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The "Scene/Sequel" Writing Approach
🕑 Added 2021-01-22 20:05:37 +0000 UTC
THIS WEEK I have been putting my story notes through a writing process originally referred to as the “SCENE / SEQUEL” approach. If you are a writer and are curious about new ways to approach story-making, I recommend just giving it a shot. The instructions are straightforward, the requirements are low.
But! Before you do, only take this into consideration: I find the Scene / Sequel approach is best used as a tool for analysis. It is a process or an approach, not a solution or formula. Use it to investigate the nooks and crannies of your story, not to grow new branches (or—yikes—proceed from start to finish). I'll explain why later.
Here is your introduction to the Scene / Sequel approach:
- I first heard about it in this writeup from Jim Butcher. In separate posts, he describes a “Scene” and he describes a “Sequel.”
- More recently, I found this good critique. Read it as well. In general, I find advice is best when you know its strengths and weaknesses, when you hear out its proponents and detractors.
Now, since the terms “Scene” and “Sequel” sound too much like other useful writing terms, let’s throw them out. It is a shitty name. Others have recommended “Proactive/Reactive,” or “Heads / Tails.” I like the latter.
I picked up this approach to solve a problem. I had given the 500,000-word second draft of my novel—then called WITCH PROJECT—to trusted readers, and had received the following feedback:
- It is very long.
- It lacked emotional flavour.
I interpreted this feedback like so: it is okay for a book to be long if it doesn’t feel long. If it feels long, it’s because the story is lagging or sleepy or redundant or unclear. As for the emotional element, I knew there were emotions in the story. They drive a lot of our character’s choices. But perhaps I had left them to reader inference to too-great a degree. Maybe I needed to surface them better. I wasn’t articulating them well enough.
I wanted this book to be good. (Goal.) But people were telling me it “wasn’t there yet.” (Conflict.) I needed to get back to work. (Disaster.)
I felt daunted by the prospect of revising 500,000 words, but I was determined to make the book good. (Emotion.) I had spent too much time on it and I liked elements of it too much. I knew it was close. The right elements were there, but they were cluttered or buried. (Review, Reason.) If I just had a new way to look at it, I could probably re-focus the wandering parts of the story and reveal the more intimate, emotional aspect that had driven so much of the story, but which I did not put into words. (Anticipation.) So I chose to dig around and see if there was a method that would give me some support on my next stab at the book. (Choice.)
Knowing that, for some reason, writers use index cards to structure their stories, I searched for “index card story writing technique” or something like that. I probably followed a few links and ended up on Butcher’s Scene/Sequel writeups. I don’t remember exactly what about them spoke to me. Perhaps it was his talk about “cool” and “warm” books—I had a cool book on my hands and wanted it to be warmer. Maybe I liked that this approach felt easy to access. Regardless, I decided to try it.
With my entire story in mind, I went through and re-wrote it on a series of index cards, alternating scene and sequel, or heads and tails. I took all my story beats and re-mapped them as closely as possible to the heads/tails format. This was my approach to the cards:
HEADS
- POV Character: Madeline. (It’s always Madeline, because the book is written from a third-person limited POV, and it’s Madeline’s POV. Elements of the story depend on it. So the answer for this field is always Madeline.)
- GOAL: I figured out what Madeline wanted to achieve in this story beat. We always talk about what our protagonists “want.” This is where I reminded myself what that might be.
- CONFLICT: I wrote down the obstacle(s) in her way. Often, I have a hard time distinguishing this point from the next one, “Disaster.”
- OUTCOME / SETBACK / DISASTER: Does Madeline achieve what she wanted? Butcher describes the three available options: “yes;” “no;” and “no, and furthermore…” He says never to let this answer be “yes.” As a diehard contrarian, I looked for good spots to get away with a “yes,” but it never made the story more interesting.
TAILS
- EMOTIONAL REACTION: How does the setback make Madeline feel?
- REVIEW AND REASON: Madeline thinks about this setback. What happened? Why? What sort of shape is she in now? What has changed about other characters, or their relationship with her? This was often a good place to remind myself of the stakes. Stakes are important.
