Episode 71: External Conflict, Tropes, and Poppy's Choice in Tempt Me at Twilight

Write a Novel with Rachel

Rachel from Story Cipher here! If you’ve been around awhile, you’ve heard me talk week to week about the Academy where I coach members through writing their novels. This week, I’m opening the doors for new members! If you are struggling to get the story in your head actually on the page, I can show you how! When you join the Academy, we get you started with what is called Novel 101, where we spend 6 months guiding you through the ins and outs of writing a novel. * We develop your story Idea into a plot with an outline * We bring the outline to life by writing two whole drafts * We learn to smooth it all out through the process of revision I take everything there is to know about writing your story and break it down piece by piece. If you are looking to write a novel, Novel 101 will show you how. We’ve had members writing for the first time, developing a WIP, struggling to give their vivid characters a plot, you name it! If you love stories and are eager to craft your own story, then Novel 101 is for you! By the end of this year, you could have a strong draft and all of the skills that go into shaping your other novels. If you are interested I have the complete syllabus you can download here → www.storycipher.me/academy [http://www.storycipher.me/academy] Kickoff starts June 22! I can’t wait to see you! ~ Rachel This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit storydeepdive.substack.com [https://storydeepdive.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 76: Openings, Soft Magic, and Escalating Stakes in Fourth Wing

Welcome to Story Deep Dive! In this episode, Dana and Rachel break down the plot of Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros, from the in-medias-res opening to the magic system that had both editors reaching for their red pens. Whether you’re a romance writer, fantasy author, or story strategist, you’ll gain valuable insights on opening at full speed without flattening your escalation, choosing how an academic setting drives your plot, and why an unconstrained magic system quietly undermines your stakes. You can also watch the video version of this podcast on YouTube! Estimate Timestamps 0:24 – Dana’s Check-In: Danja Tales Dana is on book three of three, drafting an entire romance series before releasing book one. She unpacks the why: closing open loops, drafting lean, and learning how she gets in her own way during first drafts. Rachel puts a pin in it for a future follow-up episode. 9:52 – Rachel’s Check-In: Story Cypher Academy enrollment opens June 13 for one week. Rachel walks through what’s new in NOV 101: a comprehensive syllabus mapping every module’s skills, and a workbook for building a consistent writing practice before the first draft begins. 💡 For more information about The Academy visit: www.storycipher.me/academy [http://www.storycipher.me/academy]. 29:36 – The Opening: In Medias Res Done Right The story opens mid-argument, and that argument carries the entire setup. Rachel shares her metric: how much information does the inciting incident need to be meaningful? Dana adds hers: make entry a no-brainer, because momentum buys reader grace. “We give you 50 feet.” 35:41 – If You Open at 100, That’s the Baseline Rachel’s roller coaster analogy meets Dana’s pacing warning: a rocket-launch opening means everything after has to escalate from there, and you pay for the speed on the back end. 36:19 – Academic Settings: Two Ways to Play It Rachel’s framework: either the school is the antagonist with built-in escalating trials (Fourth Wing), or the school is the setting and the conflict centers elsewhere (Ninth House). Know which you’re writing, and populate the space between challenges with rivals, training, and other forces of antagonism. 46:12 – Hard Magic, Soft Magic, and the Squishy Problem Dana flags the magic as too squishy, and Rachel runs the hard-versus-soft spectrum. Unconstrained magic functions like deus ex machina and undermines the stakes of the whole story. Dana’s line: “If you are saying this is a fantasy, we don’t get a pass because it’s a romantasy.” 56:34 – The Romance Is Owed Equal Weight Dana’s standard for genre blends: equal, not token, or leave it a subplot. The slow burn earns patience early, the last third rushes, and “sex is not going to paper over everything.” Get the undercurrent right and everything else is gravy. 1:01:22 – The Freshness Pass Three reading lists (fantasy, romance, romantasy) and a market warning from both hosts: Fourth Wing got a pass for being first and fresh. Now that it’s been done, your book won’t get the same one. Book Selection: Title: Fourth Wing Author: Rebecca Yarros Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders from #1 New York Times bestselling author Rebecca Yarros Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders. But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away...because dragons don’t bond to “fragile” humans. They incinerate them. With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant. She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise. Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom’s protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret. Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die. Where to Find the Book Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is available in several formats. It’s also widely available in libraries and online retailers. Details on her website [https://rebeccayarros.com/fourthwing]. Next Episode: In the next episode, Dana and Rachel turn to the characters of Fourth Wing: secondary casts that mirror the protagonist, a love triangle with real stakes, and the POV choice that makes the dragons sing. Join the Conversation: Like what you heard? Subscribe, leave a review, and share your thoughts. Follow Story Deep Dive at storydeepdive.com [http://www.storydeepdive.com] and connect with Dana and Rachel to keep the discussion going! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit storydeepdive.substack.com [https://storydeepdive.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Come Plot With Coach Dana

Hey Story Deep Dive fam! You know I talk about story on here all the time. The craft of it. What makes a reader stay up past midnight. What makes a book impossible to put down. I run a Bootcamp for romance writers a few times a year. Five days, one hour a day, where I walk writers through plotting their romance novel using the framework I’ve used to plot hundreds of books over twenty years. By the end of the week, you have a complete plot outline you can actually draft from. We have one coming up June 15–19, and I want to personally invite you. If you’ve got a romance novel living rent-free in your head, one you can feel but can’t seem to finish, this is the week we fix that. I made a short video talking about it. Watch it above, and if it sounds like something you need, the link is right here. 👉🏾 danjatales.com/bootcamp/ [http://danjatales.com/bootcamp/] I’d love to see you in the room. Until then, I’ll “see” you tomorrow when talk about characters in Fourth Wing. All right, ya girl’s out! As always, happy writing. Dana Pittman, JDChief StoryTeller | Developmental Editor | USA Today Bestselling AuthorI help aspiring authors write addictive romance and fantasy novels.www.danjatales.com [http://www.danjatales.com/] | www.danjataleswriters.com [http://www.danjataleswriters.com/] This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit storydeepdive.substack.com [https://storydeepdive.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 75: Romantasy, Genre Blending, and High Stakes in Fourth Wing

Welcome to Story Deep Dive! In this episode, Dana and Rachel open their four-part deep dive into Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros with the conversation every romantasy writer needs first: what this genre actually is and what it demands of you. Whether you’re a romance writer, fantasy author, or story strategist, you’ll gain valuable insights on blending two genres without shortchanging either, intertwining external and romantic stakes, and writing for the audience your book is actually promising. You can also watch the video version of this podcast on YouTube! Estimate Timestamps 0:52 – Rachel’s Check-In: Story Cypher NOV 101 enters its final module: revision. Rachel walks through the act-by-act revision workbook her students use after completing two full drafts, and why it’s built to serve writers whether they need three drafts or fifteen. 4:22 – Dana’s Check-In: Danja Tales June at Danja Tales brings the Romance Writers Bootcamp, five days, one act per day on the romance four-act structure, plus the first DTW summer retreat. Dana explains the difference between learning the four-act structure and using ARB to plot a romance, and why this boot camp gets clean teaching time on every act. 💡 For more information about Romance Writers Bootcamp visit: www.danjatales.com/bootcamp [http://www.danjatales.com/bootcamp]. 18:14 – The Blurb and What Romantasy Actually Is After the Fourth Wing blurb, Dana defines the commonalities she looks for in a romantasy: the happily ever after, fantastical elements, magic, otherworldliness, increased stakes, and life-or-death consequences that reach beyond the protagonist. Her caution: “every romantasy is not the same.” 26:18 – Why Genre Designations Matter Rachel connects definitions to outcomes: knowing your genre’s expectations lets you deliver them intentionally and market to the right audience. A mismatch between marketing and audience means readers arrive with expectations you never planned to meet. Dana adds the traditional publishing angle: sometimes your audience is an audience of one. 29:16 – The Macro