The 3 Act Structure: Writing an Engaging Middle

The second act can be challenging for writers for so many reasons. It's the longest act in a novel, and it's where you need to create a cohesive plot and sustain it. In this video, we'll look at the qualities of act 2 across all different elements of a story, as well as some tips for how to conquer it.

TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - Intro
0:55 - Qualities of act 2
1:49 - Character
4:30 - Plot and structure
6:28 - Story
7:08 - Writing tips

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[Babblecat]

Best writing channel on Youtube, I have to take detailed notes <3

[apollomoon]

Wow, Shailen, I couldn’t agree more. I think It’s so easy to write beginning sections because it’s fresh and exciting to put down the ideas that inspired me to write the story in the first place. Same for the last sections. Before I write a word I usually have visualized a way to wrap the story. But the middle is like shoveling dirt or raking leaves. Endless drudgery to fill the pond with water so the story can float to the end.
I particularly like your thoughts on resolving conflicts. That’s one of the most difficult things for me to do. It’s too easy to solve them and then be lost for a way to move on. Thanks for this video. I don’t feel so alone now in this task. 😵‍💫

[Joe-zkps]

Working on the second act of my first novel right now, and this gave me a lot ideas for how to address a few things and add some depth to it. I'm energized now. Thank you!

[rachelthompson]

James Scott Bell's book, Writing from the Middle, illustrates well a useful idea which others, like Larry Brooks, have also commented on. At the dead center of the book is a moment of refection whereby the MC realizes what it is about herself that is preventing progress in solving the problem. Bell calls it the mirror moment. After the first plot point, the MC is searching, floundering, and failing to find a solution until at dead center the MC finds a way to move forward, setting her needs aside if necessary, and then she begins to fight back and/or make ready for the big confirmation, I.E. the next plot point.

[Tutoriala]

For me, the two things that have helped the most are these two ideas:
1: The middle isn't "the stuff you have to go through to get to the good part at the end." The middle...IS the story. The first act is just the setup, and the 3rd act is the payoff. The second is the longest, and it's where The Stuff Happens. It should be obvious, but it blew me away when I heard that. Because it's easy to treat it ONLY as extended setup and filler to get us to the Third Act, because, well, you've got to have a middle, right? Treating it as "the middle" makes it seem like it's just a linkage between the Good Parts. Treating it as "the meat" turns it into something far more interesting.
2: Related to the "midpoint" advice in this video, but also distinct: try moving your ending to somewhere in the 2nd act and see what happens. The Hobbit is a good example of this--they reach the Lonely Mountain really early, and the dragon dies and they complete their original goal...but there's still a bunch of book left. All the ramifications of that become The Battle of the Five Armies, and we get to really explore the characters in more depth now that the original Want has been fulfilled--there's nothing left but the Need. The Wizard of Oz sort of does this too, by reaching the Emerald City only to suddenly shift our priorities with a new wrench thrown in: kill the Wicked Witch of the West. I love this technique because 1) it automatically generates meaningful, motion-filled content for a substantial portion of the story, 2) it helps break cliches by throwing the whole story in a direction that probably hasn't been done before (you're taking a premise that might be traditional and exploring the uniqueness of your characters as they grow beyond that premise), and 3) at least for me, any "cool ideas" I come up with usually are for the climax, since that's the culmination of the story: if I move those earlier, I actually get to explore them in more interesting ways, instead of showing them at the very end and ending the story before their ramifications can be explored.

[brycesonflowers]

The Empire Strikes Back accomplish a lot of momentum in Act 2 of the Star Wars Trilogy.

[ProjectMathesar]

This is honestly the part that I've always struggled with.
I can create a beginning and an end pretty easily. It's everything in between that I suffer with.

[PhoenixCrown]

Great video. I loved the focus on keeping momentum, raising stakes, increasing urgency throughout the 2nd act.
I'll be thinking about the "midpoint." I like how you described before it is the premise as promised, then there's a turning point... Should this be a "point" or more of a "period?" For example, in my novel, there is a 3-chapter stretch where my MCs are exposed to information that goes against their world view, their doubt increases, and they're forced to consider they've been lied to (that's a period where they change a lot), and then there's an instance where the MC uses magic, shattering the world view all at once.
Think I need to watch act 3 video to see when 2 really ends to identify my midpoint =) Thanks!

[lakeshagadson]

is there a way you can teach a person who wants to do the same thing as you

[kiropo]

Can I publish a poetry book in your site

[u_t_d_s_h-_a]

Acts, or is it scenes?
Acts is usually attributed to plays Do they write 'dramas' anymore? ---apart from movie scripts ofcourse---which by and large is no less forms of play / drama...

[kit]

The midpoint is useful. Some people formalize it as part of four act structure. Search, four act structure.

[johnhaggerty]

It's easy to see how an exciting story never flags in the middle - *You Let Me In* (Camilla Bruce) *My Brother* (Karin Smirnoff).
Yet middle sections can be elusive - *The Glass Bead Game* (Hesse) *Growth of the Soil* (Knut Hamsun) *Troy Chimneys* (Margaret Kennedy).
*In writing, * said Bernard Malamud, *I had to say what had happened to me, yet present it as though it had been dramatically revealed.*
So we come back to Henry James's idea of experience as continuous revelation, something novelists should bear in mind as they approach the middle.
Lionel Trilling's *The Middle of the Journey* is also elusive, hard to figure how he brings it off, which may be why he never wrote a second novel.
The quotation from Malamud is taken from *Talking Horse - Bernard Malamud on Life and Work* (1996) editors Alan Cheese & Nicholas Delbanco.
Talking of equines, do not miss Amina Cain's *A Horse at Night* (Daunt Books 2022). On Page 88 she writes of toxic female friendship in literature.