Climbing the writing mountain

I’m beginning to plan what my writing groups will be doing this ‘term’ after the summer break. With both groups, creative writing and the family history writing group, I am in a way going back to the beginning, reviewing what we have done over the last few years, but trying to explore other approaches.

I broke down the way most stories work and this is what we worked with previously (the same can apply for the most part to writing a family history)

the events: what happens
the reason behind the events: why it happens
the triggers to the action: how it happens
the extras: information to understand the story
the complications; unexpected events which change the situation
the climax: the exciting bits when everything changes, the turning point
the solution: how it comes to an end, the outcome
the resolution: closing remarks, end piece, summing up, epilogue

… and things I suggested were worth remembering to check on were:

plot
people
POV – point of view
purpose
place
pace

A writing friend shared a different way to tackle writing a story – using the same points and ideas but presented in a visual way.

Now for once I am not using my own photo, bu here is one I downloaded –

The idea is that writing a story follows a similar pattern to climbing an imaginary pointy-shaped mountain, It’s like a journey and there shouldn’t be too much slogging through the foothills of plot, before there is the beginnings of an ascent. Maybe the ascent should be fairly gentle, but there nearly always has to be a bit of a gallop towards the summit, before the journey back down – which should be as interesting as the ascent – leads to the completion, and maybe a deckchair paragraph or two to sit down and reflect on what’s been accomplished.

Here is the plan:

Up: