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You see, story structure comes with some pretty significant benefits. Not only does it prevent your story from stagnating by providing clear points of transition, but it can—if used well—create a powerful sense of catharsis for your readers. All the elements of your story, from your characters to your scenes, should eventually come together within some kind of basic, structural framework. The final result will be a novel readers simply can’t put down.

However, as was the case with character arcs, there’s no way we can cover every aspect of structure here. Not only are there many types of story structure to choose from, but each type has a huge amount of nuance and complexity within it. Everything from episodic structure, to three and five act structures, to the Hero’s Journey—yeah, you can see why people write volumes about this topic alone. As a result, today’s take on story structure will be an abbreviated one .

Still, the elements we cover here should give you everything you need to understand basic structure and apply it to your novel. After all, the real key to mastering story structure is to use it while still honoring your original ideas. While many writers are wary of story structure for fear it will dictate their story to them, today’s goals will only refine the story you’ve created—not replace it.

Story structure is much like character development in that it involves a lot of technical terms, but can still be boiled down into a few essential parts.

At their core, story structures are culturally recognized ways of telling stories based on a clear set of plot points—plot points simply being scenes meant to fulfill a specific role in their respective structure. For you as a writer, these structures help you ensure every scene in your novel flows towards a clear end goal, slowly building towards key moments of change that shape the conflict of your story. The result is a novel that’s deeply compelling and cathartic for your readers.

While there are many types of story structure out there, the one you’re probably most familiar with is the Three Act Structure. This is the structure most common in Western storytelling and is basically standard for Hollywood movies. However, you can still find the framework of the Three Act Structure in almost all Western media, no matter how experimental. You may even find that your scene timeline loosely follows the Three Act Structure already, making it even easier to incorporate .

Since the Three Act Structure is both widely used and fairly easy to understand, it’ll be the focus of this chapter. Of course, before you can start applying it to your story, we’ll need to define it first!

For starters, each of the three acts in the aptly named Three Act Structure will serve a distinct purpose for your novel:

This is the scene that opens your story. It’s designed to catch your reader’s attention and encourage them to keep reading by introducing a unique aspect of your world or characters.

This is the moment your story really begins, and it’s also when Act 1 ends. Your protagonist has spent Act 1 learning about the conflict they’re about to face, and here they’ll finally become fully involved in the events of your story thanks to a pivotal decision they’ll make.

This is the next major turning point of your story. Your Midpoint marks the halfway point of your novel and sees your protagonist face a major challenge. By overcoming this challenge they’ll gain new skills or knowledge that will allow them to start actively shaping the events of your story. From here on out, they have a plan for resolving the conflict, even if that plan might fail later.

This plot point marks the end of Act 2 and is a harsh reality check for your protagonist. Here they’ll suffer a major defeat at the hands of your antagonist, throwing their previous plans into disarray. This will be their lowest moment, when they feel like they've lost everything.

In the following scenes, they’ll need to reflect on their goals in order to recommit to the journey ahead.

This is the final confrontation between your protagonist and antagonist. It may be a major battle, a confession of love, or a heated argument. Whatever it is, your protagonist will need to draw on all the skills, knowledge, and alliances they’ve gained throughout your story if they want to succeed. Alternatively, they may fail.

These are the last few scenes of your story, meant to show your readers the final effects of your Climax. Whether your protagonist succeeded or failed in their quest, here you’ll take a moment to say some final goodbyes and show what your story’s world will look like going forward. You may also lay the groundwork for sequels here.

This rising line represents the increasing tension as your story and its conflict progress. Likewise, the four major spikes at the First Plot Point, Midpoint, Third Plot Point, and Climax are because of the pivotal nature of those scenes—they’ll naturally be more intense and involved than other scenes in your story. Similarly, the smaller valleys in this line are caused by the various scenes that occur between your six major plot points. More intense moments raise the line, while calmer periods of reflection lower it.

However, regardless of these dips, you can see that the overall trend is one of increasing tension leading up to the Climax. Every scene in your story should build towards the final confrontation in some way, no matter how subtle. Finally, once the Climax is over, your story settles into the Resolution, where readers see the aftermath of the Climax.

To help illustrate this structure in action, here’s the plot of Star Wars: A New Hope broken down using these six major plot points:

Darth Vader intercepts Princess Leia’s ship in search of stolen plans for the Death Star. However, Princess Leia sneaks them out of his grasp with the help of R2-D2.

Upon returning home with Obi-Wan, Luke finds that Stormtroopers have killed his aunt and uncle. Now with a personal reason to hate the Empire, Luke joins Obi-Wan and the two set out in search of Princess Leia.

While searching for Alderaan, a tractor beam pulls the Millennium Falcon aboard the Death Star. The group must now escape, made even more complex when they realize Princess Leia is also on board.

