate needless repetition (the parts that “readers tend to skip,” as Elmore Leonard said), you typically ratchet up the suspense automatically. (My two examples below show this overlap.)

On the other hand, these two categories still need to stand on their own. Increasing suspense doesn’t always eliminate needless repetition, and eliminating repetition doesn’t always result in suspense.

Eliminating Repetition

In Blueprint Your Bestseller Stuart Horwitz talks about the importance of striking a narrative balance between repetition and variation:

Repetition can get dangerously close to boring. You have to be careful when you have the same event or adjective or discussion happening over and over again. [But], you can’t have all variation, either . . . it is the pattern created by repetition and variation that communicates meaning.

Example of Repetition: Hagrid’s Return

Hagrid is sporting injuries quite early in the outline—before even chapter thirteen, because Rowling writes that he’s “still” getting injured, which means he’s injured before chapter thirteen as well.

But other than the unexplained injuries, Hagrid’s storyline has no significant development until we meet Grawp in (then) chapter thirteen. I believe that Rowling realized she had too much repetition without enough variation, so in the final Order of the Phoenix, she doesn’t introduce Hagrid’s injuries until chapter twenty and she waits to introduce Grawp until chapter thirty.

Example of Repetition: Occlumency

In the outline Harry is already getting Occlumency lessons from Snape in (then) chapter thirteen (the same chapter where Hagrid still has injuries). But the final book postpones Harry’s lessons until after he attacks Mr. Weasley in a dream. Why is this change important?

First, the Occlumency storyline is vital to the believability of the whole plot. As Lupin says, “Harry, there is nothing so important as you learning Occlumency!” If we the readers don’t buy into Occlumency—if Rowling can’t convince us of its importance—then the entire story is weak.

With the Occlumency storyline, Rowling is dealing with the same issue as Hagrid’s injuries: the repetition of the lessons is becoming boring; there isn’t enough variation. Rowling also needs to convince us that Harry’s situation is indeed dangerous.

If Rowling had Harry starting lessons simply because Dumbledore (or whoever else) said so, that wouldn’t be nearly as believable as Harry needing to start lessons because he’s already proven himself a threat—by attacking Mr. Weasley. Actions speak louder than words.

Increasing Suspense

Example of Suspense: Hagrid’s Return

By delaying Hagrid’s return, Rowling not only eliminates needless repetition, she also increases the suspense. Hagrid’s unexplained disappearance adds mystery to the plot, and therefore, more suspense as well.

Rowling creates another offshoot of suspense by having Hagrid return right when Umbridge is desperate to fire teachers. In fact, right before Hagrid strolls into the story, Rowling has Umbridge put Professor Trelawney on probation. Naturally, we start worrying about Hagrid.

Rowling then uses Hagrid’s tenuous work situation as the reason to introduce Grawp. Notice in the outline Hagrid is refusing to leave Hogwarts, and we only happen to meet Grawp when Harry, Hermione, and Ron try to warn Hagrid about Umbridge. But in the final Order of the Phoenix, we don’t meet Grawp until the situation is clearly out of control (Hagrid is now on probation); and instead of refusing, Hagrid is okay with being fired, which gives him good reason to bring Harry to Grawp—someone needs to take care of Grawp in Hagrid’s absence.

Hagrid’s delayed return to Hogwarts also increases the suspense in the Quidditch storyline. Hagrid shows up right after Umbridge bans Harry from Quidditch. Although Hagrid’s unexpected arrival directs us away from Harry’s ban, it also increases the suspense because we’re not focusing on it—we’ve moved on to Hagrid’s story, yet we’re still wondering how the Quidditch problem will pan out. (Additionally, Harry’s ban from Quidditch serves as his excuse for sneaking into the Forbidden Forest to meet Grawp.)

Example of Suspense: Occlumency

In the outline Harry is skipping his Occlumency lessons simply because he wants to skip them. But in the final Order of the Phoenix, Harry looks into the pensieve and sees something unsettling from Snape’s past. Snape is so furious that he throws Harry out and refuses to give him any more lessons. Talk about ratcheting up the suspense! Harry’s peek into the pensieve both increases the tension around the Occlumency lessons (as Hermione continually nags Harry that he needs to resume them) and increases the mystery around Snape’s past.

