Essentials of Plot Design in Fiction

Like building the foundation of a house, great novels and short stories alike need strong, well-thought out plot structures to craft rich, compelling tales. In this weekend seminar class, students will learn practical strategies on utilizing techniques of layering and depth-building in fiction to create powerful central conflicts and intricately woven storylines and subplots that add complication, tension and complexity to story. Taking a layered approach to story building helps writers better organize and understand the narrative hierarchy at work in their story, while deepening character arcs and allowing haunting themes to take shape and emerge. Through in-class exercises, mini group workshops, and in-class reading and discussions of intricately designed short stories and novels like Alice Munro's "The Beggar Maid," Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things and Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad, students will learn practical techniques in crafting better plot outlines, subplots, and revision strategies that they can directly apply to their own fiction.