Write Your Draft in Scenes Instead of Chapters

This approach made something click in my writer brain 🧠

📢 Big news, plotters.

I’ve decided to start the process of getting my tennis romance idea down on paper.

Here’s the bare bones of what’s set in stone so far — coach(FMC)/pro player(MMC) dynamic to friends to lover and chronic illness representation (I have much research to do on that front).

Yeah, that’s all I got so far, but I think there might be something there.

As you can see, I’m very much in the planning phase, and because of that I’ve been consuming podcasts and blogs like they actual provide nutrition.

And this morning I stumbled upon an episode Savannah Gilbo posted way back in 2020 called 3 Reasons You Should Write in Scenes vs. Chapters—and something clicked in my brain while listening.

So, let’s dive in. Maybe it’ll click something for you too.

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Scenes & Chapters Are Different

Way before I was an editor, I was a simple fanfiction writer who only concerned myself with chapters. I didn’t even think about scenes or really what they were, to be honest. And I sure as hell didn’t know scenes had their own structure.

I wrote my fanfictions mostly on vibes, based each chapter off what happened in the chapter before and where I vaguely knew I wanted the story to finish.

Now, as a developmental editor, I’ve learned more about scenes, scene structure, scene and sequel, and more. I know how to apply them to help my authors, but when the tables turn and I’m trying to figure out my own writing it always feels like all the books, courses, and webinars fall right out of my head.

So, it’s fascinating to approach writing craft content from the mind frame of a writer vs. an editor.

Scenes

Scenes are essentially mini story within your overall story. They need their own beginning, middle, and end. They need a change arc from start to finish—Savannah is possibly referencing “value shifts” here from The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne.

• Each scene contains a value shift, which describes a universal change from the beginning of the scene to the end of the scene.

  • In The Story Grid, they mostly talk about scenes going from positive to negative, negative to positive, positive to more positive, negative to more negative.

Chapters

Chapters are arbitrary divisions within your story. Their sole purpose is to help you control how the reader experiences your story. Your scenes will exist within your chapters based on how you decide to break them up.

• Sometimes a chapter will consist of a single scene.

• Sometimes a chapter will consist of multiple scenes that work together to 1) create a similar point or 2) express a similar message or 3) work together to build to a pivotal moment.

Pacing by chapter means that longer chapters will slow your pacing down while shorter chapters will have the opposite effect.