Wired for Story

Produktbeschreibung

This guide reveals how writers can utilize cognitive storytelling strategies to craft stories that ignite readers' brains and captivate them through each plot element.

Imagine knowing what the brain craves from every tale it encounters, what fuels the success of any great story, and what keeps readers transfixed. Wired for Story reveals these cognitive secrets-and it's a game-changer for anyone who has ever set pen to paper.

The vast majority of writing advice focuses on "writing well" as if it were the same as telling a great story. This is exactly where many aspiring writers fail-they strive for beautiful metaphors, authentic dialogue, and interesting characters, losing sight of the one thing that every engaging story must do: ignite the brain's hardwired desire to learn what happens next. When writers tap into the evolutionary purpose of story and electrify our curiosity, it triggers a delicious dopamine rush that tells us to pay attention. Without it, even the most perfect prose won't hold anyone's interest.

Backed by recent breakthroughs in neuroscience as well as examples from novels, screenplays, and short stories, Wired for Story offers a revolutionary look at story as the brain experiences it. Each chapter zeroes in on an aspect of the brain, its corresponding revelation about story, and the way to apply it to your storytelling right now. 

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction

1 HOW TO HOOK THE READER
COGNITIVE SECRET: We think in story, which allows us to envision the future.
STORY SECRET: From the very first sentence, the reader must want to know what
happens next.

2 HOW TO ZERO IN ON YOUR POINT
COGNITIVE SECRET: When the brain focuses its full attention on something, it
filters out all unnecessary information.
STORY SECRET: To hold the brainâ€Ös attention, everything in a story must be there
on a need-to-know basis.

3 I'LL FEEL WHAT HE'S FEELING
COGNITIVE SECRET: Emotion determines the meaning of everything—if weâ€Öre not
feeling, weâ€Öre not conscious.
STORY SECRET: All story is emotion based—if weâ€Öre not feeling, weâ€Öre not
reading.

4 WHAT DOES YOUR PROTAGONIST REALLY WANT?
COGNITIVE SECRET: Everything we do is goal directed, and our biggest goal is
figuring out everyone elseâ€Ös agenda, the better to achieve our own.
STORY SECRET: A protagonist without a clear goal has nothing to figure out and
nowhere to go.

5 DIGGING UP YOUR PROTAGONIST'S INNER ISSUE
COGNITIVE SECRET: We see the world not as it is, but as we believe it to be.
STORY SECRET: You must know precisely when, and why, your protagonistâ€Ös
worldview was knocked out of alignment.

6 THE STORY IS IN THE SPECIFICS
COGNITIVE SECRET: We donâ€Öt think in the abstract; we think in specific images.
STORY SECRET: Anything conceptual, abstract, or general must be made tangible in
the protagonistâ€Ös specific struggle.

7 COURTING CONFLICT, THE AGENT OF CHANGE
COGNITIVE SECRET: The brain is wired to stubbornly resist change, even good
change.
STORY SECRET: Story is about change, which results only from unavoidable
conflict.

8 CAUSE AND EFFECT
COGNITIVE SECRET: From birth, our brainâ€Ös primary goal is to make causal
connections—if this, then that.
STORY SECRET:A story follows a cause-and-effect trajectory from start
to finish.

9 WHAT CAN GO WRONG, MUST GO WRONG—AND THEN SOME
COGNITIVE SECRET: The brain uses stories to simulate how we might navigate
difficult situations in the future.
STORY SECRET: A storyâ€Ös job is to put the protagonist through tests that, even
in her wildest dreams, she doesnâ€Öt think she can pass.

10 THE ROAD FROM SETUP TO PAY OFF
COGNITIVE SECRET: Since the brain abhors randomness, itâ€Ös always converting raw
data into meaningful patterns, the better to anticipate what might happen next.
STORY SECRET: Readers are always on the lookout for patterns; to your reader,
everything is either a setup, a payoff, or the road in between.

11 MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE RANCH
COGNITIVE SECRET: The brain summons past memories to evaluate whatâ€Ös happening
in the moment in order to make sense of it.
STORY SECRET: Foreshadowing, flashbacks, and subplots must instantly give
readers insight into whatâ€Ös happening in the main storyline, even if the meaning
shifts as the story unfolds.

12 THE WRITER'S BRAIN ON STORY
COGNITIVE SECRET: It takes long-term, conscious effort to hone a skill before
the brain assigns it to the cognitive unconscious.
STORY SECRET: Thereâ€Ös no writing; thereâ€Ös only rewriting.


Endnotes

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Index 

Autoreninfo

LISA CRON has worked as a literary agent, a TV producer, and a story consultant for Warner Brothers, the William Morris Agency, and many others. She is a frequent speaker at writersâ€Ö conferences, and a story coach for writers, educators, and journalists. She teaches in the UCLA Extension Writersâ€Ö Program, is on the faculty of the School of Visual Arts MFA in Visual Narrative Program, and is the author of Wired for Story. She splits her time between Santa Monica, California, and New York, New York.