by Scott King
Protagonist is forced to deal with change:
The protagonist can embrace the change introduced in the catalyst moment or he can resist it. If he resists it, things will go bad, and he will be forced to accept it.
The Big Picture:
Upon embracing the change, the protagonist will see the world and his situation differently. In additional to his intimate want, he will develop a Big Want. The Big Want is the thing he is trying to achieve throughout the rest of the story.
ACT II
New Status Quo:
Now that the protagonist has a Big Want, things have changed and he will find a new status quo in his life and relationships.
Status Quo Growth and Big Want Attempt Cycle:
Depending on the genre and the length of the story you are trying to tell, there will be a cycle of Big Wants Steps & Status Quo Growths. The protagonist will constantly try to achieve his Big Want. He will either fail or he will succeed and his Big Want will evolve. In this cycle is it important that the relationships the protagonist has constantly grow, and that he constantly gets closer to achieving his big want.
Big Want Final Step:
The protagonist is ready to go after his Big Want. The protagonist’s flaws that have been revealing themselves every now and then will bubble forth and will force cause him to fail at getting their Big Want.
Rock Bottom:
The protagonist has failed at his Big Want. In addition, the other relationships and life situations he has been building throughout the story will collapse.
ACT III
Epiphany Moment:
The protagonist finally faces his flaws. This is the moment where he either changes or embraces not changing.
Empowered:
The protagonist makes amends and rebuilds his relationships. With the strengths gained from those and the strength from overcoming or giving into his flaw, he gears up and gets ready to make one final attempt to achieve his Big Want.
Climax:
The protagonist faces off against whatever has been preventing him from getting his Big Want.
Temptation Moment:
In this moment the protagonist will be tempted one final time to give into his flaw or to deny it for good and prove he has changed. Either way, he will also achieve or not achieve his Big Want as a result of this moment.
Epilogue:
A bookend that wraps up the theme of your story and gives closure to the relationship and life situations of your protagonist.
Not every novel will fit into this paradigm perfectly, but most will or be close to it. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone squeezes into it very nicely:
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Hook:
A world of magic and fantastical things is teased and the mystery of how a baby defeated an uber-powerful dark wizard is established.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Meet the Protagonists:
The story jumps ahead and the reader meets an older Harry who is living with the Dursleys. It is established in these scenes that Harry lives an unfilled life and that he desperately wants a family and a place where he feels like he belongs.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Status Quo:
Harry’s life with the Dursleys seems stagnant, and yet weird things keep happening. Harry’s hair grows back after being cut, he apparently flew onto the roof of a school, he shrunk a shirt to doll-size, and he was able to speak with a snake and help it escape from a zoo.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Catalyst Moment:
The letters arrive. Hagrid eventually shows up and Harry learns that his parents were wizards and murdered by a dark wizard named Voldemort. Even though he has been raised as a muggle, Harry has been accepted to attend Hogwarts and learn magic.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Protagonists are forced to deal with change:
Harry’s mind is blown, and at first worries that it was all a dream. Hagrid takes him to buy school supplies and Harry fully embraces the idea of Hogwarts.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Big Picture:
While at Gringotts, Hagrid picks up a mysterious package. Harry doesn’t know what is in it and will spend most of the novel unraveling its mystery.
ACT II
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s New Status Quo:
Harry leaves the Dursleys and attends Hogwarts. He makes new friends and builds relationships with them, quickly adapting to his new life at Hogwarts.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Status Quo Growth and Big Want Attempt Cycle:
Two things drive Harry’s actions throughout Act II of the novel. The first is the House Cup and his desire to win it for Gryffindor. The second is his desire to solve the mystery of what was in vault 713. Harry constantly tries to fulfill these wants.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Rock Bottom:
The mystery of the object from vault 713 is solved. It’s the Sorcerer’s Stone! Also Harry, thanks to his Quidditch skills manages to snag Gryffindor the lead for the House Cup. Everything seems to be perfect, until the incident with Norbert loses Gryffindor the cup and Harry realizes that Voldemort is after the Sorcerer’s Stone
ACT III
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Epiphany Moment:
Harry could roll over and take the losses. He could choose not to stand up for himself and those he has grown to care about, but instead he shows he is a true Gryffindor and decides he will attempt to stop Voldemort.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Empowered:
Ron and Hermione let it be known that they will join Harry. They are true friends, a surrogate family, and together they will try to prevent Voldemort from getting the Sorcerer’s Stone.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Climax:
Harry, Hermione, and Ron face the traps and spells meant to protect the Sorcerer’s Stone. They use the knowledge they have learned over the course of the novel to continue moving forward.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Temptation Moment:
Facing off against the Big Bad, Harry stares into the Mirror of Erised. Harry conquers the mirror and defeats Voldemort.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’s Epilogue:
Harry awakens in the infirmary. He chats with Dumbledore who explains a few things. Then he gets to see his friends and learn that they will all proceed to be second years. As an added bonus, their actions in stopping Voldemort and Neville’s bravery earns Gryffindor the House Cup.
