Ellen McGinty is an author and editor of Young Adult fantasy and historical fiction. She lives in the Tokyo metropolis with her husband, three boys, and a hypoallergenic cat. When not writing or editing, you can find her exploring the wilds of Japan with an abundance of espresso and the occasional kimono. Her debut YA fantasy novel, Saints & Monsters, with dragons, lots of heart, and autoimmune rep releases with Quill & Flame Publishers in March 2024.

If you could capture the essence of manga in a fiction novel, would you? Many stories in manga and anime seem to possess an otherworldly quality, a depth of insight, and remarkable twists found lacking in so many stories nestled in American publishing houses. If you’ve read the fantastic twists in manga like One Piece or The Promised Neverland, or even in Korean dramas like Parasite, then you know what I’m talking about! There’s just something different about East Asian stories, and Japanese manga in particular. What can writers learn from these stories? Do they follow a different structure?

The Basics: 

The west has an age-old obsession with goals, efficiency, and blueprints. It relies largely on the Three Act Structure (though there are four, five, and seven acts as well). We have the Hero’s Journey from Vogler, Save the Cat by Blake Snyder, Freytag’s Pyramid, and countless books on story engineering, breaking those plots into scenes and beats and micro beats.

When I first embarked on the journey to become a published author, I thought that if I just mastered these then I’d write an amazing book. But after studying countless methodologies, I quickly discovered that there is so much more to story than a formula—thank goodness! It’s that artistic freedom of expression that draws many of us to write in the first place. Once I started giving my stories breathing room, they began to flourish.

Then I moved to Japan and discovered another structure, sometimes referred to as “plotless structure” or “plot without conflict.” Enter: Kishotenketsu—a story structure developed from ancient Chinese poetry and widely used in manga and East Asian literature.

Kishotenketsu: Four-Part Story Structure

起Ki – the beginning
承 Sho – the development
転 Ten – the twist
結 Ketsu – the conclusion

According to a manga artist I interviewed, this structure informs their understanding of story. But their advice? Study the plot, but master the character. In essence, keep in mind that the structure is more of a guideline, not a detailed blueprint. Captain Barbossa had it right when he said, “The code is more what you’d call guidelines, than actual rules.”

The structure is quite simple:

Of course, before plotting a story you need a strong hook. The simpler the better. This is your premise in one sentence. A young boy with devil-fruit powers sets out to become king of the pirates. (One Piece)

Now the plot:

1. 起The Beginning: Introduce the characters and the world. The interesting thing about the kishotenketsu is that it doesn’t necessarily require conflict or an inciting incident, though many have them. Conflict isn’t built into the framework by default, but it’s still often part of the narrative.

Monkey D. Luffy finds his first crew mates, establishes some of his backstory and the world.

2. 承The Development: This is about expansion and tension, not necessarily change. It explores the characters and world. In shonen (boy’s action/adventure) manga it’s also where complications emerge and tension builds.

Luffy makes more friends, gets to know them and their stories, but he must also battle sea kings, fishmen, other pirates to help his friends.

3. 転The Twist: This event is placed similarly to the climax of a western story. The key to the twist is that it’s unexpected, and usually unrelated to the previous two acts. It’s a surprise that forces the character to react. It doesn’t have to be tragic, but could be played for comedic effects as well, the possibilities are endless.

*Spoilers* One of his friends betrays him just when the pirates need her most and steals everything!

4.結The Conclusion: This connects the twist to the rest of the narrative in a coherent picture.It’s howthe character responds and adapts to the new turn of events.

*Spoilers* Luffy refuses to accept his friend’s desertion. He believes the best in others when they don’t believe in themselves and fights to win his friend back.

Sounds similar to western story structure doesn’t it? Both have hooks, tension, and compelling characters. The main difference is that the development of the story IS the development of the character and the emotional attachment of the reader. Manga, at its core, usually has a character driven plot, this is especially true of sports manga like Slam Dunk or Cross Game. When interviewing my manga artist friend about story elements, he listed the order of importance as: character, tension/emotional impact, and simplicity.

TOOL 1: Establish Characters

It makes sense that manga would rely heavily on character as a visual medium. In many ways, manga is exceptional at Deep POV—the art of writing as if in the character’s head without filters like “saw, wondered, heard” and at showing instead of telling. Manga takes its time to depict character emotions and personality in an unflinching way.

Japanese stories can be so adept at drawing out an emotional connection. It’s as though every character is an oyster buffeted by waves and pried open with painful slowness. You never know when it will pop open or what will come out. Will the character’s persistence result in a pearl? Or will it snap from the pressure and sink to the ocean floor? The “twist” in the kishotenketsu is often related to this part of the character’s journey.

Character psychology plays a large role in the visual design, the backstory, facial expressions, and even the panel layout. While novel writers don’t have the advantage of visual drawings, we do have other tools to express emotion and cue a reader’s emotional connection and response:

1. White space and sentence length

2. Dialogue with action tags (and the absence of tags!) like “he said” or “His jaw clenched”

3. Strong verbs

4. Using all five senses

4. Deep POV

5. Showing instead of Telling

6. Close-ups: Manga artists were actually inspired by the cinema’s technique of close-ups. Disney does close-ups very well with zooming in and out of scenes to shift between the big picture and the character’s internal struggle. Fiction writers use this almost intuitively to focus on one character with sensory details you’d only notice if close-up with a camera. These scenes are best interspersed with more distant or wide-shot scenes. The “close-up” is an important tool that allows readers time to feel the character’s emotion.

TOOL 2: Tension and Emotional Impact

Manga is often written in installments and serialized, much like early Victorian writers such as Dickens. Since it’s written with a “snapshot” mindset and built on twists, it keeps the reader engaged and wanting more every time. I’ve noticed some Indie authors using this method to serialize their books into shorter arcs and then compile them into a novel with good success. Another way manga builds tension is with solid subplots and deep secondary characters that have their own twists. Fiction writers can use those techniques too!

TOOL 3: Simplicity

A top cause of rejection for both manga artists and authors is this: the story is too complicated. Keep it simple. Simmer your story idea into a one line pitch that grabs the reader, then test it! Is the character interesting enough? Is the tension apparent? Write this one line with active verbs and strong word choices. The example below is for a manga, but using a western structure for the premise:

When (inciting incident occurs), a (specific character) must complete (goal), or else (stakes).

For example:

When his family is murdered by oni, a young boy sets out to find a cure for his sister, the sole survivor of the tragedy before it’s too late. (Kimetsu no Yaiba/Demon Slayer)

Have you seen these tools at work in manga or anime? Ever tried them in fiction? Share in the comments.

Ellen has generously offered to give away a copy of her book Saints & Monsters to one Go Teen Writers reader. Enter on the Rafflecopter form below. Here’s the story:

With her crooked spine and reckless heart, Princess Meera always knew she wasn’t meant to become queen of Ezo. But when her sister, the rightful heir, is cursed on the eve of her coronation, Meera must defend her kingdom from ruthless invaders by taking the throne. Yet, while some countries have simple coronations, in Ezo . . . the princess must first claim a sea dragon.

Only the dragon is vicious, perfect, and whole—everything Meera is not. And if the dragon doesn’t deem her worthy, it will devour her. Turning to the Saints for help, she doesn’t anticipate that her actions will transform the dragon into a mortal, or that she’ll steal his heart . . . literally.

Now, as two hearts beat inside Meera’s chest, she’s reminded that her life is entwined with a dragon, who despises her weaknesses. Despite their differences, they must work together to reverse the curse and save the kingdom before more is lost than their stolen hearts.