Plotting Workshop
Copyright 1999 by Leigh Michaels
Each participant is given four different-colored index cards, one for each of the following categories. Each individual's four cards do not have to relate to each other or form a story together. (Or an individual can put the following suggestions on cards, and add cards to any category as ideas occur.)
Card 1. Heroine. What makes her unusual? Her job? Her personality quirks?
(She's very short and sensitive about it. She wears purple every day. She's clairvoyant-- she can see the future. She's a struggling singer/song writer. She's an exhausted widowed mother tired of waiting on her grown children. She's an accountant who can't balance her own checkbook. She's afraid of heights. She's a top fashion model. She sells toys. She runs a gift shop. She's the spoiled-brat daughter of a wealthy man.)
Card 2. Hero. What makes him unusual? His hobby? His past?
(He's a record producer for a large company. He's trying to establish a veterinary practice. He's a doctor but he doesn't want to practice his specialty. He's blind. He's a very tall Wall Street broker. He's a single airline pilot with a girl in every airport. He's a college teacher with a sassy daughter.)
Card 3. Setting. Geographical location, or a type of setting.
(Small rural town, run-down Victorian house, ghost town in Texas, amusement arcade, Cape Cod, sophisticated bed-and-breakfast inn, a grocery store, large city church with big music department, small college town in Minnesota, Santa Monica--on the Pacific Ocean, London.)
Card 4. Basic problem/situation. What's going on, right now?
(The heroine's treasured cat needs immediate and expensive medical care. Local flooding has stranded people. She has to give a speech and she's never done it before. She needs a job immediately to support herself and her child. She's free with money, he's tight. She's received a bagful of jewels by messenger and has no idea where they came from. He's just inherited his sister's twins. She's lost all her money and credit cards and is far from home. Her family thinks she should provide for them with the money she just won in the lottery. Hero and heroine are locked in a warehouse together and can't get out anytime in the next 72 hours. He has a skiing accident and breaks both legs. They're both trying to purchase the same item at an auction.)
Keep the categories separate. Draw one card from each category and using what-if and backwards plotting techniques, make them into a story.
This exercise is copyrighted material and is offered for the individual's own use. Further distribution or sale is not permitted.