A Few More Examples of Rowling Increasing the Suspense

Rowling originally has Grawp as Hagrid’s cousin, but he later becomes his half-brother. Even though Hagrid has always been soft-hearted, it’s more believable that he’d so desperately cling to Grawp if Grawp was his last lifeline to an immediate family member.
In the outline Rowling has Harry running into MacNair visiting Bode in the hospital; she later deletes this scene—probably thinking that it would decrease the suspense by giving away too much.
At first Rowling only has Harry suspended from Quidditch, but she decides to increase the stakes by giving him a lifetime ban.
In the outline, Rowling has Umbridge not suspect the existence of Dumbledore’s Army until much later in the story, but in the final book, Umbridge not only knows about the D.A. as soon as it forms, she also immediately threatens expulsion with Educational Decree Number 24. This significantly increases the suspense, because now we’re not wondering if Harry is going to get caught but when.
Originally, Rowling has Harry attack Mr. Weasley and then stay at Hogwarts until Christmas break—she even has him shop for Christmas presents in Hogsmeade. But in the final Order of the Phoenix, she has Harry and the rest of the Weasleys leave immediately for Sirius’ house. The snake attack is an important turning point in the story (the midpoint, to be exact) and Rowling doesn’t want to downplay the consequences.

Put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff’s worth, without pity, and destroy most of it. [Tweet This]

—Colette

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Failure Is a Necessity

“The man who gets up is greater than the man who never fell.” —Concepcion Arenal

Often, you have to fail as a writer before you write that bestselling novel or ground-breaking memoir. If you’re failing as a writer—which it definitely feels like when you’re struggling to write regularly or can’t seem to earn a living as a freelance writer—maybe you need to take a long-term perspective.

—J. K. Rowling

Using Plot Points and Pinch Points in a Story with a Twist Ending

Recently I’ve had a few readers ask the same question:

What exactly is a pinch point and how do you differentiate it from everything else in a story?

Okay, first, here’s the most important thing you need to know about plot points and pinch points:

They always need to be developed from the reader’s point of view.

[For the definition of plot points and pinch points, see my earlier post.]

What a Pinch Point Is, and Is Not

One of my blog followers (politely) argued that he thought the second pinch point in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone shouldn’t be the successive scenes of Snape showing Filch his Fluffy-bitten leg and trying to curse Harry off his broom but should instead be the scene in the Forbidden Forest when something creepy (i.e., Voldemort) slithers out of the darkness and drinks the blood of a dead unicorn—because, in the end, Voldemort is the real antagonist, not Snape.

I agree that the slithering something is definitely a what-the-freaky-heck-is-that moment, but let me explain why it cannot count be the second pinch point.

A pinch point, as defined by Larry Brooks in Story Engineering, is

an example, or a reminder, of the nature and implications of the antagonistic force.

Essentially, a pinch point is meant to show your readers the powerful forces pushing against your hero. Which means that your readers have to identify the bad guy as the bad guy for your pinch points to have any meaning.

This is especially important to understand if you’re writing a mystery, or any story with a twist ending (which Rowling has a particular penchant for in the Harry Potter series: Quirrell in book one; Ginny in book two; Sirius in book three, etc).

Plot points and pinch points act like a metronome for you as the writer, giving your story beats and keeping it on tempo, but if you have a twist ending or a hidden antagonist whom your readers aren’t meant to recognize until later, then those “secret beats” won’t mean anything to anyone but you. Instead, your readers will be confused and bored with a story that looks like it isn’t going anywhere (even though you know it is).

That’s why plot points and pinch points need to be developed from the reader’s point of view.

An Example: Snape as Antagonist

In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Rowling presents Snape as the supposed antagonist. Quirrell (which includes Voldemort) is the hidden antagonist. This means that the pinch points in Sorcerer’s Stone need to be directed at Snape, not Quirrell, in order for readers to feel like the story is progressing.

(But remember, it’s still absolutely vital to drop hints about the twist ending so readers don’t also feel gypped at the big reveal; the fastest way to lose readers’ respect is to trick them.)

Notice, then, that Rowling sneakily interjects Quirrell into Snape’s pinch points—for example, when Harry’s scar sears in pain while looking past Quirrell’s turban at Snape. It’s such an innocent detail that we breeze right past it, not realizing that it’s actually critical. However, since that turban clue doesn’t mean anything at the time, Rowling needs to keep us interested until it does.

How?

By focusing on the red-herring antagonist, Snape, so we feel like the story’s going somewhere—just not where we think.

Same goes for the second pinch point. We think that Snape is trying to curse Harry off his broom at the Quidditch match, but Snape is actually trying to protect Harry from Quirrell’s incantation. Rowling ties everything together below the story’s surface.

The What versus the Who

All of this goes for plot points as well. Whatever is presented to the readers as “the story” (even if it’s a farce) is what needs to follow the story structure of first plot point, midpoint, and second plot point. Between all of that, you still need to squeeze in the clues that reveal “the real story.”

But that’s actually not very difficult, because a story’s red-herring antagonist (as depicted in the pinch points) typically determines the direction of the real story anyway.

For example, the two big plot questions in Sorcerer’s Stone are:

What is hidden in the third-floor corridor, and who is trying to steal it?

Like most of Rowling’s Potter books, we eventually figure out the what (the sorcerer’s stone), but we’re as confused as Harry about the who. We think the antagonist is Snape, but then we realize that it’s actually Quirrell, who is, ultimately, Voldemort.

So, the plot stays the same; it’s only our view of the characters that changes.

In short, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone could arguably be viewed as a pinch point for the whole Potter series, since it’s where we first come face-to-face with the evil power of Voldemort, but that individual scene with Voldemort drinking the blood of the unicorn cannot be a pinch point for Sorcerer’s Stone because a pinch point depends on the reader’s understanding of who the antagonist is.

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Don’t Fall into This Trap: Hogwarts Is Not Why Harry Potter Became a Best-Seller

If you were to ask yourself, Why was the Harry Potter series so record-smashingly popular?

It’d be easy to think, Well, Hogwarts, of course.

The Hogwarts setting is so imaginative, so detailed, so enthralling. In fact, that’s what Rowling herself used to think (“the magic is so fun and the idea of this hidden world is so appealing”). But then in 2011, she changed her mind.

She had gained some perspective, she said, after talking to thousands upon thousands of fans. The appeal of her story had nothing to do with setting at all. What was it? She realized that:

[readers had fallen] in love with the characters.

Character Trumps Setting

Some of the most popular novels recently have had memorable settings (e.g., The Hunger Games and Divergent), so it’s tempting to think that a unique setting is the be-all, end-all of a blockbuster book. It isn’t.

Only one thing can create a fresh, gripping story: character.

Or to be exact: character in conflict.

How to Create Characters in Conflict

Sample Study: This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Every year I reread The Great Gatsby, but this year I also read for the first time This Side of Paradise, which was Fitzgerald’s first published book.

One of Fitzgerald’s greatest talents as a writer was his ability to succinctly yet so clearly portray each of his characters’ inner and outer conflicts.

For example, here’s how he introduces the character Rosalind in This Side of Paradise.

Rosalind is—utterly Rosalind. She is one of those girls who need never make the slightest effort to have men fall in love with them. Two types of men seldom do: dull men are usually afraid of her cleverness and intellectual men are usually afraid of her beauty. All others are hers by natural prerogative.

If Rosalind could be spoiled the process would have been complete by this time, and as a matter of fact, her disposition is not all it should be; she wants what she wants when she wants it and she is prone to make every one around her pretty miserable when she doesn’t get it—but in the true sense she is not spoiled. Her fresh enthusiasm, her will to grow and learn, her endless faith in the inexhaustibility of romance, her courage and fundamental honesty—these things are not spoiled.

There are long periods when she cordially loathes her whole family. She is quite unprincipled; her philosophy is carpe diem for herself and laissez faire for others. She loves shocking stories: she has that coarse streak that usually goes with natures that are both fine and big. She wants people to like her, but if they do not it never worries her or changes her.

She is by no means a model character.

The education of all beautiful women is the knowledge of men. Rosalind has been disappointed in man after man as individuals, but she had great faith in man as a sex. Women she detested. They represented qualities that she felt and despised in herself—incipient meanness, conceit, cowardice, and petty dishonesty. She once told a roomful of her mother’s friends that the only excuse for women was the necessity for a disturbing element among men. She danced exceptionally well, drew cleverly but hastily, and had a startling facility with words, which she used only in love-letters.

The foreword to the 1996 edition of This Side of Paradise said that Fitzgerald was criticized for “the novel’s lack of polish, its dreadful spelling and frequent gaffs in word-choice.” These would ultimately prevent the book from reaching “the permanent heights of acclaim attained by his later works,” but still Paradise received “outstanding reviews and sold spectacularly.”

