Save the Cat! Writes a Novel

by Jessica Brody

Remember all those flaws you jotted down in chapter 1, when we created our story-worthy heroes? Well, here’s where you pick one (or two, or three) and show us how those flaws are screwing up your hero’s life. Is your hero meek and lacking confidence? Well, don’t just tell us about it. Show your hero being meek and lacking confidence with a specific visual scene.

The Opening Image has a mirror beat (or an opposite beat) called the Final Image, the very last beat of the novel. If the Opening Image shows us where the hero begins, the Final Image shows us where the hero ends. They are bookends of the transformative journey. And you should make them as different as possible. Otherwise, where did the hero go? What was the point of reading this story? The further apart your Opening Image and Final Image are, the more worthwhile the story. It’s as simple as that.

Essentially, the Theme Stated is the hero’s need or life lesson, somehow hinted at up front in the story (often by a secondary character).

The Theme Stated is a single-scene beat. It usually comes and goes very quickly. The theme is stated and then the story moves on. But it doesn’t necessarily have to be a person who states the theme. Although that’s more common, I sometimes see themes stated on a billboard the hero passes or in a book or magazine the hero is reading. You can be creative in how you state your theme, just as long as you state it.

Of course not! They completely, 100-percent ignore this person. Because at the start of the novel, your hero is resistant to change. They hear the theme stated and they go, “What the heck does he know? He doesn’t know me.” That’s why it’s often best to have the theme stated by a secondary character—a passerby, a fellow traveler on the bus, a nemesis—as opposed to someone close to your hero. This is by no means a hard-and-fast rule, but it’s easier for a reader to believe that the hero would ignore the theme if it’s stated by a stranger or someone the hero doesn’t necessarily know or trust.

But what is your hero going to learn by the end of the book? That very theme that was stated so early in the story. Which means they had the answer to their problems the whole time; they just refused to listen!

The Setup is a multi-scene beat. Meaning you get several scenes or chapters to accomplish all that you need to accomplish in the Setup. And get ready, because it’s a lot.

Your hero has to be actively pursuing something when the book begins.

These are also called the A Story characters, because they represent the A Story (or external story) of the novel. (As opposed to the B Story character[s]—we’ll meet them later.)

This means you may want to take time in your Setup to show your hero at home (with family, with spouse, with kids, or maybe alone in their apartment), at work (in the workplace, at their job, or at school), and at play (how your hero unwinds with friends or by themselves).

The possibilities are endless, but the objective is the same: to make the reader understand why this person needs to go on a journey of transformation. Because clearly things aren’t working out in this status quo world of Act 1.

This is called the stasis = death moment. It’s the moment that comes somewhere in the Setup beat that shows the reader that change is imperative; otherwise, things are going south. Fast.

Catalysts often come in the form of bad news (a letter in the mail, a phone call, a death, getting fired, being diagnosed with a deadly disease). Not always, but often.

The Catalyst is a single-scene beat in which something happens to the hero to send their life in an entirely new direction. Notice that I emphasize the word “to.” The Catalyst always happens to your hero. It’s something active that will bust through the status quo and send them on the road toward change.

The Debate is the time in your story for your hero to take a step back and decide how they’re going to proceed after this life-altering Catalyst has knocked them down.

It’s a multi-scene beat in which you visibly show us how resistant your hero is to accept the change that’s been thrown at them. An effective way to do this is to take your hero back to home, work, and play. Show them struggling to decide what to do next in all aspects of their life. Because if they decide too quickly, you risk losing credibility with your reader.

Act 2 is the opposite of Act 1. If Act 1 is the thesis—the status quo world—then Act 2 is the upside-down version of that. The polar opposite. The inverse. The antithesis.

It’s important to note that heroes don’t have to physically go anywhere in order to Break Into 2. But they do have to try something new.

It’s a single-scene beat. You get one scene or chapter to break your hero into Act 2. That’s it. So make it a good, effective break.

You make sure the choice to Break Into 2 belongs to your hero. They must be proactive about it. The decision can be put before them by someone else, but the actual choice to act must be theirs and theirs alone.

If you’ve set up your wants and needs correctly, your hero’s external goal (want) is not what will inevitably fix their life. They think it is. They’d bet their life on it! But in the end, it’s their internal or spiritual goal (need) that will make them a better person.

That’s why I like to call Act 2 fixing things the wrong way.

At this point in the story, your hero is making an effort. They’re getting off their butt. They’re rallying. They’re doing what they think has to be done to solve whatever problems you’ve set up in Act 1, and we have to give them credit for that. They’re trying. But they’re making uninformed decisions. They’re still motivated by those wants. They’re fueled by the A Story (the external story). So yeah, in Act 2 they might be slaying dragons and solving clues and kissing boys and flying spaceships in intergalactic wars, but these things, while übercool, are not the answer. They won’t fix what needs to be fixed in the long run.