Beats are amazing. Screenplays live and die by structure and how they are used. You aren’t writing a screenplay. You are writing a novel. That means that although beats are a good starting point, you don’t need to follow them exactly. If you are writing your first novel and are new to writing, then sure, follow them until you get more words under your belt and better understand your voice. If you have one or two finished novels or half-finished novels, then don’t restrict yourself and think that you have to follow the beats exactly, merely use them as a guidepost.
Chapter Fifteen Takeaways:
•The stakes are what will happen if your protagonist fails to achieve what they want.
•The more intimate the stakes are to your protagonist the more important they will feel.
•The majority of fiction makes use of a three-act structure, and within that structure they use common story beats.
•Use beats to structure your novel, but don’t feel that you have to stick to them exactly. Novels have more leeway when it comes to beats and structure.
Chapter Sixteen
Through the Trapdoor
Chapter Summary:
It’s exam time, but Harry can hardly focus on them because his scar intermediately flares in pain. Even at night, he can’t sleep because he has horrible nightmares. Ron and Hermione shrug off Harry’s scar-pain, while Harry is sure that it is a warning.
Thinking past events through, Har
ry realizes the whole Norbert incident was a bit odd and goes to confront Hagrid about it. Hagrid cracks under pressure, admitting that when drunk he might have shared the secret of how to get past Fluffy.
With nothing else stopping Snape or Voldemort, Harry, Ron, and Hermione try to warn Dumbledore of the danger. They run into McGonagall and learn that Dumbledore is in London. They try to warn McGonagall, but she brushes their concerns aside.
Harry decides that tonight he will break into the locked corridor and steal the Sorcerer’s Stone to prevent Snape and Voldemort from getting it. Hermione and Ron tell Harry that they will not let him face the danger alone.
That night, when sneaking out of the Gryffindor dorms, Neville tries to stop Hermione, Ron, and Harry. Acting tough and standing up for himself, doesn’t work out well for Neville because Hermione casts a full body-bind on him. It’s like the leg-locking curse, only worse.
The three sneak to into the third floor corridor. Once inside, Harry uses a flute to defeat Fluffy. Moving on, Ron and Harry jump through the trapdoor, getting caught in a plant that tightens around them as they try to escape. Hermione uses her blue fire to defeat the plant.
In the next room, they find a locked door and dozens of winged keys. Harry uses logic and a broom to get the right key. Unlocking the door, they find a human-sized chess board. Ron takes charge, moving Harry, Hermione, and himself as chess pieces. To win the game, Ron sacrifices himself so that Harry and Hermione can move on to the next room.
The next room has a knocked-out troll in it. Ron and Harry slip past it without a problem. The penultimate room is clearly Snape’s contribution to protecting the Sorcerer’s Stone. The exits to the room become awash in magical fire and the only way to get past it is to drink one of seven potions. A riddle-like logic puzzle explains which potion to drink, and Hermione quickly solves it. There is only enough for one person to drink it so Harry takes it and moves onto the final room.
Setups and Payoffs:
“Through the Trapdoor” is a mix of action and paying off all the lessons and things the children have learned at Hogwarts. In chapter twelve, Hagrid gave Harry a flute and it’s the same flute he uses to defeat fluffy. Hermione is able to thwart the Devil’s Snare with fire. It is the same kind of fire she cast in a jar and used on Snape. Harry is able to identify the right flying key and capture it because of his Seeker skills. Ron is able to beat McGonagall’s chess game and the reader knows that because ever since Christmas he has shown how good he is at wizard chess.
Not only does this chapter have a grand adventure feel to it, but because there are so many callbacks to things that happened over the school year it feels a bit like flipping through a yearbook. The puzzles the kids solve are a reminder of how far they have come and how much they have grown since they first arrived.
We have spent a lot of time talking about how Rowling sets things up. She did it with her mysteries, with plot-related events, and with character-driven moments. The reason there seems to be so much set-up throughout the novel is because that is how storytelling works. You should be able to blindly flip through Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, pick a random scene and be able to say why that scene is important.
That is something to remember when crafting your own novels. Every scene and every chapter should have a purpose. The biggest reason to include a scene is because of a plot-related event. The scene of the hooded figure drinking the blood of a unicorn is important because it is what allowed Harry to realize that Voldemort was back. The sequence of Harry and Hagrid in Gringotts was important to set up the mystery of what was in vault 713.
Beyond plot, the next best reason to have a scene in your story is because it reveals character or further establishes the relationships between the characters. Harry originally met Draco in Diagon Alley. If we cut that scene completely from the novel, how would things change?