Why?

Because Fitzgerald built his story around interesting characters who were dealing with interesting conflicts.

Second Sample Study: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Great Gatsby is one of the most celebrated novels of all time—and it is all about characters in conflict.

Here’s how Fitzgerald introduces Tom Buchanan, a character who absolutely must be believable in order for readers to accept the story’s ending:

And so it happened that on a warm windy evening I drove over to East Egg to see two old friends whom I scarcely knew at all. Their house was even more elaborate than I expected, a cheerful red-and-white Georgian Colonial mansion, overlooking the bay. The lawn started at the beach and ran toward the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over sun-dials and brick walls and burning gardens—finally when it reached the house drifting up the side in bright vines as though from the momentum of its run. The front was broken by a line of French windows, glowing now with reflected gold and wide open to the warm windy afternoon, and Tom Buchanan in riding clothes was standing with his legs apart on the front porch.

He had changed since his New Haven [Yale] years. Now he was a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner. Two shining arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. Not even the effeminate swank of his riding clothes could hide the enormous power of that body—he seemed to fill those glistening boots until he strained the top lacing, and you could see a great pack of muscle shifting when his shoulder moved under his thin coat. It was a body capable of enormous leverage—a cruel body.

Gatsby became a classic not because its setting of extreme wealth in the Jazz Age was interesting. It became a classic because Fitzgerald perfected the art of characters in conflict.

How to Create the Best Characters

One of Rowling’s greatest strengths as a writer is her ability to create complex, lifelike characters (Stephen King called her the current champ of backstory). I’ve included a chart below found on Tumblr which lists the different personality types of the Potter characters—look at all that conflict!

If you struggle with character development, I recommend Please Understand Me II by David Keirsey. It was my 2013 number one pick for best writing books. It’s actually a psychology book and it analyzes the sixteen types of personalities, covering everything from societal roles to parenting styles to sex lives.

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Story Structure in ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’

Since writing my series of posts on story structure for Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, I’ve been asked numerous times to analyze another Potter book, particularly one of the longer, more complex ones. So I’ve picked the longest, beastliest book of the bunch: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

(Of course my analysis will only be as helpful to you as your recollection of Phoenix, so feel free to skim through a summary of the plot for a refresher.)

This post will be a quick look at the specific plot points and pinch points in Phoenix—I won’t be repeating all the lengthy definitions and explanations of story structure from my first set of posts.

(If it’s been a while, you can reread my post, or you can simply buy Larry Brooks’ Story Engineering, which landed on my 2012 list of best writing books and is the bedrock of everything in this post.)

What Story Structure Looks Like

All right, let’s get down to it. Below is a graph of story structure in its most basic form:

Now here is a graph of the pinch points and plot points in Order of the Phoenix:

How to Identify the Main Storyline

Rowling has several subplots in Phoenix. To name only a few:

Harry’s romance with Cho;
Harry’s Occlumency lessons with Snape;
and Harry’s ongoing feud with Dolores Umbridge.

These subplots, however, still tie in to and enhance the main plot, which is:

Voldemort’s attempts to acquire a secret weapon and Harry’s attempts to stop him.

[Note: It’s important to know as the writer exactly what your main plot is, because your main plot determines what your story’s pinch points will be.]

What You Need for the First Plot Point

Remember that the first plot point has to fulfill two criteria:

1) The hero needs to get his marching orders.

2) He needs to set out on a journey (otherwise known as “the point of no return”).

No one wants to read about a hero who has a mission but nowhere to go, or vice versa, a hero who’s going somewhere but has no mission.

Harry gets his “marching orders” in Phoenix when Sirius tells him that Voldemort is trying to acquire a weapon; soon after Harry sets out on his journey to Hogwarts.

Understanding Anomalies in Story Structure

In both Phoenix and Sorcerer’s Stone, the placement of Part Four of story structure—The Resolution—falls short of the expected 20-percent mark.

This variance is typical in books that rely heavily on uncovering a mystery (in these two cases, a stone and a weapon). Once that mystery is revealed it’s a mad rush to the finish, thus the shorter ending.

What Rowling Did Wrong: On Respecting the Rights of Readers

Last month J. K. Rowling started a hullabaloo when she questioned the suitability and long-term viability of Ron and Hermione’s relationship.

I personally wasn’t fazed by the whole who-should-be-with-who argument. What did concern me was that Rowling had overstepped her bounds as an author by casting doubt on a storyline she had already finished.

