5 Questions to Ask Before Adding a Subplot
by Janice Hardy
Subplots can add depth and resonance to a story, but sometimes, they just knock the whole novel off track.
I’m currently revising two novels. My agent asked me to cut out a fairly large subplot from each of them, which changes a lot of little things in the novel, as well as some major things. Her advice was absolutely spot on, so I don’t begrudge the work, but seeing as I did this twice in a row, it’s made me reevaluate how I’ll plan my own subplots going forward. (And made me go back and read all the posts I’d written on subplots, ’cause clearly, I forgot my own advice *grin*).
When Subplots Don't Work
Subplots have a way of taking over novels. Unnecessary ones steal all the action, distract the protagonist, or in the worst cases, shine brighter than the actual plot. Helpful subplots enhance the story, support the theme, and brighten what’s already there. A truly bad subplot will try to smother the novel in its sleep with a pillow.
The annoying part is…
We can’t always tell which subplot we’re dealing with when they first come to us—is it helpful, unnecessary, or will it murder our story?
Some of the best-looking subplots I’ve ever had were the literary equivalent of will-o-the-wisps—shiny ideas enticing me to follow their light and see where they went. It wasn’t until I was deep in the swamp that I realized I’d been led astray. However, there have been just as many times that bright light led me to a brilliant subplot that brought my entire novel to a new level.
Evaluating Your Subplot
Before you add that subplot to your story, consider if it will help it or hurt it.
1. Will this subplot make the story better or just longer?
A distracting subplot adds more of what you’ve already written, just with different details. It doesn’t add anything new, even if the subplot itself is technically good. All it does is delay the time your protagonist takes to complete her goal. Maybe it’s yet another chase scene, or another example of the protagonist making bad decisions based on emotions, or another person who abandons her when things get tough.
All things readers have already seen.
A good subplot changes your protagonist’s goal, life, or experience in a way that matters to the overall story.
Ask yourself: By the end of this subplot, will readers understand something they didn’t before?
If the subplot doesn’t bring anything new to the story or character, odds are it will abandon you in the woods after weeks of work and make you cut everything associated with it.
2. Does your subplot raise the stakes?
If you’re taking a side trip in the story, that trip should create higher stakes or more tension for your characters. Pinpoint exactly what you gain by this diversion. Maybe it reveals a bigger threat on the horizon, or they formed a bond with someone they don’t want to lose, or they discover a secret that changes how they feel about what they’re trying to do.
Whatever it is, by the end of this subplot, things should be worse for the protagonist than they were before, either internally or externally.
Ask yourself: How will this subplot make things harder for my protagonist?
Be wary if the subplot only shows yet another way the protagonist's life is threatened, or has the same stakes you've already established.
3. Does it require more attention and page space than the main plot?
We often question a subplot because it feels like it’s hijacking the story, or it’s demanding to become the story. If you feel you’ve spent too much time on it, estimate how much more page time you’ll need to wrap it up. If you know it’s going to take another nine chapters of your 27-chapter novel, and drag you further away from your core conflict, that’s a big red flag this might not be the best subplot.
Ask yourself: What about this subplot is drawing me away from the main storyline?
If you’re spending that much time on it, there must be something there you either find compelling, or that you instinctively know the story needs. However, it could also be your subconscious trying to ask you…
3A. Is that subplot the story you really want to tell?
Hey, it happens to us all. We dig into a premise, and as we write, other ideas pour in and we discover something amazing that demands our full attention. Sometimes, we need to write the wrong words to find the right ones.
Ask yourself: Is the subplot the better story?
For really demanding subplots–it might be worth an objective look to see if the reason it’s getting so much of your attention is because you like it more than your main plot.
4. Does it connect to the theme and/or character arc?
Subplots can tie a story together because they can slip into any aspect of it and make that aspect relevant. This is particularly true with your theme. If your theme is “discovering self-reliance” and your protagonist’s character arc is that she needs to stand up to her mother, you might have a subplot where she has to stand up for herself in a smaller, less threatening way so she can learn how and see she’s capable of doing it.
Ask yourself: Does this subplot show my theme, or help my protagonist learn a valuable lesson?
A novel isn’t just about how the plot unfolds (and this is coming from a hard-core plotter). Subplots are the threads that tie the story to the plot and give it greater meaning.
5. If you cut the subplot, would it change how your protagonist resolved the problem in the end?
Look at the core conflict. This is what your book is ultimately about—the big bad driving your story. This is the problem that readers want to see resolved to their satisfaction. Even if that problem is an internal character arc, the plot is still how the protagonist learns to deal with and fix that internal problem.
