Let’s imagine your story is like a river, and your main character is traveling down it in a canoe.
When we meet your character on page one, they’ve been paddling the same way for a long time. Maybe they don’t like it, but it’s comfortable and seems safe. It’s gotten them this far, anyway.
But then out of nowhere, they come upon a waterfall and before they know it, they’re falling. They’re thrown from the canoe, which breaks and is taking on water. Your poor character is in the river now, clutching what remains of their canoe. They’re still trying to assess the damage from the waterfall when they realize that up ahead, the river divides.
Now they have to make an educated guess about which direction is the wisest to go. So as best they can with the information they have, they steer the canoe in one direction. Maybe as they start down that way, they realize, “No, bad choice! I should’ve picked differently,” but the current is so strong that they’re locked in now, and the only way to go is forward. Or maybe they feel good about their choice, and they can’t see the rough waters ahead quite yet.
If you’re writing a hero’s journey style story that’s the beginning of your story. Your character is comfort is the home world, the waterfall is the inciting incident, and choosing the stream—a decision they can’t reverse—is what sends us into act two of the story.
(If you want more info on the hero’s journey, here’s a post that might help: How To Develop Your Story Idea Into A List of Key Scenes
The middle of the book is a struggle for many writers. Since Act II is sooooo vast, I’ve found it helpful to think of the middle in two parts. Act II Part A and Part B. And those are divided by a big middle scene.
Act II Part A
Something that I learned from K. M. Weiland is during this part of the book (typically the 25%-50% range of your manuscript) your main character is in a period of reaction.
They’re active—that’s very important—but they’re still reacting to that waterfall moment. They’re trying to get the canoe fixed or trying to get back in the canoe. Their action is related to what happened back at the waterfall, not necessarily to what’s downstream.
In my WWII novel, Within These Lines, the inciting incident is the evacuation of the Japanese Americans. After that happens around 25% of the way through the story, the characters need time to react, mourn, and grieve.
Evalina does this by spending time putting together care packages, writing letters to the government and newspapers, and writing letters to Taichi. Even though these are all actions she’s taking, they’re a reaction to what happened to her at the inciting incident.
Meanwhile, Taichi has been evacuated and is being confronted with (historically accurate) bad thing after bad thing after bad thing. Just like Evalina, Taichi is in a phase of trying to regain his footing after going down the waterfall. He has not yet found the inner strength to fight back or push for change. He’s still just trying to get back in the canoe.
During this 25%-50% of the story, we should definitely be showing how the characters are growing into who they need to be to succeed later in the story. As you show them trying to get back in the canoe, they’re learning and changing. They are still primarily reacting … but actively.
What if you don’t know how long your book is going to be?
But what if you haven’t written very many novels (or any) so you don’t know how long a story is going to take? How do you even know if you’re in Part A or Part B of the middle?
When I was writing my first few books, I didn’t know much about story structure or how long novels should actually be. Even after I learned about those things, figuring out “this size of an idea equals approximately this many words” took time and practice. It will for you too.
So, if you’re still early in your writing journey, when you’re reading posts like this I would try to just soak it in, but not actively work to apply it to your writing. Otherwise you can get so hung up on what you’re “supposed to do” it can trip you up as you’re creating. You’re job is just to the write the story in the way that seems best to you.
What do you feel you struggle with the most in the middle of your story?
Thanks for the reminder that the middle is a reaction to the waterfall. I actually really like that analogy, and it makes more sense than some of the others I’ve heard!
I think my hardest part of the middle is making sure my characters are still actually doing something and struggling and trying to push through before I dump them in the climax.
It was a really helpful way for me to think about story, so I’m glad it was useful for you too!
Yes, keeping characters active is a struggle sometimes!
Really great analogy and advice.
I think when I was first writing I was so focused on the end game and trying to do “advanced” things like percentages & stuff that I didn’t take time to learn, feel, and make mistakes. I have a different mindset now 🙂
After one of the early writing conferences I went to, a friend of mine who was also new to writing said to me, “I think I’m too educated for my pay grade right now.” Those early conferences can be so overwhelming! In an effort to grow and try to avoid mistakes with writing, it’s easy to get caught up on a lot of things that don’t matter yet and forget to focus on telling stories.
Absolutely, its easy to get caught up in education & marketing. That’s why right now, for me, certain things are off the table. It’s about learning the craft.
The hardest part of the middle for me is the individual sections. I have the big picture figured out, along with a good portion of the chapters, just there’s some scenes I still need to figure out.
I have one character’s whole side of the story planned out, but for the other character it seems like there’s too many time gaps.
I understand that! It can be hard to get every character moving along at a good pace.
I know exactly what you mean. It’s been the same with my WIP. There’s still so much I still have to piece together. It can be overwhelming at times, but I just keep reminding myself that the editing process exists for a reason. Sometimes I’ll figure things out along the way, and some things I guess will surprise me when I reach my ending. Sometimes you just need a clearer view of the pieces you have to find out what pieces you need.
I’ve never heard the story middle explained in this way. It makes soo much sense, and will be beneficial to my writing.
I’m currently approaching the middle of my story. ? I would say my weak point is making sure everything is happening naturally, while still maintaining momentum.
I love the river analogy. It will be a big help as I finish my draft and edit what I already have.
I’m approaching the middle of my WIP. My protagonist has just been locked in the dungeon, looking at deadly punishment. My antagonist is having a little celebration for herself, and cracks a plan to marry the king of the next-door kingdom, who later teams with my protagonist. It’s confusing, though. I have no clue yet how these decisions, and evil plans are going to affect my protagonist’s goal…. Middles kinda scare me!
My biggest struggle was: what are my characters supposed to do all the time? K. M. Weiland’s approach helped me too. Dividing the second Act into reacting and proactively acting (after the Midpoint) helped me a lot. But everything fell into place with her mention of the pinch points (you can find that on her website, I think in de Structuring serie). It was like a lightbulb: so my antagonist is actually also doing things, beside coming along when I needed him (in Act III)? He is actually planning and scheming too? That openend such a world of possibilities, that the middle of the story became suddenly fun to outline and write.
I really like the idea of Act II Parts A and B. I’m working on editing my novel right now and I have a decent idea of where the Act breaks are, theoretically, but I haven’t really delved into that concept that much yet. I think it’ll be fun, at least, and helpful.
What I find hardest about middles is keeping up a sort of low-level narrative tension to draw the readers along without boring them. I was stuck trying to figure out what I needed for a while, then a writer buddy mentioned this and I realized I had good overarching plot tension but little scene-to-scene draw. I’m still figuring out how to add this–maybe working backwards from my different Act separations will help me decide what needs to be going on to keep things moving? But anyway, great post!