- ANTICIPATION: She reviews options. She looks into the future, thinks about the directions available to her and their outcomes.
- CHOICE: Madeline picks a new direction; she has a new goal. Here is where I reassert the character’s agency, and agency is important.
And then? I re-wrote the entire book. I had planned on simply revising it, but it was easier to start from scratch, copying things over where appropriate.
I found the heads/tails approach very helpful! I eliminated a few redundant chapters and had a much clearer image of the emotional elements. I had neglected to include much “anticipation” on my characters’ part, and introducing more of that made the story more digestible, I think. And I feel like the chapters found natural conclusions (usually either a disaster or Madeline making a choice) and clip along in a more natural fashion.
Heads/Tails was very beneficial to WITCH PROJECT. So I thought I’d give it a shot for DD4, only at an earlier point in the process; I developed my original outline into a storyline made out of Post-It note beats and details. Then, I jammed that story into the Heads/Tails grinder. What did I find?
It was more difficult using the Heads/Tails approach this early on in the writing process.
The biggest problem I had was that this approach—especially when executed on index cards—naturally encouraged me to think of the story in same-sized chunks. I felt like I was pouring my story into an ice-cube tray. I don’t want ice cubes, I want a more natural feel, like a shattered block of ice: there will be big chunks, small chunks, rough chunks, smooth chunks, slivers and nuggets and specks and mounds. I don’t want the story to tick like a metronome. I want it to keep a steady beat, sure, but I also want it to have melodic swells, and quiet passages, and frenetic parts. The Heads/Tails approach did not encourage that.
This approach initially did not seem suited to the opening sequence I currently like. In it, DD and her parents are aboard a ship, heading “home” to England, where she will celebrate her thirteenth birthday. She’s looking forward to learning to be an English Lady, which she assumes will involve a lot of proper swordsmanship and she’ll be taught how to ride the big horses. But there are fears of pirates on the water, and her father has his own secret reasons for wanting to be cautious. So he insists they seek safe harbour until they can join a larger sailing convoy.
It’s not hard to identify what DD wants (she wants to go to England, she wants to learn what she thinks being an English lady involves). We can identify some conflicts, too (she is mistaken about what being an English lady involves, and there are pirates, and her father would rather play things safe than hurry home). So perhaps her disaster is that dad demands they pause their voyage when a mysterious ship appears on the horizon (maybe it’s pirates). But then, what does she do in response to this disaster? From her POV, she has little agency.
Her father does have agency—he sees a potential pirate, he chooses to seek safe harbour. So what do I do with DD, who will be our POV character for most of the story?
This is what I like about this approach and what I dislike about this approach.
On the positive side, looking at the story this way forced me to come up with something different to do with DD. She can’t control the sailing of the ship, but she can gain agency in other ways. Perhaps she climbs to the crow’s nest, where she meets a midshipman who’s about the same age as her. She reveals her excitement about returning to England, she reveals her mistaken assumptions. Conflict: the midshipman knows otherwise re: being an English Lady, and reveals she’s mistaken. DD processes this new information, and weighs her options. Perhaps she chooses to ignore the midshipman. Perhaps she chooses to confront her parents about what she can expect at home. Either way, she has agency with regard to her goals while her father’s goals and choices are operating on her story in other ways.
On the downside, this sort of interconnected business (balancing DD's POV with her dad's) is hard to record in the Heads/Tails format.
This approach is also challenging when we get to a story beat like, “hey, DD is put in a dungeon (a disaster), and she is let out by a benevolent stranger (serendipity, which has no place in the Heads/Tails structure).” At first glance, it might be impossible to fit this turn of events into the Heads/Tails approach. Worse, it might encourage us to do some questionable writing: right now, my solution to that scene is to make DD choose to languish in the dungeon. She gives up on her other goals and makes her new goal to become one with the bricks and mortar of her enclosure. The disaster that interrupts that goal is that a benevolent stranger helps her escape. I dislike this because I’ve seen that sort of character choice in stories before, and it is lame. “Oh, woe is me, I will resign myself to my fate.” Bullshit. That’s only happening so that the structure-drunk writer can challenge your resignation.