Now look at your subplots. There's a good chance these are solid in their own right, even if they don’t fit the bigger picture (which is why they’re so hard to spot and cut). They might even follow interesting characters and create tension and do all the things they're supposed to do.
Ask yourself: Does that subplot relate to/advance/enhance/reveal more about the core conflict in some way that affects the outcome of the story?
An unnecessary subplot won't affect the resolution, because it won't tie into the core conflict. If the protagonist never learned about that subplot, or met the character who has the subplot problem, things would have turned out basically the same.
Final Thought
Going off into the woods can lead us to a wonderful place we’d never have found otherwise, but sometimes, it just leaves us to die alone in the dark.
As long as we pay attention to the path we’re on and where we’re going, we’ll be better equipped to identify the subplots that will make our stories stronger.
Now it's your turn... Has a subplot ever led you astray? Please share your experience with us down in the comments!
* * * * * *
About Janice
Janice Hardy is the award-winning author and founder of the popular writing site Fiction University, where she helps writers improve their craft and navigate the crazy world of publishing. Not only does she write about writing, she teaches workshops across the country, and her blog has been recognized as a Top Writing Blog by Writer’s Digest. She also spins tales of adventure for both teens and adults, and firmly believes that doing terrible things to her characters makes them more interesting (in a good way). She loves talking with writers and readers, and encourages questions of all types—even the weird ones.
Find out more about writing at www.Fiction-University.com, or visit her author’s site at www.JaniceHardy.com. Subscribe to her newsletter to stay updated on future books, workshops, and events and receive her ebook, 25 Ways to Strengthen Your Writing Right Now, free.
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iTunes | Indie Bound
Featured image created using Canva subscription.
Leave a Reply
28 comments on “5 Questions to Ask Before Adding a Subplot”
Tagged as:
Subscribe to WITS
Recent Posts
- A Spring Gift from WITS: Share Your First Lines!
- 7 Tips to Build a PR Strategy that Works for YOU
- Complete Guide to Revising Your Novel: Part THREE—Analysis
- Some Keys to Achieving Confidence in Your Writing
- Write Emotional Scenes that Better Engage Readers
Great post, Janice, and necessary. This is something I see a lot in my editing work. I particularly appreciate your point about subplots that take over the story. I've worked on plenty of manuscripts where I asked the author exactly what you mentioned, whether the subplot is really the story they want to tell, because it's taking over the main story. I'll be sharing this in my newsletter for authors.
Tiffany! *waving hello* Thanks so much for sharing us with your readers. We appreciate it. 🙂
Thanks so much! I've had that same conversation with writer friends, and even other writers at conferences. It happens to us all 🙂
Asking the right questions before adding a subplot is essential for a cohesive story. Just like with writing, whether crafting engaging plots or using Cover Letter Services, clarity always matters.
Great article. thanks for the well designed questions that are giving me direction out of the mire I've created in the third novel of my series. I've been stuck for several years and finally realized that I have added too many subplots. I am encouraged to keep at it.
Thanks! I'm glad I was able to help guide you out of the subplot quagmire 🙂 Be ruthless! Keep cutting until you think, "Nope, that needs to stay."
Good luck!
I LOVE subplots! They're one of my favorite things, and I get really excited when I read a subplot that enhances the main story. That being said, these questions are absolute gold. Because...as a writer, sometimes I don't rein my own subplots in as well as I should. 🙂
Me, too, which is why I know tricks on wrangling them, LOL. I think it's easy to get excited about the possibilities in our stories, and we just run with them without thinking about where they'll take us.
I'd also imagine it's worse for pantsers 🙂
Hi Janice!
These are fantastic things to ponder. I've found myself turned around, stuck in the swamp often enough.
Is there a way to know that you're going too far in the wrong direction before getting too deep?
Maybe if I ask myself these questions I can keep from getting stuck for too long.
Thank you! For me, I start to get that nagging feeling when I notice it's been a while since I wrote about the main plot, or I have to force little reminder thoughts and comments from the narrator to remind readers what the actual plot is. 🙂 Not sure if that's helpful, but when I ignore that feeling, I get into trouble.
You might also try looking at how the subplot serves the main plot each time you write it. "Is this aiding the story, or just wandering away?"
Excellent advice.
I once had a publisher tell me to remove a secret baby subplot. I did and found it was too easily accomplished. Worse, it hardly changed the story, which right away told me I hadn't done a good enough job of tying and connecting the subplot to the main story in some way. The main story should have collapsed a bit somewhere with its removal, but it didn't.
My lesson: A subplot should never be easy to remove.
That really is an EXCELLENT lesson, Diana!
