Episode 64: Which is more difficult—starting a story or ending it?

In this week’s episode, JP and Crys talk about what they find more difficult—starting a story or ending it—and why. They discuss the methods they use to craft their beginnings and endings, and how those methods have changed as they have grown as writers. 

Question of the week: What’s difficult for you, beginnings or endings? Has that changed as you’ve learned certain crafts? Has anything helped you overcome that? Share your answer here!

Don’t miss our weekly check in on Patreon (it’s public!) where we talk about what we’re currently learning, any thoughts we missed in last week’s episode, and our plans for this week!

Show Notes

NRDS: National Recently Deceased Services on Vella

NRDS: National Recently Deceased Serviceson Fictionate

Brian McDonald: You Are a Storyteller podcast

Three Story Method

Steff Green’s Skeleton Draft Course 

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Transcript

JP: Hello friends. This is episode number 64 of the Write Away Podcast, and it is the 7th of October as we are recording.

I’m JP Rindfleisch, with my cohost…

Crys: Crys Cain.

JP: Hello, Crys Cain. How has your week been?

Crys: It’s been… I’m like, oh, I didn’t prepare for this. This has been another one of those times where I’m just like, I don’t know what I did. But I had a work week, which is different than most of the summer. So that’s been lovely.

JP: That’s good. What does your work week look like?

Crys: I basically made a giant list of all of the things that I’m excited about. That kind of grew out of The Career Author Summit and things that I been putting off. There’s projects, like my co-writer and I have been talking about moving our audio wide for a while and so we’re actually moving forward on that. It’s uploaded on Findaway already, but I haven’t pushed the sale button because I haven’t pulled it out of ACX yet. But we’re also uploading it direct with BookFunnel. So that is one of the projects I’m working on right now.

And it’s a lot of things like that which are admin heavy, making use of old IP to try and bring more value to it. And as if I didn’t have enough of that, I got really fixated on translations again this week, which I’ve done several times. But I may actually go to the point of requesting sample translations this time. That would be really nice to have a whole other market to reach. And it does require work, but it doesn’t require writing. So it’s a different kind of work.

JP: Yeah, that sounds really exciting. I definitely want to, Abe and I, when we have our project do translation at some point. But yeah, that sounds really fun.

Crys: How about you?

JP: It has been a pretty good week. The NRDS, our Vella between myself and Jeff, has actually been doing pretty good. Probably because we keep telling people to check it out. But regardless, it’s seems to be working. And we just released the next episode and we’ll be releasing them weekly on Thursdays, which is when we record. So I won’t say this every Thursday, I promise. But it is doing really well. And it has been fun getting some feedback on it.

Other than that I’ve been working on some author service stuff and it has been going really well. I realized I need to be –what’s the right word– I need to be more confident in what I can do and offer, because I think I was maybe selling myself short beforehand.

Crys: Yeah, occasionally this pops up on TikTok for me. It’s basically the encouragement to embrace the audacity of a middle-aged white man. And I really need to practice that more.

JP: Perfect cause I’m reaching that. So I might as well.

Crys: You’re like, I’m almost a middle-aged white man so give me the audacity. Where does that come in the package?

JP: Yeah, it’s been an interesting few years because I feel like I grasped onto Story Structure with J and Zach really early on. And with like Serial Fiction Show, picking up on the Three Cs and stuff is really quick and easy for me. And it’s the understanding that some people just need to be shown that or need to be like shown the armature before they click. Cause that’s why it worked for me. It was someone showed it to me. And I love the Three Cs. I love armature because I think that they’re just such a simple way of approaching story. I just need to be like, stop waiting for someone to tell you that it’s okay to teach other people this and just start doing it because I think it benefits a lot of people or it could.

Crys: Yeah. I’ve been in this realm long enough and not just counting my time in self-publishing, A couple of days ago, I went through all the storage that I had at my ex’s parents’ house that we’d put there when we moved to Costa Rica in the very beginning of 2014, so seven and a half years ago.

And it was five out of nine boxes were books and notebooks, no surprise. And one was like all apothecary jars. But I found notebooks in there from when I was 16 that have my 2003 early writing. And so this has been my fixation since I was a child. Like I remember writing my first play somewhere between the ages of six and nine.

I have learned a lot and a lot of people came to writing later in life. And so I often forget that people have not spent 30 years absorbing everything they could about writing. Some of them have just come in the last 10 years, last two years. And it can be really overwhelming. Part of the difficulty for me is sitting down and saying, okay, what is the pertinent information to share with this person at the state that they are at.

JP: Definitely. Definitely. And I think that’s where, like for me, the Three Cs and the armature are like such a super basic principle for people. Yeah. And once you start getting really deep into armature, like my strong opinion about how armature impacts each scene, then it’s oh, we might be going over some people’s heads.