Obi-Wan sacrifices himself in a battle with Darth Vader to buy Luke and his friends enough time to escape the Death Star. Luke is powerless as he watches Darth Vader kill his mentor and his last connection to home.

As the Death Star approaches the Rebel base, Luke and the other Rebel pilots scramble to destroy it. With Han Solo’s help and his own trust in the Force, Luke blows up the Death Star.

Unknown to the Rebels, Darth Vader narrowly escapes.

The movie ends during a large ceremony where Princess Leia honors Han and Luke for their role in helping destroy the Death Star.

What’s interesting about the Three Act Structure is that it also overlaps with key moments of your characters’ arcs. In fact, you can actually see how the major turning points in the three types of character arcs line up with the six plot points of the Three Act Structure. Check out this graph:

Your protagonist starts their inner journey at the same time they start their outer journey during The First Plot Point. Likewise, their emotional turning point happens alongside the turning point of your story—the Midpoint. They face their biggest setback at the Third Plot Point and finally prove whether or not they can overcome their inner flaw at the Climax. By the Resolution, you should be showing off the effects of their growth (or lack of growth) as a character, just like you should be showing the aftermath of your story’s conflict.

Of course, all this talk of plot points and scenes might be getting confusing. What’s the real difference between the two, or are they just different words for the same thing?

Well, no—plot points are a bit different from scenes.

Scenes, like we talked about on Day Four, are simply the individual events that make up your novel. Plot points, on the other hand, are the specific structural moments we just discussed above. Though most plot points will only contain a single scene, some will need multiple scenes to fulfill their unique requirements.

This is why we’ve been talking a lot about scenes in previous chapters, but haven’t yet talked about plot.

These six plot points are the foundation of your story's plot, and it won’t be fully formed until they’re in place. Despite common misconception, the scenes of your story and your plot simply aren’t the same thing, because plot is dependent on your story’s structure—in fact, it is your structure. Only once you’ve combined these six points with the scenes from your timeline will you have created the basic framework of your plot. Fortunately, today is when we’ll finally tackle this next major element of your outline.

Now that we’ve established the basic ideas behind the Three Act Structure, we can begin creating the plot of your own novel. To do this, we’ll be returning to your index cards, so spread them out like you did on Day Five, making sure to keep them in chronological order.

You’ll also want to reference the conflict you wrote down on Day Four. Since your whole plot revolves around this main conflict, having it clearly defined and in the forefront of your mind will make it much easier to identify which scenes fit which plot points. After all, these scenes will be the ones with the greatest impact on your conflict.

Of course, your story’s conflict might have evolved over the last few days. You’ll have expanded on your original story a lot by now, so it’s worth taking a moment to reassess your conflict and boil it back down to its core idea .

To do this, we’ll rewrite your story’s conflict as a question. In creative writing circles, this is referred to as the Dramatic Question, and is simply an expression of your story’s most fundamental conflict. Here are some well-known Dramatic Questions you might be familiar with:

This Dramatic Question is what your readers will ask while reading your novel, and it should be what you answer through your Climax. It may be the same as the conflict you originally created on Day Four, but it’s just as likely that it will have evolved since then. Whatever it is, make sure it sums up the core conflict your protagonist will face.

Once you have your own Dramatic Question written down, you can begin setting up the rest of your plot. Start by writing down the six plot points we discussed previously, each on their own index card:

These six plot points will ultimately form the tent poles of your story, holding up every other scene in between. The rest of your story should follow a smooth series of cause and effect between these points, so you’ll be using these index cards as markers that you can insert into the appropriate point on your timeline.

This is where today’s real challenge begins—you’ll need to go back through your timeline using these new index cards and figure out which of the scenes you’ve created best fit the various plot points of your story’s structure.

Fortunately, it’s likely that a large chunk of your timeline will match up closely with the Three Act Structure already, only needing small changes to existing scenes. Still, you’ll inevitably find that some of these plot points don’t have a corresponding scene at all. This means you’ll need to introduce new blank cards to your timeline, both to fulfill various plot points and to patch up any holes you find in your newly created plot.

Here are a few tips for matching each card to your scenes:

This scene should occur right at the beginning of your story, preferably before any other scenes. It needs to introduce a unique aspect of your story that will intrigue readers.

This scene will occur about a quarter of the way into your timeline, and is where your protagonist’s adventure really begins. In it, they’ll need to make a decision that forces them to get involved with your story’s conflict. After this scene they may leave to a new location or otherwise experience a major shift in their situation .

They’re moving away from their previous, ordinary life and into the unknown.

Look for this scene right in the middle of your timeline—it should be a turning point for both your protagonist and your story’s conflict.

Your protagonist will need to prove they’re learning and growing in order to handle a major challenge they’ll face here, and if they succeed they’ll be rewarded with new knowledge, tools, or skills. The scenes after your Midpoint will see your protagonist shift towards actively pursuing the conflict of their story.

