Tag: save the cat

Indie Block Party – Post 7 – Writing Tips

Published on by Sydney Aaliyah Michelle10 Comments

Writing doesn’t have to be a lonely endeavor. Join us for the Indie Block Party to meet your writing “neighbors.”

Participants will have the opportunity to share a little about themselves and their writing, while getting to know the other like-minded crazies that make up the Indie Writing World. Indie block party

Week 1
Day 1: Introduce Yourself
Day 2: Introduce your WIP
Day 3: Interview one of your Characters
Day 4: Interview one of your Neighbors (not your real neighbor…the one who signed up on the linkey after you 😉 )

Week 2
Day 5: What are you reading?
Day 6: Top 5 books
Day 7: Share your most helpful writing tips
Day 8: Share your most helpful social media & networking tips

Full instructions are available at The Peasants Revolt or Dawna Raver’s blog.

Three must read books for writers and the best advice from each:

1.  Save the Cat by Blake Snyder 

“You must give it a twist.” – other wise why should the reader keep reading.

“The whiff of death.” – At some point near the last 1/4 of your novel you have to have a death scene. Something, anything has to die.  It spurs the MC towards the climax.  

2. Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success by K.M. Weiland 

Create a scene list. – I’m a list person. 

Interview you characters and know them inside and out. – It all starts with well rounded character and it’s the author’s job to create that character. 

3.  On Writing by Stephen King 

“The real importance of reading is that it creates an ease and intimacy with the process of writing.” – When I write, I read stuff in my genre. It helps me get in the right mind set to write. 

“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write.” – I make time every day to read, now if I can make time every day to write, I’ll be good. 

Share your most helpful writing tips.

Progressive Book Club – Save the Cat

Published on by Sydney Aaliyah Michelle21 Comments


mlswift.blogspot.com

49464In the 2nd installment of Progressive Book Club, we read Save the Cat by Blake Snyder. It was a really great book geared towards screenplay writing, but a great pre writing process for novel writers.

In the book, he claims there are no completely original ideas and that’s a good thing. In order to have a successful story, in his world a box office hit, you need to have a story that is recognizable.

One of his other bold claims, I found fascinating, is that the movies The Matrix and Monster, Inc. are actually the same movie. The Matrix is in my top ten favorite movies. It was a Sci Fi action movie with movie tricks that hadn’t been done before.  Monster’s Inc. is a Pixar film. While Pixar was an innovation in animation at the time, Monster’s Inc. is the fourth feature out of the studio.

For my book club report, I put Mr. Snyder’s claim to the test. 

Tagline:  

The Matrix – The Fight for the future begins.

Monsters, Inc. – We scare because we care.

Hooks:

The Matrix -A computer hacker learns from mysterious rebels about the true nature of his reality and his role in the war against its controllers.

Monster, Inc. -Monsters generate their city’s power by scaring children, but they are terribly afraid themselves of being contaminated by children, so when one enters Monstropolis, top scarer Sulley finds his world disrupted.

Storylines:

imagesThe Matrix – Thomas A. Anderson is a man living two lives. By day he is an average computer programmer and by night a hacker known as Neo. Neo has always questioned his reality, but the truth is far beyond his imagination. Neo finds himself targeted by the police when he is contacted by Morpheus, a legendary computer hacker branded a terrorist by the government. Morpheus awakens Neo to the real world, a ravaged wasteland where most of humanity have been captured by a race of machines that live off of the humans’ body heat and electrochemical energy and who imprison their minds within an artificial reality known as the Matrix. As a rebel against the machines, Neo must return to the Matrix and confront the agents: super-powerful computer programs devoted to snuffing out Neo and the entire human rebellion.

UnknownMonster, Inc. -A city of monsters with no humans called Monstropolis centers around the city’s power company, Monsters, Inc. The lovable, confident, tough, furry blue behemoth-like giant monster named James P. Sullivan (better known as Sulley) and his wisecracking best friend, short, green cyclops monster Mike Wazowski, discover what happens when the real world interacts with theirs in the form of a 2-year-old baby girl dubbed “Boo,” who accidentally sneaks into the monster world with Sulley one night. And now it’s up to Sulley and Mike to send Boo back in her door before anybody finds out, especially two evil villains such as Sulley’s main rival as a scarer, chameleon-like Randall (a monster that Boo is very afraid of), who possesses the ability to change the color of his skin, and Mike and Sulley’s boss Mr. Waternoose, the chairman and chief executive officer of Monsters, Inc.

Characters: 

  • Main Characters – Neo and Sulley – both realize the the world they were told about is not the real world.
  • Sidekicks – Trinity and Mike – both have unlimited faith in their friend.
  • Villans – Agent Smith and Randall Boggs – both slimy and scary characters who can change colors and blend into the back ground to deceive.
  • The Double Cross – Cypher turns Neo in for a steak dinner; Mr. Waternoose poses at Sulley’s mentor and turns out to be the man behind the whole evil plan.

Worlds: 

  • Industrial worlds
  • Dual realities
  • Neither world knows the real truth about the other.
  • The scene when they show the pods connecting humans to The Matrix and the doors storage room have a similar feel to them.

My conclusion: I get the comparison. It is interesting to break down a movie to its parts and realize on a basic level, they are the same movie. I agree with Blake, it’s the similarity in stores that makes them intriguing because like Blake Snyder says, to write a successful work that will sell, you need to find an idea and do it different.

What you do you think of the claim there are no original ideas left in the world? Can you think of any other movies that on the surface appear different, but are actually the same story?  

Source:  imdb.com