Ines Johnson is Having a Breakdown

The Pet the Dog moment can be used to remind us of the stakes of your story before the big battle or ordeal your hero must face. But you can also use it for the villain, or the bad boy, to humanize them and add more conflict to your story by giving the reader pause to consider changing, or challenging, their loyalties.

The Save the Cat scene is where we meet the hero and the hero does something to make us identify or empathize with them. I know of three ways to establish empathy and make readers instantly get the feels for characters.You showcase their extraordinary qualities. Or their ordinariness in an extraordinary world. Or you have them save a cat from a tree or a dumpster in a shoot out.

A better way to do an infodump of backstory is to use a Novice. The Novice enters the story when we do. They're also brand new to this world, but they're in the story so they can ask the questions we're dying to know, be shown the process of the way the world works, try to model the behaviors of the customs of the people, and make mistakes and get set straight to ensure we all understand.

Next time you're tempted to write a prologue, determine if you might be better served by a teaser to give your readers a Slice of Life of your world, or Set Up your character's Story question that you'll answer by the end of the book.

A teaser has three jobs; it had to be immediate, quick and grab attention. It gets you ready for the meat of the episode. It's like an amuse bouche that leaves you wanting more before you're served the main dish.

In the battle of Plotters vs Pantsers, let's take a step back and look at the Pacing of your story.