Essential Guide to Writing a Novel

Episode 215 - The ratchet, a strong plotting tool.

May 1, 2026·25 min
Episode Description from the Publisher

How can we know if our scene pushes the story forward. Does our scene contribute to the story? The ratchet can test our scene. I talk about the ratchet and show how Cormac McCarthy and F. Scott Fitzgerald used it. Plus, a technique for searching for instances of telling in our manuscript so we can change them to showing. And C.S. Lewis's rules of writing. Support the show Buy the master class.

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