Writing a Story Like Dominoes
We’ve all seen domino constructions where, after tipping the first piece ever-so-slightly, all the rest fall in a beautiful cascade of rhythmic motion. The domino effect, as it’s called, can apply to any action that causes something else to happen in a similar way. When it comes to writing a story, the domino effect can be a helpful tool for ensuring that your scenes advance logically and that your characters react to what happens in a way that’s true to their emotions. Whether you write your manuscript off the cuff or carefully plan out your plot ahead of time, considering how your scenes work together like dominoes can help you create an engaging story.
Domino is a small rectangular block with one face displaying an arrangement of dots resembling those on dice and the other blank or marked differently. A set of dominoes may be made from a variety of materials, including ivory and silver lip ocean pearl oyster shell (mother of pearl), as well as woods such as ebony or other varieties. A number of games can be played with these sets, and dominoes are sometimes used as art pieces, with curved lines, grids that form pictures when they fall, and 3D structures such as towers or pyramids.
As an icebreaker, I asked Hevesh what she thought of the idea of using domino as a metaphor for how to write a story. “I think it’s a really good analogy,” she said, “because, just like in a domino construction, your story needs to be paced properly.”
She went on to explain that dominoes have inertia, or the tendency to resist movement until they feel a force acting upon them. When the first domino is tipped over, all the potential energy stored in the other dominoes becomes available to push on them and cause them to topple as well. This is what allows builders to make intricate and amazing displays in which hundreds or thousands of dominoes are lined up in careful succession, only to collapse with the slightest nudge of one domino.
Similarly, in a story, all the tension and momentum that’s been built up in a scene will disappear if the next one doesn’t connect with it in an interesting or exciting way. If a scene doesn’t advance the story forward or introduce new emotional stakes for the hero, readers will be likely to lose interest and turn away from your work.
Just as Hevesh spends a lot of time planning and reworking her domino designs before she actually builds them, authors need to plan their plots carefully and test them out in small parts before putting them all together. This can mean that we write and rewrite our chapters until they’re exactly how we want them to look, with each scene connecting to the next in a clear and logical fashion. Once we’ve done this, we can begin to see our stories in the same way that Hevesh sees her incredible works of art.