On the other hand, perhaps I just need to think about the Heads/Tails structure differently. Perhaps DD accepts the stranger’s help and escapes, but is now indebted to someone she hates. Or perhaps in an earlier sequence, DD made a choice that earned this stranger’s admiration, without DD’s knowledge; DD’s earlier choice pays dividends. The stranger’s help is now less serendipitous. DD’s earlier agency caused it to happen.
It can be difficult to shape certain story turns to fit the requirements of the Head/Tails approach. But that’s also it’s strength: in the process of shaping the story to fit into its requirements, it’s possible to generate creative new solutions or approaches to the story. And so I recommend it as a tool for analyzing a story, rather than blocks with which to build one. Using it as a tool, you might be required to think of your story in new ways. Using it as building blocks, I worry will lead to a story that’s too “even” in its construction, too repetitive in its movements.
Some assorted notes and thoughts on the Heads/Tails approach:
- It’s good for helping me remember to include things audiences need, like review and anticipation. However, too much open-ended verbalization of review and/or anticipation is—I think—what leads us to the Dan Brown effect, where we already know exactly what will happen (Dan will get the puzzle box open) but pages and pages of words are wasted on the way there (the puzzle box is from such-and-such place, and the code is arranged in this way, and if I do this it’ll blah blah blah and if I do that it’ll blah blah blah). THE DAVINCI CODE is the book that taught me it was okay to quit a book.
- Related to above, regarding explicit review and anticipation: it’s good for our characters to think out loud, visualize, show what bad things will happen if they don’t achieve their goals. Gives the readers something to fear, and makes the STAKES explicit.
- The Heads/Tails approach does have a “natural” feel to it, like Butcher describes, and it generates natural suspense and connection between scenes, but you have to work hard to obscure the formula, or else the patterns are too easy to spot.
- I like how it encourages the writer to fill in necessary blanks, addressing perhaps unconsidered aspects, whether or not you want to make those aspects explicit to the reader or not. It’s a good “research” tool in this way, in the Stephen King sense (in ON WRITING, king refers to research not just as taking in outside material, but doing your own development. Maybe you might call this “world building” or “design” or “brainstorming.”)
- Bad for denouements (I like LORD OF THE RINGS’ eleven endings, sorry-not-sorry).
- I often don’t know how to fill in the “Conflict” entry, because it seems redundant to “disaster.”
- This approach creates scenes that don’t “nest” well. It can be difficult to track ongoing, overarching goals and conflicts.
- Naturally prohibits spontaneous or serendipitous things from happening. This can be good. I remember a Pixar story team idea that coincidence or spontaneity should only ever be used to make things worse for your characters. And deus ex machina is right out. UNLESS it’s funny. If a story beat makes you laugh in a genuine way, I believe that beats all principles.
- This method seems to encourage simplicity—it’s hard to include a lot of colourful detail, texture, and character in those little Heads/Tails fields—but I guess that’s the job for later. That’s where the “writing” part comes in.
I like the Heads/Tails approach for all the reasons Butcher explains in his posts. It has a lot to recommend it, as long as we don't lean too heavily on it.
Comments
Rebecca Gage
Yes, absolutely!
Tony Cliff
You know, I am not very familiar with the process when a book is written and illustrated by different people. For BUBBLE, the author wrote out the script, then found the publisher, and the publisher asked if I was interested. I can open up the question to other readers, though, if you don't mind. There are people in this Patreon community who would know better than I do.
Tony Cliff
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha don't ask. (It's almost 500k, but now that I write that out, I find it hard to believe. I'll be *very* surprised if it gets published at that length.)
Rebecca Gage
Oooh! Fingers crossed. I've got stuff out on submission too. It's a rough time to be doing it. I'm curious, what was your final word count? I thought max was like 120k for a SFF novel.
Rebecca Gage
No, I'm new here and wanted to get caught up from oldest to newest. Also, I'm curious how a book would get turned into a graphic novel. I'm familiar with how your process works, but how does a novel get turned into a GN? Like the Animorphs series has been out for decades, but my kiddos are discovering the GNs. Or is it similar to non-fiction where you come up with the ideas, then pitch to agents, then it gets turned into a GN?
