How Five-Part Structure Can Make Revision Easier

During tonight’s #ScribeChat we’re discussing how to edit your manuscript, and one of my bibles for self-revision is a wonderful book by Elizabeth Lyon, MANUSCRIPT MAKEOVER, in which she states that:

“Understanding and reflecting dramatic structure is fundamental to fiction writing.”

For typically structured manuscripts she suggests employing a five-stage structure during your analysis of your manuscript’s strengths and weaknesses. In essence, it goes something like this:

1. A character has a problem
2. Complications arise and conflict intensifies
3. Crises culminate in a climax
4. The problem is resolved
5. The hero or heroine learns something about self or life.

If you can answer the questions of each stage, you’re a long way to achieving a well-structured manuscript, and even if you didn’t know your theme before, it should be apparent by the time you’ve answered them.

I’ll be adding to this post after the chat, but this will get you started!

Further Reading:

Blogs:

• Jungle Red’s interview with Elizabeth Lyon
• Jody Hedlund: Three Simple Stages of Self-Editing

Books:

• Self-Editing for Fiction Writers
• Revision and Self-Editing by James Scott Bell
• Make A Scene by Jordan E. Rosenfeld
• The Power of Point of View by Alicia Rasley