You’ll find this scene around three quarters of the way into your story. Here your protagonist will experience their darkest moment, both emotionally and physically. They’ll suffer a huge defeat, and it will seem like all of their plans have failed. This is a time for them to question themselves and the journey they’ve been on.

This will probably be the easiest scene to spot in your timeline, because it’s where all of your story’s characters and conflicts come together one final time.

Here, your protagonist will use everything they’ve learned to overcome the antagonist and resolve your story’s conflict in their favor. The outcome of this plot point will seal both the fate of your protagonist as well as the fate of the world and characters around them .

These scenes will come after your Climax, marking the end of your story, and this is where you’ll show what the world looks like after the Climax is over. What has changed, both about your protagonist and their world?

This is also when you’ll say your final goodbyes to your characters and hint at what their lives will be like now that the conflict is over. Importantly, this plot point can consist of multiple scenes.

These tips should be you pretty far, but if you need a little extra boost, here’s what my story’s plot might look like based on this structure:

Varya is at the tail end of a mission when she finds herself under pursuit by a group of armed security forces. She manages to lose them in a crowd, but finds that one is harder to shake than the others. She swiftly kills the man in a nearby alley before slipping away, unnoticed by his allies.

Kostya—the leader of the Soviet KGB—calls Varya into a private meeting where she is offered the top position on a secret mission meant to start World War III. Desperate to please him and rise in the ranks of the organization, she agrees. She’ll do whatever it takes.

After Kostya decides Varya is dragging her feet, he sends other Soviet agents to attack her adoptive family. However, Varya protects them, suddenly realizing she’s become more invested in their safety than in completing her mission. From here on out, she becomes Kostya’s enemy.

Varya’s adoptive family discovers her original mission after she’s caught by US agents. She’s put in a high security prison and her family denounces her. Soon after, she learns that Kostya is the one who sold her out.

Varya confronts Kostya, and during the exchange he reveals his personal motivation for targeting her adoptive family. Varya’s adoptive parents also see the truth and forgive her. They work together, ultimately killing Kostya and alerting the targeted nuclear facility before WWIII starts.

Varya’s information is wiped from all databases, and she and her new family move away from their old town. However, they’re happy together, and make plans for the new life they hope to lead.

By the end of this process, all of your plot points should be placed within your scene timeline and you should have anywhere from thirty-five and forty-five scenes in total, if not a few more.

Of course, less than thirty-five scenes can be ok, depending on your story. Still, if you find your final timeline has significantly less than thirty-five scenes, think hard about whether you’ve fully explored your story’s idea. Most genres sit comfortably in that thirty-five to forty-five scene range, though there are certainly exceptions!

Once you’ve incorporated these six plot points into your timeline, you can record this newly formed plot in your draft outline. Fortunately, this step is fairly simple.

Returning to your draft outline, all you need to do is write down each of these six plot points in a list below your Dramatic Question. Then, record their corresponding scene(s) next to them. Add all of the information from those scenes’ index cards to this list as well.

This is also a good time to do some other general cleanup of your timeline. Now that you know the six major plot points of your story, go through the rest of your scenes and mark any that contain important foreshadowing for these later moments. You may also want to review any of the notes and changes you made to your scenes, to ensure everything still works chronologically. Finally, gather your index cards in their correct, chronological order, maintaining any of the changes you’ve made. We’ll need to pull them out a few final times in the coming days, so you’ll want to keep your timeline intact and organized.

Once you’ve added all of your plot point cards to your larger scene timeline, simply stack them in order and store them the same way you did before.

By now, your draft outline should have:

When dealing with story structure, there tends to be two opposing camps. One side structures their stories to the letter, going so far as to scrap their best ideas if they don’t perfectly match their chosen structure. On the other end of the spectrum, many writers refuse to touch story structure at all for fear it will constrain their creativity.

However, as with so many other things in life, a balanced approach is best. I mentioned this in passing during today’s introduction, but it felt too important not to reiterate once more—while you shouldn’t be beholden to story structure, you also can’t ignore its benefits.

Throughout today’s goals, parts of your story may not have perfectly fit the six plot points of the Three Act Structure. Perhaps your Midpoint happened sixty percent through your novel rather than fifty percent, or maybe your protagonist didn’t suffer a physical defeat at the Third Plot Point, but rather experienced a personal revelation. That’s ok. In the end, preserving the core of your ideas can be worth bending the rules.

Story structure is an excellent tool for creating a novel that connects with your readers, and it can help you avoid some of the most common mistakes writers make. By following this framework, you ensure your story comes together with a satisfying conclusion, full of impactful moments along the way. After all, we wouldn’t have spent an entire day applying structure to your novel if it wasn’t worth the time.

However, if your plot doesn’t perfectly fit the template we discussed, that’s still ok. So long as you’re confident your story is at its best, you’ll be just fine.