Structure Works Rachel establishes the baseline before any critique: Fourth Wing’s overarching structure functions. Escalating challenges, a clear midpoint, an all-is-lost slide, a climax that gathers the threads, and a cliffhanger into book two. Everything else this month is developmental-editor work on stacking the odds. 31:44 – New Adult, 90% Dialogue, and Two Genres at Once The episode’s three running threads: Fourth Wing is new adult and reads close to YA, it’s written in roughly 90 percent dialogue with very little prose, and combining genres makes you responsible for both. Rachel contrasts Violet with Alex Stern in Ninth House and Vin in Mistborn, young protagonists who read older because their stories demand it. 43:43 – Intertwined Stakes Dana’s core teaching for the month: in a romantasy, the external stakes and the road to the happily ever after must be intertwined, so success in one depends on the other. The world building “draws the lines and colors them in,” and every stroke affects the fate of the romance. 58:03 – Caveats from Two Editors Rachel acknowledges the book’s logical gaps and soft world building, and why those bother some readers and not others. Dana lands the month’s thesis: caring about a protagonist covers a multitude of sins, but an editor’s job is to eliminate as many of them as possible. Book Selection: Title: Fourth Wing Author: Rebecca Yarros Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders from #1 New York Times bestselling author Rebecca Yarros Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders. But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away...because dragons don’t bond to “fragile” humans. They incinerate them. With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant. She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise. Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom’s protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret. Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die. Where to Find the Book Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is available in several formats. It’s also widely available in libraries and online retailers. Details on her website [https://rebeccayarros.com/fourthwing]. Next Episode: In the next episode, Dana and Rachel dig into the plot of Fourth Wing: the in-medias-res opening, the academic setting, open loops, and the magic system question every romantasy writer needs to answer. Join the Conversation: Like what you heard? Subscribe, leave a review, and share your thoughts. Follow Story Deep Dive at storydeepdive.com [http://www.storydeepdive.com] and connect with Dana and Rachel to keep the discussion going! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit storydeepdive.substack.com [https://storydeepdive.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 74: Genre Contracts, Blank Pages, and the Case for Structure

Welcome to Story Deep Dive! In this bonus episode, Dana and Rachel dig into structure — not as a set of rules imposed from the outside, but as the tool that makes telling a story actually possible. Whether you’ve been resisting a beat sheet or spinning out on a blank page, this episode reframes structure as a cheat code that works for you and a compass that points toward the story you’re trying to tell. Whether you write romance, crime, fantasy, or anywhere in between, you’ll come away with a clearer sense of how structure functions, why genre expectations are actually on your side, and why the placeholder is the most underrated tool in any writer’s toolkit. You can also watch the video version of this podcast on YouTube! Estimate Timestamps 0:05 — Check-Ins: Final Pushes, Full Manuscript Requests, and a Summer Retreat Rachel’s clients are deep in their final stretch before publication or pitching. One book is days away from going to the proofreader for a July release. Another client just landed her first full manuscript request from an agent — a significant milestone a few weeks into querying. A third client is wrapping his query letter and plans to start pitching this summer. Dana’s gearing up for the first-ever DTW Summer Retreat, a mid-year checkpoint where Inner Circle students take stock of what they planned in December versus what actually happened. “I planned it like X, Y, Z, and this is what it’s been like in reality.” 11:20 — The Topic: Why Structure Matters (And Why You’re Not Exempt) Dana sets the tone upfront: she loves structure, and this episode is going to push you whether it’s your jam or not. Rachel frames the two entry points: Dana sees structure as a cheat code for intentional storytelling. Rachel sees it as a service to the audience — a mechanism for delivering the experience the reader came for. Both positions arrive at the same place. 