But yeah, I totally agree. It’s the figuring out what level to talk to people at because the last thing you want to do is for it to go over their head. Cause you don’t want to overwhelm anyone.

Crys: Yeah. And I want to clarify when I say basic, like base building blocks. That if you don’t get it quickly that there’s something wrong with you, there’s not. It is one of the things that is simple, but not always easy, particularly when you get deeper into it.

Like you said, there’s okay, here’s the basic level understanding. Cool, totally get that. And then you apply it to a scene in real life and it’s different than what you thought it might look like. So you dig in deeper and you dig in deeper. What does it look like in all these different situations?

JP: Yeah, no, totally. And it’s all about the foundational building blocks, making sure that we have the same language there before we build on it. Definitely, totally agree.

Crys: Speaking of building blocks, I came up with a question this week for us to discuss about craft and it’s about starting and ending a book. Not the act of it, but which is more difficult for you, writing the beginning of a book or ending a book? And those are our basic building blocks of stories, beginning, middle, and end.

And I think almost everyone agrees that the middle is the worst. So we’re just taking that out of the equation. And I’m curious, as I’ve had this conversation with several other writers and the answers are varied and the reasons why are varied. So I’m curious for you, which is more difficult, starting a story or ending it? Like making sure that you have the right start and the right end and why?

JP: So I think if I were to tell you a few months ago or whatever, I don’t know when, I would probably say that endings were the most difficult, but really I’m starting to see the beginnings are. And as I’m starting to focus heavier and heavier on character dialogue and how personality and internal wounds and whatever impact that character’s voice, I find that the deeper into the writing I get. And there’s almost for me, yes, there is a level of pre writing that can get me 75% there for character voice, but it isn’t until I’m in the work that I can really start to see how that voice flows and how it looks.

And so beginnings for me are more difficult than endings because I almost feel like I don’t know who these characters are. I don’t know if anyone has ever had this before, but you know how when you give a presentation and you’re not a hundred percent sure you know what that presentation is about until you’ve started it. And you’re like, I’m not confident about what I’m talking about. And then halfway through, you’re like, wait, I know my stuff. And then you like get more confident in talking. That’s how I feel with writing because I’m like, yeah, come on people, you know how I like these characters, you should like these characters.

And then by the end of it, I’m like, now I want you to cry.

Crys: I am the same. And it used to be the endings were the most difficult, because I could start a story, launch into it, 10, 20,000 words later, and then I would peter out because I’m like, Ooh, I don’t know where this is going. I don’t know how it’s going to end.

And things were difficult. I could start a story, no problem. Once I actually started finishing stories and I had a few endings under my belt and knew what a good ending felt and what a crappy ending felt like, I realized how much of that depends on how you start the story, and whether it feels satisfying or not. Because one of my favorite tools is reflection, that there are pieces at the very end that match pieces at the very beginning and show as sign points of things that have stayed the same or things that have changed. And so you show those elements at the beginning and at the end in symbolism and things that are said and things that characters do. It can be just about anything can be literally reflected at the beginning and end of a story.

Once I got to that point where I’m like, okay, I do know how to write a full story now. Now let me like try to start off on the right foot. Especially with the romance, because I don’t go back through and do a deep edit. We write those, we send them to an editor for continuity and grammar and clarity, and then they get published.

So I’ve got to know at the beginning what emotional landing point I want to hit at the end. And that makes the beginning a lot harder because I have to know what I need to set up.

JP: Totally agree. And I’ve come to learn that I am not someone who likes 100% plotting because I will spend too long plotting and then I’ll be like, now I don’t want to write this because I feel too constrained to write it. I’ve found that having a loose outline and then doing whatever I want when I write is working better for the stories that I want to write.

But in doing so, the beginnings I’m always like, ah, how do I want to do this? How do I want to approach it? Usually I have a vague idea as to what the armature is when I start. And then once I go through it, I can refine that. And by vague, like the armature is there, I have a rough idea that it’s about something. So this is a more of a theme. And then by the time I read through it, I can pull out a stronger armature and then just make sure that is strengthened.

Crys: Have I ever thrown the W-Plot at you? Have we talked about that?

JP: I’m going to say no, but you did. And I just don’t remember it.

Crys: Yeah, I mean that’s fair. I probably mentioned it. But I don’t think I’ve really discussed in depth. That plotting style works much better for me than something that is simpler. It’s something like seven or nine plot points sketched in the shape of a W basically.

So it’s shaped like a W and the low points are the low emotional points and the higher points are the higher emotional points. And I find it really useful. I think that might be like a whole episode on its own. So maybe we can talk about that more next week. But the reason I like something like that a bit more than using something like Three Story Method for the overall story structure is I need a bit more in the way of guide points along the way. I need more of like trail marks than just, go 15 miles east and you’ll get to your midpoint kind of thing.

