Ways to Write Scenes
Scenes are the building blocks of our stories. Learn different techniques to bring your stories to life.
One-Line Scene Outline
This is something that I picked up from Brandon Sanderson. He writes and thinks about his scenes in a sequence to the end. So, instead of writing out his scenes in an in-depth way, he writes one-sentence descriptions of what happens in his stories. Then he fills in the story based on that.
This isn’t something that I would suggest to someone just starting out, but if you can hold all the information of your scene in your head and convey it to yourself in one sentence, more power to you! Using this method will allow you to see how your story looks and flows on the page before writing it.
8-Step Process
Author C.S. Lakin has a simple step-by-step process that she uses for fiction that involves selecting the scene’s position within the story, identifying its purpose and high moment, focus on highlighting any conflict, show character change, and a bit more.
Instead of setting up the different parts that she sees as the scene elements, she suggests authors write it out or put it into whatever format they want as long as they identify the different parts.
Scene Structure Break Down
The folks over at Advanced Fiction Writing have used the tricks written by Dwight Swain in his book Techniques of the Selling Writer to break down the way to write scenes that are meant to engage and thrill readers. Essentially, you break the scene down into its large and small-scale elements.
They also introduce the scene and sequel method that distinguishes two types of scenes. One, the scene, meant to be your average scene and sequel that works as the place for characters to reflect and respond to what happened in the actual scene.
Writing Deep Scenes
Over on Jane Friedman’s blog, authors of Writing Deep Scenes Martha Alderson and Jordan Rosenfeld share insights from the book on how writers should think about scenes and construct them.
Questions and Visualization
Writer John August presents a set of questions and screenwriting visualization to help writers with their scene craft. The questions allow for writers to be reflective of what they want to do in the scene and how they want to present it.
There is also a step in his process that asks for the writer to write down in bare strokes what happens in the scene to help them focus on what is important.
Scene Lists
A technique used by many writers is writing out a simple list of the scenes in their novel in order. This calls for the writer to write out a one-sentence summary of their scenes in order for the book. Like the first technique shared by Sanderson, this scene list helps keep the story alive and flowing the way you want it.
Unlike the other technique, however, is this one calls for a little bit more information, though not much.
Scene Templates
Aigner Loren Wilson is a queer Black Science Fiction and Fantasy Writer of America, Horror Writer of America, and Codex writer. Her work has appeared in Tordotcom, Fiyah, Vice, and more. She strives to help writers reach their publishing goals and attain their dreams. Subscribe for access to masterclass courses in writing, editing, and making a living as a writer.