by Diana Stout

You’ve got a great idea for a new story. You have an idea of how it’s going to end. You have at least one main character, maybe two, so you start writing while the idea is hot.

The idea grows as you’re writing, so you’re making it up as you go along, and the characters are revealing who they are. And, then suddenly, you hit a wall. You don’t know what happens next, and your brainstorming ideas are dismal.

Several days pass, and you’re still stuck. Maybe this idea wasn’t as good as you first thought. You’re now wondering if you’ve lost your muse. Even the characters aren’t exciting anymore.

You don’t want to give up because you’re halfway through the book. But, you’re stuck.

Suddenly, you get a new idea. An exciting idea. A different story idea. So, you shelve this problematic story and turn to writing the new idea instead.

And then, it happens again. You’re halfway through the story and you’ve entered the dead zone.

The sagging middle. Where great ideas weaken and get mired in the murky waters of story that creates painful writing.

The Three Biggest Reasons for the Sagging Middle

1. Nothing is happening.
2. The climax is in the wrong place.
3. There’s a lack of emotion.

What Should Occur in the Middle?

Blake Synder, author of Save the Cat!, a bookabout screenwriting, calls this plot point The Midpoint.

According to Michael Hauge, the author of Writing Screenplays That Sell, Selling Your Story in 60 Seconds, and The Hero’s Two Journeys with Christopher Vogler, the middle is one of five major plot points in the story that is designed to “elicit maximum emotion” both from the character and the audience.

This middle plot point should spin the story in a different direction and be fraught with anxiety, frustration, self-doubt, or fear.

Other Perspectives

Different writers have called this particular plot point by different names, but they all mean the same thing: it occurs in the middle of the movie or the book, at the 50% mark.

For Michael Hauge, this plot point marks the Point of No Return. The main character can’t return to the Ordinary World from which they came. Bridges have been burned. They’re now closer to the end of the story than they are from the beginning; and, they’re no longer that same person.

Chris Vogler, author of The Writer’s Journey, calls this plot point the Approach to the Innermost Cave. It’s both a huge step into the heart of the conflict and the heart of the character’s wound.

James Scott Bell, author of Write Your Novel From the Middle, coined this potent Midpoint as the Mirror Moment. He contends this Mirror Moment is a self-examination within a scene, where the character fully recognizes they can’t go back.

This Midpoint is a highly emotional scene as we see the character wanting to change, with the plot moving forward because of their renewed resolution in changing, which spins the story in a different direction.

The Nothing is Happening Problem

When nothing is happening, there’s always going to be a lull in the story, yet the middle isn’t the place for a lull. The Midpoint is easily the third highest emotional plot point in the entire story. The other two plot points that should elicit more emotion than the Midpoint are the Major Setback (at 75%) and the Climax (at 90-99%).

To determine what’s happened so far, make a list of the story events. Once listed, determine if the main character made the decision or someone else did, which means the character was acted upon; you want the main character making the decisions or agreeing with them. Then rate each event on the previous emotional scale of 1-10.

If lots of events occurred because of the main character’s decisions and the events were emotionally engaging, could your sagging middle be problematic because you’ve resolved the conflict? That there haven’t been enough twists and turns?

The Climax is in the Wrong Place Problem

When consulting with other writers and showing them how the five big plot points will create maximum emotion, they often discover there’s only one big confrontation, and more often than not, they discover it’s in the wrong place.

Once we move that big event to the Major Setback or Climax, they realize they had finished their story too early, that they didn’t have enough emotion or any emotion, or that the story lacked genuine conflict.

All of which led them to ask, So, what goes in the middle? What’s missing?

The Lack of Emotion Problem

Emotion is why we read books and watch movies. We want to experience what the protagonist is feeling. Too often, there’s not enough emotion.

Story emotion is revealed through the main character’s pain. If there’s no pain, there’s no conflict, and if there’s no conflict, there’s no story.

Conflict generates pain, which generates emotion.

Were the emotional scores you gave your list of events high, low, or midline? They should be high. If not high, is it because there’s no pain?

How to Fix the Sagging Middle

To fix the sagging middle, you want to ratchet up the main character’s emotion with tension, danger, stress, and anxiety. They need to be in danger emotionally, physically, mentally—separately or together.

To fix the Nothing is Happening Problem

Make something happen!

• Create a twist.
• Another crime is committed or another body is discovered.
• A character regrets having sex or saying I love you.
• A character on a quest realizes they’ve just been tricked or been going down a wrong path.
• The main character discovers something or someone they thought they could trust can’t be trusted.

To fix the Climax is in the Wrong Place Problem

Move your Midpoint to the Major Setback or Climax.

• Create an added crisis or twist, a mini climax, the first of several battles that lead to the largest battle of all—the climax.
• If your Midpoint is in the right place, then create an emotion-filled Climax.
• Make sure that events in the first half are properly leading to this new crisis, which later leads to the Major Setback and Climax.

To fix the Lack of Emotion Problem

Layer the story with more emotion.

• Hurt your main character.
• Fill every scene with emotion.

Allen Palmer named each of Christopher Vogler’s 12 plot points from The Writer’s Journey with a specific emotion. Seeing those named emotions, for me, was key to understanding how to layer those plot points more effectively, more deeply.

Final Thought

Far too often I’ll hear a writer, especially a romance writer, say, But I don’t like hurting my characters! Hurt them to the point that you’re cringing or fearing for them.

A sagging middle is a sure sign that something is wrong with the Midpoint plot point.

Brainstorming more events, more pain, more emotion, and moving your plot points around until you feel a lump in your throat occurs, or any other emotion you’re trying to elicit, because if you’re feeling it, your audience will feel it, too.

As you read this blog, did certain movies or books come to mind that provided an emotional Midpoint? Share their titles with us.

Have you struggled with the sagging middle in the past? Do you still?

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About Diana

Finding joy in helping other writers, Dr. Diana Stout has just published two resource guides, CPE: Character, Plot, & Emotion and its companion book, the CPE Workbook, to help writers eliminate their sagging middles and demonstrate with examples and templates how a bit of plotting can be an aid to your pantsering.

Michael Hauge states that “Diana brilliantly reveals and edifies the uniquely powerful principles of plot and character.”

To learn more about Diana, visit her Sharpened Pencils Productions website.

Top photo created in Canva.