Enter the B Story character! The B Story character is a helper character—the person who’s ultimately going to somehow help your hero learn the theme. They usually come in the form of a love interest, a new friend, a mentor, or a nemesis.

There are only two criteria for being a successful B Story character (others need not apply): They must in some way represent the upside-down Act 2 world. They must in some way help guide the hero toward their life lesson or theme.

The first criterion means that the hero could never have met or noticed this character in Act 1. It was only because of the Catalyst and subsequent Break Into 2 that this B Story character fully came into the hero’s life.

All of these B Story characters are, in some way, products of the Act 2 world.

The B Story character can help guide your hero toward their life lesson in a variety of different ways. For example: Your B Story character can be the embodiment of the theme.

Or your B Story character can be someone who, by their very nature, brings out the theme in the hero.

Or your B Story character could be someone who suffers from the same flaws as your hero, but in an even more exaggerated way, thus holding up a mirror to your hero’s flaws and allowing them to see the truth for themselves.

However you choose to do it, helping the hero learn the theme is the ultimate role of the B Story character. And they’re introduced here, in this single-scene beat, somewhere in the first half of Act 2 (usually during the Fun and Games beat).

even third act of the novel, but here’s where they first come into the story. Either in the form of a new love interest, new friend, new mentor, or new enemy. It can really be anyone. Just as long as they can effectively

No, you can introduce as many characters as you want in Act 2. But the B Story character will be that special character that fulfills that very special role as the ambassador of the life lesson.

And if you’re having trouble figuring out who that special person will be, good news! You can have more than one B Story character! That’s right. Many great novels have what are called twin B stories.

But if you’re going to have more than one B Story character, make sure both characters are fulfilling their duties in this role. And make sure they’re fulfilling it in different ways. Otherwise, why do we need both?

The Fun and Games beat is probably the reason your reader picked up this book in the first place. It’s also called the promise of the premise. Because when a reader starts reading a book, they were most likely told something about this particular beat—either from the summary on the back of the book, a book review, or a fellow reader.

The key to figuring out the Fun and Games beat is realizing that this part of the story might be fun only for the reader. Not necessarily for the hero.

So to avoid confusion, let’s define the Fun and Games beat like this: a multi-scene beat in which your hero either shines in their new upside-down world or flounders in it. Because those are your only two options. They’re either loving it or hating it.

Now, that doesn’t mean your entire Fun and Games beat has to be all struggle or all success. In fact, I recommend it not be. The Fun and Games is nearly 30 percent of your novel.

You have to vary the action. I call this the bouncing ball narrative. Your hero is up, your hero is down. Things are going swimmingly, things are going horribly. The hero succeeds at something, then fails at something. The girl gets the boy, the girl loses the boy. The detective makes a breakthrough on the case, only to discover it’s a false lead. The king wins a battle, then loses a battle. Up, down, up, down, and so on and so forth. This unpredictable dynamic is how you make your Fun and Games rich, engaging, and most of all, fun!

But despite how many times your ball bounces, in the end there should be a general direction in which the beat is heading: success or failure. This is something you must decide. Is this beat an upward path (the general direction heading toward success)...

The general direction of your Fun and Games is a critical decision to be made as you structure your novel. Because as you’ll soon see, whichever path you choose for this beat—upward or downward—will ultimately define not only the next beat (the Midpoint) but the rest of the second act.

The Midpoint is a crossroads of things. Many things. It’s the middle of the book, yes, but it’s also the middle of the second act, which is a crucial middle of the hero’s transformation.

Basically it’s a single-scene beat in which three very essential things happen: The hero experiences either a false victory or a false defeat. The stakes of the story are raised. The A and B stories intersect in some way.

First things first: false victories and false defeats. Remember when we were in the Fun and Games, and I asked you if your hero was on an upward path or a downward path? Well, if you’ve answered that question, then the good news is, you’re already well on your way to figuring out your Midpoint. See how sneaky I was about that?

The Midpoint is the culmination of whatever path you chose for your Fun and Games. Because essentially, the whole goal of the Fun and Games is to drive the story toward the Midpoint, and to give the Midpoint definition.

On the other hand, if your hero has been floundering like a fish out of water in the Fun and Games beat, then your Midpoint will inversely be a false defeat. The downward path has reached a low point. Your hero has seemingly lost.

By creating a Midpoint in which your hero fails to get what they want (fails to achieve their external goal), you are also shining a giant spotlight on the bigger issues. You’re saying to the reader, “Hey! Look! My hero thinks their life is over because they didn’t get this thing that they thought would fix everything.” But obviously that thing wasn’t that important if there’s still half a novel to go. Obviously, there’s a bigger story here.

We writers set up these false victories and false defeats so we can do one very crucial thing (the second essential Midpoint element): to raise the stakes of the story.

Up until this point, your flawed hero has been given an opportunity to change their ways and fix those flaws (via the upside-down world of Act 2), but they really haven’t taken advantage of that opportunity yet.