8 thoughts on “HWSWA: Subplots”

  1. I just watched this

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mI0QEt9CeKc

    It is Joe Russo and Taika Waititi talking about film structure while bonding over Flash Gordon the movie. Russo talks about a three act structure, and how he breaks the second act into quadrants, meanwhile Waititi says he just does things instinctively. It’s an interesting 45 minute conversation.

  2. “I bought this book, the author better come through for me and not try a bait and switch so I’ll buy another book to get my answers.”

    this……. and the ones that I can just feel the author thinking “I’ll set them all in the same town and then they’ll have to get them all to find out how this all works together” NOT speaking to Ms Hibbert or Ms Higgins – I don’t mind the related stories if they all work as stand alones.

  3. This was both immensely helpful and slightly terrifying, and has given me much food for thought. I need to look over everything again (dammit!) with an eye to the subplots, but I think I know what they are now.

    1. Suggestion not rule. Only use if you think there’s something wrong with your story. If you’re happy with it, ignore us at will.

  4. I enjoy these posts so much, and look forward to them all week. I don’t have much to say after the individual posts, but it seems like each one is another piece of the puzzle. It’s all starting to come together for me.

    And the part each week where you both wander off into the weeds always makes me laugh.

  5. This was very illuminating! Thank you, Jenny, for taking pains to be specific and include explanations for those of us who are simpleminded!

    Also, I feel like I better understand Bob’s divagations given that he was having to struggle to see what was on the screen — what a hassle that must be.

    I remember reading, back during the creation or maybe post-publication of Don’t Look Back, a fragment of the story of how the two of you started working on a collaboration. But I don’t think I ever knew who suggested it in the first place. Do you even know that?

    1. Bob did. We were drinking on Maui at a writer’s conference and he said, “I think we should write a book together.” So we talked about it, pretty much the way we still talk now. He’s a great collaborator, works hard, writes great stuff, taught me a lot, always carried the luggage (we traveled a lot for PR). But as he said at the end, we should never be in the same zip code again. We’ve been friends for sixteen years, but we know our limits.

      For a more detailed explanation, here’s a very old Argh post:

      https://arghink.com/2005/08/writing-in-books-with-boys/

  6. Wow. That was really enlightening! Thanks so much — the only part I recalled was that the first talks about collaborating happened at a conference, but I don’t think I’d known more than that.

    Funny, I can enjoy a bit of action in an otherwise relationship-based story, but way too much action and I get to feeling like I’m stuck in a room with a teenage boy, checking for exit signs.

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