Hi Reader!!

My book, Meta Story: What Marvel & the Messiah Can Teach Us About Great Storytelling, has launched! In honor of the book being out, I’m sharing below something from the book that you aren’t likely to find in any other resource: "The Wafer." And in honor of a plot point that is all about the feels, my tip relates to not over-plotting. Enjoy!

An Idea

An excerpt fROM my book, "Meta Story" on The Event point: the Wafer

Wafer defined: A brief event immediately following the Crisis, showing the emotional cost of the Crisis

I am indebted to Christopher Riley (author of The Hollywood Standard) for pointing out the Wafer to me. I was walking him through my take on structure, and he asked, "Where's your wafer?"

I nodded sagely and gave him my complete answer.

"What's a wafer?"

The Wafer is a small but critical scene/sequence in the story immediately following the action of the Crisis. This is the chance for the Central Character to feel the weight of the loss they just suffered. The action during the loss is often too busy to really feel the cost.

The Rileys (Chris and Kathy) call this a "wafer" because it is designed to be thin; this is a time to feel, not to wallow.

The Wafer is less about action and more about emotion. A chance to live in the moment, to make the loss real. So real that moving on becomes a bigger deal.

Chris in Get Out listens to the tape that explains exactly what is going to happen to him. Harry Potter meets Dumbledore on the train station platform between here and there (Deathly Hallows: Part 2). Ryan Stone talks to an Inuit fisherman (Gravity). Hamilton walks with his wife through the streets ("It's Quiet Uptown"). Schofield listens to a soldier pray out "I am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger" (1917).

Macbeth is rattled having learned of his wife's death; the first time he is truly thrown off since the re-assurance of the witches. He cannot die; but has to wonder if living should be the goal.

Resource: ​Meta Story​ This book combines the insightful “how-to” of storytelling with the theology that supports those elements in stories. Chockful of examples from modern and classic movies, television, and theatre, this text is perfect for anyone examining ancient parables or creating new ones for the culture today.​ ​ See other resources here

TIP

I’m the type of writer that loves plots; I adore structure and finding the right place for everything and putting everything in its right place. So, this month’s tip is as much for me as the rest of y’all: don’t overplot!

We sometimes get so caught up in the story beats that we forget to let the darn piece breathe. The events don’t matter if they do not affect the characters; and the characters can only feel those effects if the script has space for them to feel.

This is true of the audience as well: a story with no place to process emotions will not have an emotional impact on the audience. That’s why one gets bored with action movies that are just a string of every-increasing peril – if we don’t have time to process the peril, it becomes white noise.

Same with the comedy, or the romance, or the adventure.

Give your script a rhythm – action and reaction, momentum and pause, race forward and sit back for evaluation. Your audience will thank you for it.