Crafting a Compelling Novel Concept

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Note from Jane: Today’s post is an excerpt from Story Fix: Transform Your Novel from Broken to Brilliant by Larry Brooks (Writer’s Digest Books).


A weak concept can be strengthened and saved.

Almost always, the source of weakness and dysfunction within a story dwells in the nature of the concept itself; i.e., the degree, or complete lack, of something compelling within the concept. It’s hard to turn a boring concept into a compelling premise, and yet, this is the golden ring of revision. We need to do precisely that, usually by adding a conceptual layer rather than by looking to the premise to fix the problem.

This means that recognition of weakness as the first step in the repair process, because that recognition allows you to jettison the weakness and replace it with something better.

Concept is a tricky issue.

You could write a novel from this concept: “a story about a guy living alone in a big city.” That actually is a concept, just not a very compelling one. At first there’s nothing interesting or unique about the protagonist, the setting, or the situation. It’s flat, and therefore dead on arrival. You don’t need to chuck it, but you do need to enhance it to save it. Good concepts go beyond the banal to offer something fresh and, most of all, compelling, and this example is nothing if not generic and bland.

A better concept might look like this: “a story about a wealthy widower who suddenly finds himself alone after thirty years of marriage and moves to Los Angeles to live with his younger brother, a film director who enjoys life in the fast lane. The man must negotiate his staid values and comfort level with the onslaught of aggressive, sophisticated women who seem to want to rescue him from his depression.”

To me that sounds like a significantly more compelling story than the first concept. If you don’t agree, then the issue resides with your story sensibility, which is the key variable for what you decide to write.

I encounter this particular concept issue frequently with my coaching clients, and often their response to my feedback is something like, “Well, I intended that. It’s obvious that something else will be in play that complicates his situation.”

It’s not obvious. Never assume an agent, editor, or reader will expand the scope of your concept in his mind because it’s obvious to you. If the juice of your concept is layered, define the layering at square one.

The second example meets several of the criteria for a compelling concept, one of which is this: The reader hasn’t encountered this story before, or if she has, this offers a new and intriguing twist.

The acid test of a compelling concept is simple.

If you pitch your concept—without having to add elements of the premise to make it interesting—and your listener responds, “Wow, now that is interesting. I can’t wait to read a story based on that idea,” then you’ve hit pay dirt. If you received that response, then your concept is, by definition, compelling and intriguing, at least to that particular listener. The trick is to offer something that a stadium full of listeners would respond to in the same way.

The word compelling, however, is a mixed bag.

Reaching for the bar labeled compelling presents an opportunity to add depth and richness to your concept. Yet, “compelling” always remains a matter of opinion. What is compelling to some may be considered trite and ridiculous to others. That’s why we have different genres. Readers of romances may not find the notion of traveling to a different dimension to encounter an alien life force all that compelling. Even if it’s a romance, if you set it in an alternate universe, then it is also something else.

There are no hard and fast guidelines for attaining a “compelling” level of appeal. One agent’s next Hunger Games is another’s been-there-read-that story. For the writer sitting alone in his office, this leaves little to work with other than his instincts. This is why it’s important to develop a cutting-edge, highly market-accurate story sensibility, because without a commercial nose for what masses of readers will find appealing, a writer’s notion of “compelling” may fall short.

The goal of all of this, at its highest level, is to evolve your story sensibility.

You want to be able to look at your existing story concept and say, “Yeah, that’s good,” or admit, “Well, I thought this was cool, and it is cool for me, but I can see now how others might not agree, because the story is nothing special.”

You may like mustard on your peanut butter sandwiches. But good luck trying to launch a chain of sandwich shops based on that concept.

Elevating your story sensibilities becomes the most potent tool of all in the revision of a story. With concept, an idiosyncratic story sensibility shows itself immediately, via the criteria and then via reader reaction to the idea itself. Thus a concept can either make or break your story before you write a word.

Here are some examples of inherently conceptual concepts.