14:10 — Structure as a Cheat Code When you have a structure — whether it’s a beat sheet, a four-act map, the heroic journey, or Save the Cat — you have a blueprint. Dana makes the comparison directly: no one wings building a house. The blueprint doesn’t decide what the house looks like; it ensures it doesn’t fall down. Structure gives you mile markers for when tension should escalate, when emotional payoff should land, and when turning points should hit. Your creative energy goes into what lives between the markers, not into deciding whether the markers exist. 17:18 — Genre Expectations as Creative Constraints That Help Rachel’s central argument: genre expectations are not restrictions — they’re a contract with the reader. She uses Sharp Objects as the example. Gillian Flynn uses the crime genre’s structural requirements (investigation, suspects, investigative beats) as the container for exploring violence, belonging, and family darkness. The structure focused the exploration. It didn’t confine it. “She uses the expectations of the crime genre to do that. But then the contents of those beats — what’s actually happening, what the crimes even are — these are all part of the exploration.” Genre expectations give writers a set of buckets for their ideas. The reader’s expectations become a scaffold to build on, not a ceiling to bump against. 22:07 — Structure as a Cure for the Blank Page Dana names it directly: structure is “a cure for feeling lost on the page.” When you know what the next beat needs to accomplish, the blank page stops being a void and becomes a question with parameters. Rachel extends this to the editing phase: holding a draft up against a structure lets you see not just that something is dragging, but why — what beat got skipped, what escalation got missed. The diagnostic clarity that structure provides works at every stage of the process. 24:06 — The Placeholder Is Your Friend Don’t spin out on a hazy scene. Put in a placeholder that names what needs to go there and keep moving. Rachel’s instruction: finish the draft first. Having the whole story gives you the context to fill those gaps in — “sometimes you need, number one, the distance from the thing. And two, the whole story.” Dana adds her practical approach: brackets in the manuscript for missing research, unnamed characters, or underdeveloped scenes. “It is so satisfying to do a control find and go find those brackets and begin to fill them in.” The broader point: knowing your structure helps you know what you don’t know. You can’t fix a gap you can’t see. 32:37 — Structure as Audience Service and the Genre Contract Dana and Rachel both push back on the idea that breaking structure is how you become original. Dana: “You don’t want somebody doing the neck snap because you did something off the wall. You would rather be that you give them what they’re looking for, but you do it in a way that only you can do it.” Structure is the starting line. Your voice, your tropes, your specific combination of elements — that’s what you bring inside it. Rachel frames it as service: structure helps your audience track the story, follow the emotional arc, and arrive at a satisfying landing. When the genre contract is broken, readers notice the violation instead of feeling the emotion. 38:04 — Innovating Inside Structure (Not by Breaking It) For commercial fiction writers, structural expectations are good news. The opportunities to innovate are wide. The mistake is looking for originality in the wrong direction — reaching for structural weirdness instead of leaning into what makes your specific execution distinctive. Dana: “Nail it and then begin to make strategic choices intentionally. You’ve already established the foundation that’s already there and good to go.” Structure also frees up creative energy: once the framework is holding the story, you can pour your best work into the elements you love most. 44:33 — Structure Becomes Intuitive — But Never Absent Experienced writers who seem to write without structure aren’t winging it. The structure is internalized. Dana: “People mistake that for being that you don’t have structure. You do — it is innate. When you think of an idea, it’s already placed securely where it should be.” Rachel adds the honest clarification: fluency doesn’t mean the first draft is clean. It means you can feel when something is wrong and name why. You develop the ability to distinguish between the voice of fear and the voice of writer’s intuition — and that distinction, once you can hear it, changes everything. Next Episode: Dana and Rachel kick off their discussion of Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros. Join the Conversation: Like what you heard? Subscribe, leave a review, and share your thoughts. Follow Story Deep Dive at storydeepdive.com [http://www.storydeepdive.com] and connect with Dana and Rachel to keep the discussion going! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit storydeepdive.substack.com [https://storydeepdive.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]