Your Book Doesn't Need a Plot: A Study of Turtles All The Way Down | Olivia J

"It's not what you write; it's the way you write it," Jack Kerouac

"Of course books need plots, Olivia! If you don't have a plot, then you'll just get a sad teenage boy wandering around the streets of New York City for three days, and who wants to read that!"

Yes. I want to read that.

(That was a reference to The Catcher In the Rye. Get on my level.)

Anyway, yes, you heard me correctly. I'm insinuating that your book doesn't need to have a traditionally developed "plot" to be successful.

Who needs plots, anyway? They're overrated.

@olivia.j.the.wordshaker

To scale back, "plot" within a story is defined as 'the sequence of events that affect other events and further the story toward its goal'. Examples: the plot of The Hunger Games is: Katniss's sister, Prim, is reaped, so Katniss volunteers, goes to the Capitol, trains and fights in the Hunger Games, wins with Peeta, and goes home.

What defines this traditional plot is a combination of events that are action-packed (being that something is happening externally) and that they are driven by the main character as well as other outside characters/forces. Both Katniss’s decisions as well as the decisions of others cause clear events in the story, and their reactions cause other events, which affect the development of themes, characters, and the outcome of the story.

However, I'm here to propose that you don't need a plot. You don't need to string all these story beats together and create anything convoluted for the story to be successful.

It really comes down to one thing:

Your book doesn't need a plot. It just needs a point.

I first experienced this with The Catcher In the Rye - my all-time favorite book, by the way. If you try and explain what actually happens in The Catcher In the Rye, it's going to sound like this:

"So, there's this kid named Holden Caulfield, and he flunks out of school, so, in order to kill three days time, he wanders around New York feeling sorry for himself, drinking a lot, and reminiscing about life, and then he takes his sister on a ride on a carousel."

Sounds boring and pointless, right? And to some, it is. However, what The Catcher In the Rye lacks in plot, it makes up for in strong prose, character development, and complex themes and messages.

Today's primary example, however, is Turtles All The Way Down by John Green. This is my most recent read, and I LOVED IT.

However, many complain of its lack of real plot or structure. But the point of the book isn't finding this billionaire, the point is Aza, and the point is the lessons, themes, and messages of the novel. It works because, while the intended external 'plot' takes a backseat to the character development and relationships, every scene in the story still furthers the point of the novel - and not necessarily the plot.

The key difference between the stories with no discernible plot and the stories with one is that the external events in a "plotted" story directly affect the character's - and the story's - overall arc. However, in a story with little-to-no plot, the external events are separate from the story's arc, as seen in Turtles. Often, they are only a catalyst, or are background noise to the front-and-center conflict of the story, which is usually a character/relationship.

The way to make a story with no plot work is that you have to have a strong point. You have to have something very clear and defined that you want to say. Everything has a point. You have to determine the point of your novel, and if the point can more accurately be shown through a plot, then so be it. If not, then, to hell with all writing rules. Everyone knows they're just guidelines anyway.

So, no. You don't need a murder-mystery or a space opera to get across your novel's point. In fact, sometimes it can distract from the heart of your story. Sometimes all it takes is a depressed kid wandering around Manhattan for us to realize how beautiful life is.

~The WordShaker