These concepts meet the criteria for a compelling concept without delving into premise. Notice how there are no heroes here, no plots, no actual story. Each of these is an idea for a story that has been imbued with a conceptual layer, which renders it immediately compelling, at least to the market sensibilities of the people you are trying to impress. It may not be your thing, which means you shouldn’t write that story … just as you shouldn’t write it if your story sense tells you that you alone hold affection for it. Some of these have been taken from best-selling stories you might recognize, while some are concepts that promised a story the writer(s) couldn’t quite deliver on.

 “Snakes on a plane” (a proposition)

“The world will end in three days.” (a situation)

“Two morticians fall in love.” (an arena)

“What if you could go back in time and reinvent your life?” (a proposition)

“What if the world’s largest spiritual belief system is based on a lie, one that its largest church has been protecting for two thousand years?” (a speculative proposition)

“What if a child is sent to Earth from another planet, is raised by human parents, and grows up with extraordinary superpowers?” (a proposition)

“What if a jealous lover returned from the dead to prevent his surviving lover from moving on with her life?” (a situation)

“What if a fourteen-year-old murder victim narrates the story of her killing and the ensuing investigation from heaven?” (a narrative proposition)

“What if a paranormally gifted child is sent to a secret school for children just like him?” (a paranormal proposition)

“A story set in Germany as the wall falls” (a historical landscape)

“A story set in the deep South in the sixties, focusing on racial tensions and norms” (a cultural arena)

In general, if you can add “hijinks ensue” to the end of your concept, you may be on to something good. If the hijinks themselves lend a conceptual essence to the idea, then include them in your statement of concept.

High Concepts vs. Real-World Concepts

High concepts depart from the norm. They exist at the extreme edge of imagination and possibility. High concepts are simply more conceptual than more common, real-world concepts. Examples would be Superman and Harry Potter and the Avengers, which bring in fantastical and supernatural elements. Examples of reality-constrained concepts that are equally compelling would be James Bond or Alex Cross or The Help or Gone Girl.

Stories about real people in real situations also benefit from something that creates a compelling context for the story. Something about a hero can be conceptual, or something a character does or believes or must deal with can be conceptual. For example, one of the main characters in Gone Girl conspires to kill herself while framing her husband for her death; this becomes the concept itself.

Concepts, high or otherwise …

  • can be character-centric, like the above examples.
  • can be a speculative proposition, like The Da Vinci Code or Star Wars.
  • can be thematically conceptual, like The Help or The Cider House Rules.
  • can be lifted from perspectives and drama in the real world, like a story about the 1980 U.S. Hockey Team or Apollo 11.
  • offer a setting, time, or place rendered conceptual by virtue of the promise it makes: The forthcoming story will play out there. Historical novels live and breathe by this conceptual potential.
  • could be about stories set within a given culture, such as Fifty Shades of Grey or a story about the Blue Angels or even the Hells Angels.

Notice how all of these examples are different than—more conceptual than—a “story about a guy living alone in a big city.” Nothing about that particular concept is unique or fresh. It doesn’t push buttons; it doesn’t appeal to a given demographic, interest, or fascination; it doesn’t pose an intriguing (at least, intriguing enough) speculative question or proposition; and it doesn’t unfold within a setting, time, or culture that would allow the reader to take an appealing, vicarious trip into such a place.

Great concepts always promise a vicarious ride for the reader. They can take readers somewhere or place them into situations that are not possible, realistic, or even something they would choose in real life. A strong concept takes readers on a ride of a lifetime, one they will never know in their personal reality.

A concept can define the story world itself, creating its rules and boundaries and physics, thus becoming a story landscape. (Example: A story set on the moon is conceptual in its own right.)

A concept can inject speculative, surreal possibilities, such as time travel, ghosts, paranormal abilities, cloning, etc., into an otherwise normal reality.

In short, a concept is simply the compelling contextual heart of the premise and story built from it. It imbues the story atmosphere with a given presence. It elicits that sought-after response: “Wow, I’ve never seen that before, at least treated in that way. I really want to read the story that deals with these things.”

It does not include a hero … unless the hero is, by definition, a conceptual creation, which is the case in several of the examples just given. A story is built around a protagonist leveraging her conceptual nature. The character isn’t the concept—because every story has a protagonist or hero. What makes her fascinating, and therefore conceptual, is the proposition that renders her unique and appealingly different (think Nancy Drew, Stephanie Plum, or Wonder Woman). When that difference screams for a story to be told, you have a great concept on your hands.

