There is some interest in trying some different writing techniques. This will be a series of swaps with a different technique highlighted each time. You may write poetry, fiction, or non fiction-- Your choice. The only requirement is to try the technique below.

In the format of an outline or synopsis. briefly tell what the characters motivation and goals are. Create outlines for three different stories/novels.

Other resources: http://thewritersresourcesite.blogspot.com/2011/10/goals.html; http://www.free-management-ebooks.com/faqld/development-03.htm

Five Keys to Compelling External Goals Copyright © 2005 by Mary Lynn Mercer

1: It's concrete. A video camera could capture them doing it. The protagonist knows what it will look like. Readers know what it will look like. In the above example, it will look like the girlfriend with the visa getting on the plane and flying out of the country. By measuring every scene against that desired image, the protagonist and readers will know whether he is getting closer to or farther from his goal.

2: It's something the character needs because he doesn't have it already. The twelfth time he's seen the same island in the company of the same girl is nothing new, and he really wouldn't miss anything if he didn't make it this time. But a character who needs something he's lacking will be desperate enough to take actions that create plot events.

3: It's important to him, if no one else. This is the motivation connection. Stakes are involved. Dreadful consequences are attached to the goal. To fail means the protagonist will be worse off than before, and he knows it. In the example above, the implied consequences are the Nazis will imprison, torture, or kill the woman he loves. In a lighter story, the stakes may not involve death, but they should involve some sort of pain--emotional, interpersonal, financial, or social.

4: It's urgent. Whether or not a story utilizes a "ticking clock" device, the protagonist's goal should always be urgent. It's not something he can risk procrastinating about until next week or next month or next year. In Casablanca, the Gestapo is closing in fast on Ilsa and her husband. There's no time to waste on other things unrelated to the external goal.

5: When the goal is over, the story is over. The moment the goal is achieved or irrevocably lost is the moment the story ends. There may be time for a short scene tying up loose ends, but the journey has reached its destination and the readers are ready to get off. When Rick puts Ilsa and Lazlo on the plane, the goal has been reached and everyone is satisfied.

For the sake of focus and clarity, it's best that a character devote his energies to only one external goal at a time. Other things can be going on in his life to provide context, but context is only interesting in proportion to its relevancy to the external goal. In Casablanca, the owner of the Blue Parrot wants to buy Rick's business, and has for a long time. This is context. It's relevant because in the end it provides Rick a way to tie up his responsibilities, freeing him to make the final commitment necessary to reach his external goal.

Several smaller goals may spring up beneath the umbrella of a character's main external goal. In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy's chief external goal is to get back home. To accomplish this goal, she must break it into smaller, manageable sub-goals: get to the Emerald City; see the Wizard; get the Witch's broomstick. None of these sub-goals exist outside the atmosphere and compulsion of the chief external goal.

The protagonist's external goal can change during the course of the story, but it's vital that a cause-and-effect relationship be maintained and that the change increases the urgency rather than decreases it. In Psycho, Marion's goal is to escape with the stolen money. When she is murdered partway into the story, a new protagonist emerges with a new goal: hide the murder. The second goal would never have come about if not for the first goal, and the stakes increase from going to jail for theft to execution for murder. Shifting goals two or three times in a story is an advanced technique that can work very well but which requires great skill. http://www.svic.net/pearl/ex_goals.html

Rules: As always, don't sign up if you have any doubt you can commit to it. It's so disappointing not to receive an attempt. This may be hand-written or printed/typed; Send to 2 partners. Profiles will be checked before assignment made and any person may be dropped due to questions about their profile. And don't forget to communicate with me and your partners if needed.