JP: That makes sense. Yeah. Cause when I use the Three Story Method and I do the Three Cs for each act, but then also the obstacles in act two. That gives me 12 guide posts. And then I flesh around them. But then I realized that I’m also just going to write what I want to write.

So sometimes that doesn’t work out. But it’s interesting. I’ll have to check out the W-Plot and we’ll talk about it sometime in the near future, because I want to see what that looks like.

Crys: I don’t want to distract from this conversation and just be like, okay, here’s the W-Plot in depth and just completely derail us. Even though I’m very excited to talk about anything craft.

So I talked about reflection as one of the tools I use for my beginnings and endings. What are tools that you use to strengthen your beginnings and endings?

JP: So for me, it really is armature. Because to me, armature is like the nerdy scientific approach of writing stories. It’s your hypothesis. It’s the proof you want to make throughout the whole thing. And in the same means that you use reflections, is how I define my approach towards armature.

Because to me, this thing is your way of looking at a scene and saying, what happens when this armature isn’t followed? What happens when you go actively against this armature? What happens when you go towards it and you fulfill it? Well, If you were to look at writing as an analysis of your armature, then each of these scenes would have a response to how they interplay with that armature.

So at the beginning, your character is not the full, true form of themselves for this armature. Therefore, whatever happens may be a poor reflection of it and maybe bring that armature in a negative light. And then by the end of it, it’s going to bring it into a positive light. That’s how the character grows is by fulfilling and enacting their armature.

Crys: Yeah I see reflection as a tool to support the armature. And for any listeners who aren’t familiar with armature, you could say theme is another word for it. We picked up the term armature from Brian McDonald from the You Are A StorytellerPodcast. And he decided to use armature because there are so many different definitions of theme. And people get really confused about what is theme. So he uses the word armature instead to define it very specifically. And that is, as JP said the kind of scientific way, and that is, a statement that your story then seeks to prove and disprove through its scenes and characters.

And your hypothesis, and then you are testing it out as some characters. Can’t remember what movie it was that he talks about, you got to get busy, the armature was like, you’re either busy living or you’re busy dying. Like something like that. Get busy living or you’re busy dying. I can’t quite remember.

And so the stories starts out with, I believe someone taking their own life. But then a lot of the story is about guys in prison and getting out of prison, like figuring out like what living actually is. And different characters showing the consequences of not actively living, even if they’re not actively dying.

JP: Yeah. And for me, armature is all about it’s the sentence, as opposed to when I hear theme, generally I get like freedom or love or self-sacrifice. And like this one that I just pulled up, if we’re talking about a character’s need for freedom, maybe the armature is something along the lines of: a future of freedom and autonomy with or for those I love is worth paying for with my freedom in the present.

So what this argues is that an outlook towards freedom in the future is worth paying for those freedoms in the present. And so how does that reflect in your character? Are there willing to do sacrificial things currently in their present situation for an outlook of a future where they’re free?

And so now you can play with that as your theme. What does that mean? What are they willing to do now for something that they get later?

Crys: Yeah. And what consequences have they faced for focusing on the now? Previously or currently.

JP: So one of the talks that we had at The Career Author Summit, this one was a virtual one, was about skeleton drafting. And I ended up using that for a scene that I needed to write for a project that I was working on. And the whole idea is just instead of outlining, you just do a really rough draft. Steff Green was the person that presented on it. So I highly recommend you check her out.

Crys: We will link to her course in the notes as well.

JP: Yes. Yes. And ultimately you do a really rough draft. And by really rough, if you’re talking like an 80,000 – 100,000-word project, you’re doing like a 10,000-to-15,000-word rough draft. And instead of doing the outline points, you’re using pieces of your work in this 10,000 to 15,000. So I basically did that, but for a scene. And it was working out really nicely for me.

I noticed that near the end, I was getting stronger dialogue because I was starting to feel the character because I didn’t really have them fully set in my mind as I was writing it. They were just a rough idea. But everything that I wrote is then usable to flesh out and make into a longer piece.

So I think that I’m going to maybe use that tool at some point in the future. And I think that is a useful way of not having these stop gaps for beginnings and endings. It’ll probably be terrible for middles, but for beginnings and endings, it’ll at least be a little helpful to get some words written down that can be used in the work.

Crys: Yeah, I do this for scene work quite a bit, particularly when I am dictating, because when I’m dictating it’s really hard for me to figure out like what happens next on the fly. So if I’m dictating, I will sit down and I will write up a page or two for an entire chapter and it’ll have some bits of dialogue. It’s just really random and ugly and then I will dictate over it.