It might be helpful to consider what another story without a vivid concept would sound like in a pitch: Two people fall in love after their divorce. It’s not a bad story if you can pull it off. But divorce is all too familiar and therefore not a strong concept by itself. An agent wouldn’t quickly invite you to send him a draft; he’d want more from the concept, leading into a premise that picks up the conceptual power it offers. If you could bring something contextually fresh to it—for instance, Two people who both want to murder their ex-spouses fall in love—then the story is already strengthened from its conceptual promise alone.

Agents and editors are looking for something fresh and new—in other words, they are looking for the conceptual. Imagine, for instance, that you are an agent and this pitch crosses your desk: “My story is about a detective who is assigned to find the killer of a girl.” This common concept crosses my desk regularly, and my feedback is easy: “There’s nothing here that sets your story apart. You’ve defined the genre itself without adding anything inherently appealing.” You might as well have said, “My story is a by-the-book detective mystery.”

No sale.

An image of the cover for Story Fix by Larry BrooksWhen I say, “Agents and editors are looking for something fresh and new,” it may be tempting to say, “Well, I’m not dealing with them. I’m going directly to readers, so I don’t have to worry about all this fresh concept stuff.” That’s risky thinking. Readers screen titles online, looking for pitches—concepts and premises—that draw them in. It’s the exact same dynamic.


For more story-fixing tips, check out Story Fix: Transform Your Novel from Broken to Brilliant.

 

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[…] Larry Brooks discusses how to create a concept for your novel that will compel readers (and agents and publishers) to read more.  […]

Jessi Rita Hoffman

Hi Larry. A lot of people use the words “premise” and “concept” to mean the same thing. How are they actually different?

Jane Friedman

Since this is an excerpt from a book, I don’t know if Larry will be jumping in, but to help answer (based on things he’s written elsewhere):

“An idea would be to write a story about raising the Titanic from the bottom on the sea. A great idea. A concept would be to suggest that there are secrets still hidden there that certain forces would kill to keep concealed. A premise would be to create an archetypical hero who is hired to do this job and in doing so saves his country from potential attack.”

More here: http://www.writersdigest.com/qp7-migration-books/story-engineering-excerpt

Jessi Rita Hoffman

Thanks, Jane. I asked the question to help other readers, thinking Larry would be joining the conversation. Here is another article from his website that nicely addresses the difference between “concept” and “premise,” for anyone needing further clarification: http://storyfix.com/a-clearer-understanding-of-concept

Larry Brooks

Hey Jessi – Jane’s response and examples below are spot on. You could consider the evolution from idea to concept to premise just that, an evolution, each step laying in more elements. The line between them is often fuzzy, causing — as you say — people in the business to confuse the issue by merging the terminology, often without understanding the difference themselves.

Concept is the contextual framework for a story. No plot yet, no characters (unless one of them IS the concept via some conceptual essence they bring to the story)… just something intriguing, interesting and compelling that will FUEL the story told from within that concept. For example, a love story set in Paris is already more compelling and intriguing than a love story set in Walla Walla, Washington.

Hope this helps, thanks for joining the conversation here!

Rebecca Adams

Thanks for the information AND examples from Larry’s book. “Snakes on a plane” is a perfect example of a single line concept that will grab the potential reader’s attention.

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Larry Brooks

Sorry to be late to this conversation, thanks to all for participating. You’re right when you observe that some folks – including people who should know the difference, like agents and editors and even some bestselling authors – don’t seem to understand or acknowledge a difference between concept and premise, which can confuse an author seeking clarity and (hear this clearly) opportunity. That clarity, once achieved, can dramatically escalate the power of your story and the pace of your career.

The difference is subtle, and once grasped, rather obvious.