The Harry Potter series had (and still has) a huge impact on the literary world, which means that Rowling has a huge impact on the literary world. She is currently the most well-known example of what it means to be a writer—and that’s why her comment irks me. It disrespects the relationship between writer and reader.

I know some of you disagree with me. You say that Rowling clearly identifies with Hermione and is more musing on her own life than on the lives of her characters. But here’s the thing:

You’re absolutely right.

The Potter characters obviously mean a great deal to Rowling. In a 2012 interview with Oprah, she said:

When [Harry Potter] ended, I was in a slight state of shock. Initially I was elated, but then there came a point [when] I cried as I’ve only cried once before in my life and that was when my mother died. It was uncontrollable . . . For 17 years I’d had [these books], through some very tumultuous times in my personal life, and I’d always had that. It was an escape for all these children; you can imagine what it had been for me.

And when Oprah said, “But you know what happens ever after,” Rowling replied:

Yeah, I do. I couldn’t stop. I don’t think you can stop when you’ve been that involved with characters for that long. It’s still all in there. They’re all in my head still. I mean, I could definitely write an eighth, ninth, tenth [book].

Let me clarify.

I’m not saying that Rowling doesn’t have the right to portray her characters as she sees fit or that she doesn’t have the right to vicariously portray herself through her characters. I would’ve had no problem with Rowling’s Ron/Hermione comment if she had written those ideas in an eighth, ninth, or tenth book.

But once a writer puts down her pen, she’s handed over the imaginative rights of her story to her readers, and it’s disrespectful to take that back and say, No, this is actually what happens, no matter how you imagined it.

Just after finishing the final Potter book, Rowling said:

It gives me a certain satisfaction to say what I thought happened and to tell other people that, because I would like my version to be the official version still even though I haven’t written it in a book. Because it’s my world.

Part of me agrees with her. She did spend years writing Harry Potter and it is her world . . . but then there’s another part of me that says, Isn’t that selfish, though?

Rowling insists she’s done with Potter, yet she won’t allow her readers to keep the story alive in their own imaginations and in their own ways.

In the end this argument boils down to one simple question: where does a writer draw the line between her rights as creator and her responsibility to readers?

I firmly believe that the best books come from writers who have the utmost respect for their readers; they’re driven to create better stories, better characters, and better worlds because they have too much respect for their readers to give anything less.

And yes, Rowling has done that in so many ways . . . I just have to disagree with her on this one.

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Letting Go after Publishing: Why Rowling Shouldn’t Have Commented on Ron and Hermione’s Relationship

Have you heard the latest buzz in the Muggle world?

Hermione-actress Emma Watson interviewed J. K. Rowling for the British entertainment mag Wonderland and some of Rowling’s quotes have made quite a stir.

The magazine itself doesn’t hit newsstands until next week, but snippets of the interview have leaked, wherein Rowling claims she made a mistake pairing Hermione with Ron instead of Harry:

I wrote the Hermione/Ron relationship as a form of wish fulfillment. That’s how it was conceived, really. For reasons that have very little to do with literature and far more to do with me clinging to the plot as I first imagined it, Hermione ended up with Ron.

She goes on to say:

I know, I’m sorry. I can hear the rage and fury it might cause some fans, but if I’m absolutely honest, distance has given me perspective on that. It was a choice I made for very personal reasons, not for reasons of credibility. Am I breaking people’s hearts by saying this? I hope not.

She also adds that Hermione and Ron will probably end up in couple’s therapy.

Not surprisingly, Potter fans have taken sides on the issue. Personally, I’m for leaving Hermione and Ron alone, and here’s why:

Rowling finished writing the books.

That’s it. That’s my only reason.

A writer will always have the itch to go back and change things. Words are permanent and you want everything to be perfect, I get that, but I’m coming from a reader’s perspective.

Any time a writer tries to dial back the clock and correct or clarify something that’s already been published, she pulls apart her intricately woven story and exposes all the ugly wires underneath. She reminds her readers that it was “only a story.” Not real people in a real world trying to solve real problems but just some characters slapped on a page.

To write an enthralling story is to create an illusion—a magic trick—and every time Rowling steps in and says, Oh wait, I should’ve done this instead, the illusion is spoiled.

Furthermore, by questioning Ron and Hermione’s relationship, Rowling violated the rights of her readers. Check out my next post for more on that.