The plot wouldn’t change at all. All the events that happened could still happen. However, that scene is still super important, because it showed Harry that the wizarding world wasn’t all fairy magic and happiness. It showed Harry that there are crappy Dudley-like people who are wizards. It also set-up Draco’s and Harry’s relationship so that when they meet on the train, Harry’s dislike of Draco made him automatically side with Ron.
Sometimes a scene or sequence should also be included because it is important for pacing or world building. Rowling does this throughout all of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. She will use compressed scenes to show the passing of time before slowing things down for a fully fleshed out scene. “Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback” is a great example of an entire chapter where the majority of it is manipulated for pacing and mood.
If you are staring at an outline for a novel, or even a finished draft, and you have scenes or sequences that don’t seem to serve a purpose, consider cutting those scenes. Leaving them in there will make your novel feel like it is meandering without direction, while cutting them so the entire novel is tighter with intention will create a sense that everything matters. When you get to the end it will feel to the reader that there was a big master plan. All the early stuff will feel like set-up for the big climax, just like how it does in “Through the Trapdoor.”
Chapters:
In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the chapter lengths vary, but seem to clock in around fifteen pages. Instead of the chapters covering a single scene, most include multiple scenes and cover a specific set of time. Rowling also assigned every chapter a name instead of just calling them by their numbers. These were choices that Rowling made, but these are not things that are set in stone.
There is no rule about how long a chapter can be or not be. Some thrillers have chapters that are half of a page while there is at least one fantasy novel, A Memory of Light, has a single chapter that is 87,000 words long. That’s longer than all of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone!
You’ll have to figure out the best chapter length for your novel and when you do, realize that chapters are a way for an author to manipulate the sense of time passing. Thanks to how points of view work, an entire chapter could take place between a single second of time or thousands of years could pass in a single chapter.
Chapter length is a way to manipulate the pacing and a way to let the reader feel like they are making progress. The longer a chapter is, the slower the book will feel. The shorter they are, the faster they feel. Depending on where you are in your story, you can use this to your advantage.
Just like how there are no rules on length, there are no rules regarding naming either. If you want to name your chapters, you can. If you want to stick with numbers, that is acceptable too.
Should you decide to name your chapters, make sure you understand that they are an additional layer added to the story. They are another element and you can use them to tease and provoke reactions from the reader. You also need to be careful so that you don’t spoil things that you don’t mean to spoil. If “The Forbidden Forest” chapter had been named “Voldemort is Back” that would have ruined the big reveal.
When picking chapter names, look at how Rowling did it. She chose titles that were effective, didn’t sound too much alike, and by referencing them, it’s easy to remember what happened in them. Remember “The Letters from No One”? Just from the title alone, it’s easy for you to think back to it. However if we ask, “Remember chapter five?” it’s harder to differentiate what occurred in it.
Chapter lengths and their titling, or lack of titling, are additional tools you can use in your novel. There are no rules for how you have to use them, but with whatever way you choose, make sure there is intention behind your decisions.
Supporting Characters:
This chapter wraps up events for Ron, Hermione, and the rest of the supporting cast. We’ll see the majority of them again in “The Man with Two Faces,” but the final chapter is more about Harry than anyone else. So now is a great time to look at the supporting cast and see what their stories were throughout the no
vel.
Ron:
Ron wants to be the hero. He wants to be the guy that outshines his brothers. He’s tired of being in their shadows and wants to be special. In “Through the Trapdoor,” Ron proves he is a hero. He proves he is special by being able to outsmart McGonagall’s chess board and he proves he is a hero by sacrificing himself so that Hermione and Harry can continue. At the same time, Ron isn’t charging ahead to stop Snape and Voldemort like a hero would. He has accepted that he will exist in Hermione’s and Harry’s shadow, but he’s OK with it.
Hermione:
From the moment she appears on the train trying to help Neville, Hermione takes charge. Her social awkwardness and bossiness push others away and halfway through the book she still doesn’t have any friends. She wants to be the best and even with what is going on with Harry’s narrative (solving the mystery of Vault 713) her main goal and want through the novel is to learn, be the best, and keep on learning. She gets extra books out from the library not to help Harry or for a class, but for herself and by the end of the book, she seems to be much more comfortable being herself. That confidence allows her to be less awkward and bossy.
Neville:
As we talked a few chapters ago, Neville has a solid character arc and this chapter is the culmination of that arc. He grew from a total cowardly mess-up to someone who was willing to take a stand for what he believes in.
Hagrid:
Hagrid is a screw-up. In many ways, he is an adult Neville and he has no redemption. He uses magic when he’s not supposed to. He leaves Harry in Diagon Alley to go drinking. He slips and constantly tells the kids information they shouldn’t know. He compromises the safety of the Sorcerer’s Stone by revealing its secrets and he breaks the law by trying to raise a dragon. Although he has no growth, he has clear wants and needs outside of Harry and the main storyline.