A concept is the presence of something “conceptual” driving and fueling the premise. A concept requires neither a protagonist or a plot, but rather, it is the “idea” or “notion/proposition” driving and framing and creating context for the plot (the plot being the premise itself). Sometimes that is a location, a time or a prevailing social context (as in The Hunger Games… the games themselves being the concept, which is frightening and fascinating even before you toss Katniss into the mix; that said, all three different books and films, of which there are four, have different premises). The premise is when you add a story dynamic — the “plot,” if you will, in the form of a hero with a problem/need/opportunity, who sets out to achieve something in that regard in the presence of opposition). As you can see, they are different things.

If you’re writing a story about two people falling in love… that’s not conceptual. Falling in love in a space station, or as White House staffers, or as members of different social strata… that makes your story more conceptual. It makes it better, every time.

A great example is the combined oeuvre of the Superman franchise. Ten movies, dozens of TV episodes across many different programs over the years, hundreds of comic books… and ONE single concept. Which is: an alien baby is sent into space, crash lands on earth, is raised by human parents, grows up with super powers which he will use to protect us against evil. Go any further from this conceptual framework and you have entered the territory of premise… which is where the confusion takes place. But make no mistake, nobody would care about Superman without that backstory. Notice how, with the conceptual layer itself, there is no hero yet (Clark Kent), yet the nature of the hero IS conceptual (you haven’t added a character, you have simply begun with what is CONCEPTUAL about the hero). Each of those hundred stories is a SEPARATE and unique premise. All ten films, for example, have a different plot. And thus, each has its own premise…. based on ONE consistent concept.

Let’s turn to television to cement this. Consider every single primetime drama you can think of. Let’s use Castle as an example. The concept: bestselling author is given access to a local New York police precinct to facilitate his research, and he ends up contributing his crime-solving acumen to their cases. That’s a concept. Itis the SAME concept for each and every episode (this is true for The Good Wife, Ray Donovan, Gotham, The Grinder… every single fictional program on television). But each EPISODE offers its own premise – its own STORY as framed by the concept – and each episode is different. Concept is the very lifeblood of television… AND of genre fiction.

Concept is the framework for a story, something you ask the reader to accept, hopefully with excitement because it is fresh and compelling. Premise is the specific thing you are asking the hero to confront, defeat and achieve (the plot). They are different yet related things, because it is the concept that fuels a premise. Can you have a premise without something conceptual, a “slice of life” story? Actually… no. Because every story has some level of conceptual essence to it.

So the trick, then, is to understand the nature of your genre and fuel your premise with something HIGHLY conceptual, or at least conceptually original. And if it’s literary fiction (the flip side of genre), then at least add some subtle conceptual layer to you story (for example, give your characters interesting/conceptual careers or backstories) to give it more allure than your beautiful sentences and episodic characterization.

Hope this helps clarify and take you deeper into this amazing facet of story understanding. If you look at the bestseller lists and the new authors who break in, almost without exception you will find something fresh and compelling – CONCEPTUAL – at the heart of their stories.

Ron Estrada

I love Larry’s work. He was the first guy to introduce me to story structure. After five unsold novels. This book looks like another gem. I’m already a fan of the single sentence summary. If I can’t make my story sound interesting in one sentence, then I don’t start writing it. His latest appears to go deeper into those topics. I’ve been holding off, but I’ll grab this one now. Thanks for sharing, Jane.

Joel D Canfield

One thing I’ve appreciated about Larry’s work (along with 999 other things) is that he reminds us that whether we seek a traditional deal or publish ourselves, the requirements are the same. The concept that would fire up an agent will fire up potential readers.

Sue Coletta

So nice to see Larry’s new craft book getting the attention it deserves. It’s a fantastic book, setup like your own private writing conference, grading system and all. Highly recommend to both new and seasoned writers.

Adrian Hilder

I will admit to being one of those eight out of ten Larry received that got concept wrong. I really thought I had nailed it at the time. It was not until I started to think about what other stories I might write in future that I eventually (months later) grasped my concept and refocused my story. It was right there at the first plot point of the first story all along, but my head was so deep into storytelling and working with the premise I could not see it.
My beta readers have given up analyzing new chapters for quality as soon as they get them. They just read it first, eager to see where the story is going, then go back and analyze it. I do hope I got there in the end and will manage to earn an audience for my stories.

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