The Choice to Enter The Second Act
In the last blog article, we talked about the inciting incident, which is the first significant disruption to the character’s life linked to the plot. The character can resist or engage, but they are not fully committed. They could walk away and often try. However, if we let them, they can teeter here on a threshold because the stakes aren’t personal enough yet.
We need to make our character go all in.
This brings us to our next big story moment- what I like to call The Choice. As with all things in storytelling, it goes by many names: the First Plot Point, the Point of No Return, Crossing the Threshold for Campbell fans, and Break into Two via Save The Cat. I like The Choice because that is what the character needs to do to move forward. They must decide to enter the new world of act two, where they are swimming upstream in uncertain waters. And something very compelling needs to happen to make them willing to swim with the sharks.
How to Craft an Inciting Incident for Your Novel or How to Kick Your Protagonist Into the Plot
As with all things in writing, the inciting incident goes by many names: the catalyst, the call to adventure, the plot thrust, and the hook. That last one is super confusing and not helpful!
What you call it isn’t important, but it is vital to understand what it does and that your story must have it.
The inciting incident is an event that hits your protagonist alongside the head and says, “Dude, so everything you thought was true... yeah, it’s not. Here’s what you are up against. Have fun now. Bye Bye.”