: Re: How to edit story structure I’ve written a plot for a long story. But it’s not easy for anybody to review because my characters’ dialogue and goals are all over the place, it’s often

@Moriarity138

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I'd recommend reading W.P. Kinsella's sprawling, largely incoherent novel, Shoeless Joe, and then comparing it to the tightly plotted, incomparable hit movie based on it, Field of Dreams. Another set of comparisons is John Masefield's Box of Delights, as contrasted with the 1984 BBC adaption (available on YouTube). In both cases, the source material is rich in vivid characters, indelible imagery and magical situations. But only the adaptation can be said to have a real "plot."

I recommend viewing your work in its current form as the raw material you're going to shape a story from. Keep in mind, most of it is going to end up on the cutting room floor --you just have to be at peace with that. Everything that stays in needs to be an important stop on some kind of journey --physical, spiritual, emotional, moral or mental --for your main character.

I'd recommend reading vast amounts of fairy tales, folk tales, the Arabian Nights, Greek myths and other compilations of classic stories from the oral tradition to see narrative-at-work in its purest, leanest form. Once you start to get the feel of story-for-story's sake, you'll begin to see how you can fit your characters and settings into that kind of structure.

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