That sums it up so perfectly! And it's true.
Great article. Read it over twice, as I tried to evaluate where my second novel fell in terms of plot, sub-plots, and themes. And, to be honest, have to wonder (hope) about how my structure holds up.
I write hard SciFi, and the themes I developed in my first novel carry on throughout the second. They are, essentially, reality and its solutions are and must be recognized as complex (I’m a big fan of Carl Sagan), AND that human societies are not mature enough to handle “great leaps” in technology.
While the plot in my first of the series was relatively straightforward. My characters are trapped together and must work as a team to escape and warn humanity of an alien danger. The main plot twist is their realization, after escaping with alien weapons now in their possession, these just might prove more dangerous to mankind in human hands. So, they decide they’ll need to control the technology and instead establish a careful alliance with the world’s nations to defend against the aliens (they’re vegetarians who just want farmland and a cheap source of labor—not monsters, but not good for the locals))
This plot continues into book two. However, while my MC (Maggie) has leverage because her team controls the new technology, they are complete amateurs when it comes to international politics and intrigue. And here’s where my main subplot becomes fully entwined with my MC’s main plot. In trying to guarantee all humanity gets a vote on how to deal with the aliens, they make an early error, which causes key countries (US, Russia, etc.) to distrust them. So, even though the UN agrees to cooperation, leading nations still try espionage to steal the weapon secrets (one small subplots, I pushed it into the background—mainly included it for realism).
The main subplot, though, deals with terrorist deepfake threats to the U.S. and (later discovered) to Russia. As these impact both governments, they also negatively affect public trust in the worldwide vote, which Maggie and her crew feel are most important. Therefore the investigation of the deepfakes—and those characters most involved—occupy the main part of the story until the climax at end of part two (I break my stories into three parts, part three being the resolution and tidying loose ends).
Maggie is finally spurred into action to help the US and Russia solve the deepfakes problem, thereby helping save the worldwide vote and regaining UN nations’ trust. However, what is the major plot for the series, while still moved ahead in many side action stories in book two, definitely takes the back seat in book two (mainly just keeping up the continuity for book three).
So, I fret at how much is too much. I feel the deepfakes subplot moves the main plot objective for this 2nd book. It’d gut the book to remove it and it took painstaking work to build the mystery and leave breadcrumbs (foreshadowing) to build to its reveals. It is large and complex, though.
The espionage subplot is small, but I felt helped reinforce the distrust problem and reflect real life. However, it wouldn’t be awful to cut.
Altogether, though, my second novel comes to 143k words. Not necessarily too large for the genre, but nevertheless at the high end. On a positive note, my (3) beta readers felt it was fast paced and didn’t feel I needed to make any story changes. Still, agents and traditional publishers have different standards and requirements.
Having let it sit a few months (sent 12 queries), I’ll probably give it another read through myself. It’s already been through several editions, so now it’s all about story.
Letting things rest for that few months always makes the story clearer for me too, Jerold. Good for you!
Sounds to me like the subplot is fairly significant. and it doesn't establish the stakes and additional conflict to defending Earth from the aliens. If they can't work together, they'll fail.
Perhaps check to see if book two is more focused on the subplot than the main plot. For example, is the climax the resolution to the core conflict (or that step of it since this is a series), or resolving that subplot?
If it's the subplot, that's a red flag that it's taken over. So either that's the actual point of this book, or you might want to make the plot you want more important.
Hope this helps!
Oh shoot! I just saw I said "doesn't" and I meant "does establish the stakes." I'm so sorry!
Thanks for circling back and clarifying, Janice. You're the best!
When an editor asks me to cut it from the story after explaining why it would be better without, I will.
That's certainly one way to do it 🙂
An interesting post. I'm not very good with subplots, so I found this helpful. Many thanks.
I love a nice road map like this too, VM!
They can be tricky. I'm glad it helped 🙂
Thank you. Good essay, good questions! Has a subplot led me astray? Yes. In my defense I can say only that, in the end, they add to the texture of the novel's ending... I hope
Nothing says they can't do both 🙂 Those random walks can lead to wonderful places.
My editor had me do rewrites for the same issue! I added subplots that didn't feed into the main plot and still have this concern. Thanks for helping.
YOU'VE HELPED SO MANY OF US BECOME BETTER WRITERS! If you could see how often in my outline there are notations like this: " - See what Janice Hardy has to say about this", you would smile! Thanks for all you do to help us become better writers. This article about subplots is another one that I will refer to, for sure.
[…] in the Storm: 5 Questions to Ask Before Adding a Subplot Subplots can add depth and resonance to a story, but sometimes, they just knock the whole novel off […]