A story is simply a collection of scenes. Sometimes that may be a continuous story that documents every moment in real time. Although, more likely it is a story that tells a story over a long period of time. Scenes from different days, weeks, or even years.
An important skill for a writer is to know which scenes are worth including in their story and which moments are not important for the reader.
Keep your story exciting and avoid the boring using the following tips.
Every Scene Counts
Every scene of your story counts. There are a lot of different ways to plot your story out into collections of scenes. If you have a scene that doesn’t contribute to plot progress, character development, or worldbuilding then cut it!
Pointless scenes are easy to identify. If you can remove the scene from your story and it doesn’t impact the story, then it is a pointless scene.
Every scene should have an identifiable resolution. The scene begins and things are one way. The scene ends and things are different.
Combine Scenes
You could write a scene about your character arriving to their new school. You could write a scene about your character later meeting the school bully.
Or, you could combine those two scenes and increase the pacing of your story. Your character arrives to the new school and, walking the halls for the first time, encounters the school bully.
The pacing is increased, your story is more succinct, and you can more quickly get to the good stuff. Avoid the filler that surrounds two separate scenes when you can easily combine them.
Summary vs Scenes
Sometimes, time passes and it affects your characters. If it doesn’t affect your characters or plot, then it isn’t worth mentioning. But, when the passage of time does impact things, then you now have the option for how to mention it.
I like to use the example of the Lord Of The Rings movies for this. They have to bring the One Ring across an entire nation, traveling through swamps, plains, and mountaintops. In these moments, the characters are bonding and going through trials, but very few of these moments become scenes.
In the storytelling, these moments are done as montage scenes. A flash of visual interest that communicates to the audience that there is so much more happening that you don’t see.
You can do this in your writing through moments of summary.
A scene is a zoomed-in moment for the reader. They see every moment. They hear every word. They read about the details of the characters and the environment.
A summary is a zoomed-out moment for the reader. They get a list of events. Maybe, they also get an understanding of the outcomes of the passage of time. A summary doesn’t have to be a bland “nothing happened” piece of filler content.
A summary doesn’t even have to be a paragraph of dialog-free narration. A summary can be communicated through a scene!
The main character limps in to the tavern, followed by his tired party. Character A is missing his helmet and Character B has a bandage wrapped around his arm. They fall into chairs around the tavern, the burly dwarf waving a coin in the air for a drink. The main character pulls out a bag of coins and asks how much for a couple rooms and hot baths.
The summary is provided in the context of the scene.
Use these tools to avoid the boring parts and get directly to the scenes that count.