Tag: structural editing

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The Mohr Story Structure Model

Regular consumers of story, either written or film, learn to recognize the patterns that come with the rise and fall of action. They develop this innate instinct about when things should happen. If something is off with the pacing of a story, the readers know. They can feel it. They may not be able to explain why the pacing is off, but they still know that it's off.

Story structure models help to provide reasoning and some mathematics to what the readers know by instinct. This is why story structure is more important than what some writers give it credit for.

However, in all my years of studying story structure, I've also noticed that emphasis is often given to the protagonist of the story, focusing on their actions and decisions. The antagonist is often treated as an afterthought or ignored completely. As such, the dynamic interplay between the protagonist and the antagonist is not leveraged to its full potential.

When I noticed this pattern, I started to develop my own story structure model that leans into the interplay between the protagonist and the antagonist. As I write this blog post, I'm currently writing a full book about the topic, defining the antagonist and looking at story structure in detail, incorporating the antagonist into the model. That book is slated for publication come February 2026, but it's time to start sharing with the world the base structure that I'm calling the Mohr Story Structure model.

The Mohr Story Structure model is an amalgamation of a lot of different models, but adds the antagonistic beats that are commonly missed or misunderstood. I employ a four-act structure.

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Understanding the Nature of the Antagonist

When we start the conversation about the protagonist and the antagonist, some writers instantly jump to the conclusion that we are referring to a good-guy-vs-bad-guy story.

One might ask, "What if I don't have a villain in my story?"

My response: "Not all stories have villains. But all stories have characters striving towards a goal of some sort… and there is always something getting in the way."

I dove deeper into this idea in a previous post, highlighting that the role of the antagonist in a story is to get in the way of the protagonist achieving those goals, whatever those goals happen to be. But your protagonist is not necessarily the good guy of the story. And the antagonist is not necessarily another character. The good-guy-vs-bad-guy concept is one of many protagonist/antagonist pairings that might exist.

It's time to take a dive into the different types of antagonists found in stories. And not all of them are characters. We'll be looking at the classic good-guy-vs-bad-guy trope, but we're also going to dive into man-vs-nature and man-vs-self.

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The Role of the Antagonist

When we start the conversation about the protagonist and the antagonist, some writers will instantly jump to the conclusion that we are referring to a "good guy vs bad guy" story.

One might ask, "What if I don't have a villain in my story?"

My response: "Not all stories have villains. But all stories have characters striving towards a goal of some sort… and there is always something getting in the way."

It is that understanding of a character's goal, and consequently what is getting in the way, that helps us to understand the protagonist and antagonist for our story.

In today's post, I want to examine what really makes the protagonist the protagonist… and what the role of the antagonist is.

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Too many short sentences make a scene feel stilted

When I was still new to writing, someone told me that to write a good action sequence you had to use a lot of short sentences. The idea was that short sentences were straight to the point and didn't give you a chance to add fluffy stuff. When I was told this advice, I was told that the short sentences would speed things up. Now that I'm more experienced, I know that this was bad advice and fundamentally not true.

Short sentences can be a great device to add emphasis, which is why this misconception exists. When used wisely, the short sentence can create urgency within your storytelling. However, too many short sentences in quick succession will create a stilted feeling in the narrative that is disjointed and slow to read. It can even make things confusing.

In today's post, we're going to discuss the true nature of using short sentences in action sequences.

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The Stages of Editing

When I tell people that I'm a freelance editor, it's quite common for people to assume that I spend my days just looking at spelling, punctuation, and grammar. I don't get this reaction from just the general public either. Many writers, especially new writers, also make this assumption. However, editing is so much more.

Editing falls into three main categories:

  • developmental, which encompasses the rewriting process and critiques;
  • copyediting, with the line-edits and, of course, the famous punctuation-and-grammar concept;
  • and proofreading, which occurs after a manuscript is typeset for publication, looking for any errors that were either missed or introduced during the typesetting process.

Each stage is necessary for the production of a publishable book.

The initial drafting of a story is a solitary practice. However, during the different editing phases, it's vital for every writer to seek out those extra sets of eyes to provide objective input. The who and the when will depend entirely on what stage your manuscript is at.

The stages of editing described in this post are the same for both traditional and self-publication. It's just the players that change.

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