Tony Cliff
Ha ha, have you read any of the more recent posts on George Saunders' craft book? It is an interesting complement to a very structured method of writing / plotting, to say the least.
Tony Cliff
My agent currently has it out on submission! Fingers crossed, it finds a good home.
Rebecca Gage
Also, LOVE that scene and sequel stuff. Jack Bickham has a great crafting book on it. I'm currently plotting a mystery and aiming for a lot of "yes, but's."
Rebecca Gage
Is WITCH PROJECT something you're going to independently publish or try traditional?
Tony Cliff
100%. I’ve never had to do a multi-POV project but that must be real useful.
Geo Neo
It was good to hear your experience with the technique. I applied the scene/sequal approach to a story I had completed. It was really useful in highlighting where I had excluded showing the emotional response and the decision making. I also have multiple POVs in the story, and the process helped me clarify who's POV would work best for each scene. However, like you it felt a bit to rigid, so I fudged the rules at times, where I felt it needed it.
Nancy K
"Failure fatigue" - yes, exactly!
Tony Cliff
(After the end of the first GAME OF THRONES book, I was onboard because of how continuously and consistently cruel GRRM was toward his characters. But as I kept reading, instead of there being any respite or change in tone, he just kept adding new characters to be cruel to, so I sympathize with your failure fatigue.)
Tony Cliff
Ha ha, the first time I read that Butcher post, I also thought "oh shut up, it can be Yes sometimes." But that is my reaction to ALL advice that is phrased in absolute terms. I definitely have room in my heart for "Yes, but…" —I'm watching KILLING EVE right now and it's chalk full of Yes Buts, and it works VERY well.
Nancy K
I may be misunderstanding the Heads/Tails technique, but I had an immediate negative reaction to Butcher's idea that the answer to "Outcome" should never be "yes." I feel like I've seen this play out in various books and TV shows: A character or characters are repeatedly thwarted until their final triumph, and to me the final triumph isn't enough to satisfy me after all the previous failures. The failures loom larger than the triumph from sheer accumulation. For me personally, I need the characters to have some incremental wins along the way. I enjoy the Writing Excuses podcast and they often mention a technique called "Yes, but/No, and...", which strikes me as a related but slightly different approach to the Outcome step. From here: https://writingexcuses.com/2015/07/19/writing-excuses-10-29-why-should-my-characters-fail-spectacularly/
That's a really helpful tool! I can't wait to try this out. Also, it would be funny if she actually wanted to be stuck in the dungeon for some other reason. And the stranger is ruining her plans making it awkward to pull off whatever her intensions were.
Tony Cliff
I was going to reply to your individual points, but please simply accept a universal “heck yes” to all of it. As ever, the quality of the tool is not UNimportant, but what you do with it is always the important part.
Tealin
Thank you for explaining the Scene/Sequel method, which you have been hinting at for the last few posts (how meta!). I agree the name is crap, and that it seems much better suited for analysis of what isn't working than for laying down the first time in fear of not getting it right. It's a much more methodical approach than mine, which is simply asking 'what would Terry Pratchett do?', although I must say that method has yet to fail me. I once 'fixed' Hamlet according to Pixar's rules of good storytelling – or at least, the sorts of notes called by the Pixar brass hats on the movies happening around me – and ended up with a structurally sound but *very Pixar-y* tidy origami of a story, which I'm sure would get a solid 90% on Rotten Tomatoes but lacked nearly all the raw, timeless humanity of the messy and illogical play. I'm a big fan of writing from the gut to begin with and tidying it up later. I think, in writing analysis, too much attention is paid to WHAT happens instead of HOW what happens is presented. The same story can be packaged in hundreds of different ways; it won't work at all in some of them, but that's not the fault of the plot, rather how it's told. It sounds like Heads/Tails helps by addressing the 'how' in the sense of making sure the character's inner life is communicated clearly and the audience is strung along with them. Of course, there will always be problems you're too close to to find a solution, and then tricks like this really prove their mettle. Always helpful to have in the arsenal!
