In all fairness, Dormouse, you assume incorrectly. At least one person on this forum cares. I do. And I care because I also have lots of books about writing at home. Well, not
lots per se, but at least 4-5. I'd be interested to know which ones you have. I will not say which ones I have because even though I usually do not operate on assumptions, you are too annoying, and I will only list them if you would ask me to.
Which you probably wouldn't, because, who reads books on writing, right?
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That being said, I'm only a few pages into
One Million Dollar Outlines, and I would already like to recommend this book if not to you (I'm too humble for that), then at least to everyone who
may theoretically be interested in what makes a best-selling story or franchise. Please, allow me to do this "terrible writing exercise" which Jon'C continuously mocks me for, and re-type a paragraph from my Kindle into this MASSABYSS post as I listen to
music.
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from Million Dollar Outlines by David Farland
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The Scope of the Problem
Most people who try to define what a story is are secretly more interested in another question: what makes a great story powerful?
Thus, Aristotle began to define a story in those terms. He reasoned that a great story has a sympathetic hero with a powerful conflict, and as the story progresses, it has a "rising action" which arouses passion in the viewer until the problem is resolved and we either feel elation that the hero has won, or we pity his fallen state.
Feralt's Triangle
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Feralt said that in a successful story, the tale begins with a character in a relaxed state, but soon a problem is introduced. As we progress through the tale, the suspense rises, the problem becomes more complex and has more far-reaching consequences, until we reach the climax of the story, where the hero's fortune changes -- either he resolved the problem, is destroyed, or must learn to live with the problem. In any case, the tension diminishes, and the reader is allowed to return to a relaxed state.
That triangle describes most commercial fiction of the 1800s, and indeed describes most of the genre fiction, television, and movies today.