Sometimes I do it when I’m writing. I’ve never done it for a full draft before, and I am interested in that for sure. Also intimidated because my brain has gotten into that one draft mindset so deeply. And this actually might be like a really good way to break it out, just making it sharply go into you absolutely will need a very intense second draft. And that might be a good way to knock my brain into a different track.

JP: Agreed. I think for you and I, maybe it’s just for me, but I think I like looking at other processes and trying them out because I don’t know if I like having one process that I stick with. And I don’t know why, but I feel like part of it is this like desire to consistently learn, figure things out, figure out how other people do things. And that’s the part that interests me. So I feel like for me, writing is all about learning the process and learning it through the means of other people. So I don’t know if I’ll ever have one single process. And I’m okay with that because I think that’s the fun part.

Crys: Yeah, I’m constantly torn. A few months ago in our planning A Year With Tarot episodes, like I was very much complaining that I’m not a robot and I can’t do things, like I want to do things the same way all the time and not have it deviate. But I can’t, one, because we’re human and that’s just not how it works, but two, also I am always looking to make things better. And it’s just this constant war with me. I’m like, but this way works and I know how this way works and I want to do it this way. And then my brains, but new shiny way, why not try? And I love learning

I’m going to dip into some Clifton Strengths here. My number one is learning. So I’ll always learned anything. It doesn’t matter. I’m gonna learn basically everything. Except like maybe what Trump’s doing. But also in my top 10, I have what’s called a maximizer and then an arranger. And an arranger likes constantly moving things around. The thread that these two have, maximizer likes everything to be the best. And so that means like connecting with people who are the best at what they do. And that means like trying to be the best for yourself. An arranger likes arranging things so that they are maximum efficiency or flow or whatever, like just moving things around to make it better.

So all that combined means that I will never have one process and sometimes that infuriates me and sometimes I’m okay with that.

JP: Yeah. I don’t know where learning is in my Clifton Strengths, but I know that I’m input, ideation and futurist. And I firmly believe that I do these things, but I’m like constantly thinking of new processes, new ways, and trying to pick apart every little thing.

So I think that learning and those other three really lead to just like this insane amount of needing to pick things apart and try new things.

Crys: Your learning is number eight.

JP: Thank you for having a creepy list.

You totally do. And I appreciate it cause I’m literally scrolling. I don’t know where I put it.

Friend who is also very similar to me in some ways, put together a spreadsheet that she shared with me that I’ve just been able to dump everybody whoever gives me their strengths info. And so I can reference it at will.

It’s weird because if you told me that was for Myers-Briggs, it’d be like, eh, whatever. But like Clifton Strengths is oddly dead on and it makes me uncomfortable sometimes.

Crys: I remember talking with a friend, we all got into Clifton Strengths at the same time and they told me their top five. And I was like, oh, you’re like this. And we were new friends at the time and they were like, that’s creepy, and I don’t know how I feel about that. How do you know that much? I’m like you just told me, that’s what you’ve just told me.

JP: It’s very interesting because usually when someone runs into an issue and you’re the opposite of them, like I had mentioned before, the person I helped out, they didn’t have ideation and input as their top and they were struggling with basically coming up with an answer to a problem that they wrote themselves into.

And you sit me in a room with them for an hour and I’ll be vomiting ideas until something hooks, and then they’re off to the races because they now have an answer that they needed. But by no means does that mean there’s any level that’s better than the other. Cause like I don’t have the skills that she has, so I reach out to her when I need those.

Crys: Indeed. We’ve strayed a bit from our talk about beginnings and endings, but it’s okay. It’s all about the writing. But do you have a question in mind to ask our listeners?

JP: What’s difficult for you? Beginnings or endings? Has that changed as you’ve learned certain crafts? Has anything helped you overcome that?

Crys: Yeah, and I will be interested. And it’s so funny how sometimes you and I are almost too scarily similar because I was not expecting our answers to be so similar.

JP: Same. It’s weird. I don’t like it.

Crys: Okay, friends. We will be recording our next book club before you hear this episode and we have not yet decided on our next book. So if you would like to have input on future book club choices, you can check out our Patreon where we have monthly reviews and plannings for our business based on our yearly Tarot pull, and voting on the next book, access to the live stream for the book club, and hopefully soon, because JP needs to give me a deadline, our writing with tarot short stories.

JP: Yes. Yes. Do you want me to give you a deadline on air? Cause I will.

Crys: Yeah. Just don’t make it the end of this month because of witches.

JP: Okay. November 30th, end of the month, next month.

I could make it the 2nd of December, so that when we’re recording I can be like, Hey, did you get this in.

Crys: Nah, make it the 30th and then I’ll rush and do it on the first before I have to report to you on the second.

JP: Yeah. Yeah. That’s the writer way.

Crys: All right. Talk to you later.

JP: See you later.