GIP!

kellyhk made it, I found it in scarlettgirl's LJ. It HAD to be my default!

Buy This Book

I originally started this post with a little demure "this is for the fanficcers, I wouldn't presume to tell the pros how to write" but y'know what? A great reference book is a great reference book and I'm not good at being demure anyway. Do media-oriented writing? Run thou out right now and purchase Alex Epstein's Crafty TV Writing: Thinking Inside the Box. Go ahead, it's Thursday, you've got those print-out Borders coupons in your email, that'll knock a few bucks off the suggested $15 retail.

That said, I'm going to address the rest of this to the fanficcers while the pros snicker at us from the bar. Hopefully while thumbing through their surreptitiously purchased copies.

I first found out about this book from susanmgarrett, who recommended it herself as a Wicked-cool read. It's something any fanfic writer should read. It's clever, it's engaging, and I'd marry it if it were a man. I've got a healthy ego and 25 years of fanfic under my typewriter ribbon so I was pretty sure I didn't want to marry it, but I am in awe of Susan, I had a Borders coupon, and I'm always up for clever, engaging books, so I picked up a copy.

I started on Chapter 2 (Great Episode Ideas). By the second paragraph, I'd picked up a highlighter. By the sixth page, I'd added red pen under the highlighter for a really significant bit. ("A great story idea challenges a character's weakness or strength - it forces a character to overcome or at least face one of his flaws, or turns one of his virtues into a risk factor." Emphasis added via Bic.)

I don't usually write a full review based on 1/10th of the book, but -- Damn! Just daaaaaamn, based on this chapter alone, what a hell of a book! Worth the price of admission right here, "Great Episode Ideas" is a fast read, it's a funny read, but most importantly, it strips down the plotlines to their bones and clearly states how to build those bones back into unique skeletons upon which to hang the plot, using as illustration examples from shows ranging from The Andy Griffith Show to Lost. He also talks about what wouldn't work and why it's a horrible idea, and even tosses in examples of how showrunners have successfully smashed the rules of their own shows. (Note to self: Netflix Deep Space 9's "Far Beyond the Stars," which I've never seen.)

After all the book reviewing I can articulate why other people's plots work or not, but ask me about my own plotting and it would either be "they left this loose thread I could tie up in a short missing scene" or (these days, at least) "I want to see how fast I can strip the characters down and stick 'em together in different combos like legos." Plot is a very weak point for me, and Epstein has given me much to chew on, such as this particularly favorite part from page 48: It's the flaw or the strength that makes it a story. (If Hamlet were in Othello's shoes, and vice versa, neither play would happen. Clever Hamlet would spot Iago's treachery in a moment, and decisive Othello would kill the usurper the moment he got back from Wittenberg.)

Want your stuff to sound more like the show you're imitating? Find out how the creators are actually building it.

Alex Epstein also has a blog, Complications Ensue