Shawn Coyne – författare

Jane Austen''s masterpiece, Pride and Prejudice, has been admired, adapted, and copied by thousands of writers. Her work is still adored by readers all over the world two centuries after it was first published. 

Have you ever dreamed you and Austen could take a turn about the room or walk the grounds of Pemberley while she explains exactly how she wrote her timeless love stories? 

In this Masterwork Guide, Shawn Coyne applies his Story Grid tools of analysis to Austen''s classic, transforming the reading experience into writing inspiration.

Coyne dissects each and every scene of the novel to show how it works. And he reveals the "must-have" moments readers crave in any love story so you can craft one of your own.

The Story Grid is a curated set of writing and editing tools that helps writers pinpoint weaknesses, learn how to fix them, and produce "stories that work." After a long career as an editor, agent, and publisher, Coyne has a deep understanding of what resonates with readers. He wants you to know that you are not the problem-the problem is the problem. 

Let the Masterwork Guide help you see the love story of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy through a new lens. Then let the Story Grid approach help you re-envision your own stories, and fall in love with writing again.

What''s at the core of every great story that leads readers to rush breathlessly to the end and then share it with all their friends? 

At Story Grid, we believe great stories are built of four essential elements: Core Needs, Core Life Values, Core Emotions, and Core Events. Whether you''re writing an action adventure, a mystery, or a love story, these are the elements that spark the emotional connection and catharsis readers are looking for. 

Assembled into a Four Core Framework, the right need, life value, emotion, and event become the blueprint for a story that will satisfy readers and bring them back for more. 

In The Four Core Framework, Story Grid founder Shawn Coyne distills 30 years of experience in publishing into a compact guide for writers who want their novels, screenplays, and nonfiction to resonate and captivate. He dissects twelve kinds of stories and explains how to create the the ideal framework for each, including: 

In The Four Core Framework, you''ll learn to keep readers turning the pages and rushing to recommend your stories. Join Shawn to get down to the core of it all.

"An astounding epic novel of J.R.R. Tolkien proportions!"

- Steven Pressfield, Bestselling author of Gates of Fire and The War of Art

Raiders of the Lost Ark playing A Game of Thrones

The Sand Sea takes place on an alternative Earth roiled by war and conquest that mirrors our own Gilded Age. The treasure that ignites greed and folly in this parallel world is not petroleum, but beserite-a mineral of immeasurable value. 

Captivated by an ancient prophecy and the call of adventure, inexperienced nobleman and scholar Peter Harmon (think of a young Winston Churchill-like naif) joins an expedition to stake his nation''s claim to a global empire. 

Harmon''s destination is a vast and inhospitable desert halfway around the world, dominated by the iron-fisted Grand Vizer Jemojeen Jongdar. A tyrant on a mission to secure the ancient and supernatural Staff of the Ram, the Lion, and the Serpent, Jongdar knows the truth that others can only imagine: The one who controls the staff will possess the power to rule the world. 

Before he can seize his destiny, Jongdar must find and destroy the one person capable of thwarting his ambition, the rightful heir to the Sand Sea realm, an innocent woman named Selena Savanar. 

Can the brave and indomitable Selena accept her true destiny and rally her people in the eye of a gathering storm? To do so will require her to outwit the man who burned her father alive and left her an orphan and beggar a lifetime ago. Or will Peter Harmon and the cadre of opportunists he rides with conquer the divided empire?

With the mythic structure of J.R.R. Tolkien''s The Lord of the Rings trilogy in a world as rich and real as George R.R. Martin''s Westeros, The Sand Sea is an immersive experience made to order for epic fantasy fans and anyone who enjoys grand-scale historical fiction.

What are the first principles in writing a story that works?

At Story Grid, it''s easy to get distracted by the tools, spreadsheets, commandments, macro lense, micro lense, and on and on. However, all of this eventually comes back to five first principles.

In Story Grid 101, Story Grid founder Shawn Coyne distills 30 years of experience working with writers to build their stories into five principles:

Also inside of Story Grid 101, Shawn also introduces you to the fundamental tools:

Story Grid 101 is for anyone new to Story Grid who needs a primer on how we approach our craft.

As writers, we all struggle to transform the messy raw materials in our minds into stories that will reach readers'' hearts. When it works, it feels like magic.

But what really makes that magic happen?

A few essential components, which Story Grid calls conventions and obligatory moments, can span the distance between writers and readers. It''s those conventions and moments that fulfill readers'' expectations in every story-from gripping action tales to tender romances.

In Conventions and Obligatory Moments, veteran Story Grid editors Kimberly Kessler and Leslie Watts provide the first comprehensive Story Grid guide to these essential elements of the writer''s craft. Kessler and Watts illustrate each concept with examples from classic masterworks, including Treasure Island, Murder on the Orient Express, and Pride and Prejudice. And they situate conventions and obligatory moments within the larger world of the Story Grid methodology, including the Four Core Framework and the Five Commandments of Storytelling. They teach writers precisely how each genre''s conventions set up critical changes, and how obligatory moments pay off those changes to meet readers'' expectations.

Ready to make your own magic?

How does a book written in 1818 by a teenage author remain a classic and a bestseller, still permeating our culture and haunting readers 200 years later? 

In this Masterwork Guide to Mary Shelley''s Frankenstein, Story Grid editor and novelist Maya Rushing Walker leads us deep into the heart of the story, demonstrating how Shelley blends essential elements of the horror and morality genres to spectacular and chilling effect.

The Guide opens with an analysis of the context in which Mary Shelley wrote and explores themes of loneliness and fear in her work. Walker then dives into a scene-by-scene analysis, drawing lessons from the way Shelley crafts each turning point, crisis, and resolution.

This is a Guide by a writer for writers. Walker takes care to highlight passages that evoke emotion and build character as well as those that propel the horror plot forward. As she explains: "Mary Shelley will teach you a lot about what it means to play with fire . . . which is a good thing for anyone who wants to write stories that have the enduring impact of Frankenstein."

Finding the right point of view is one of the most important-and least understood-challenges writers face.

Point of view extends far beyond the choice of first, second, or third person. POV determines all that a reader knows about the world inside a story. Is the murder told from the criminal''s, the detective''s, or the victim''s vantage point? An awful lot rides on that decision.

In short, a story''s point of view guides the characters, message, and events that matter.

In Point of View: Why Narrative Perspective Can Make or Break Your Story, Story Grid Publishing Editor-in-Chief Leslie Watts provides examples from dozens of masterworks to help writers understand telling and showing points of view and narrative devices. Does a telling narrator live inside or outside the story? Is the focus of a showing POV external or internal? Every choice has an impact.

Watts offers a revolutionary approach to point of view, demonstrating how deep study of narrative perspective can empower and uplift storytellers themselves. When writers truly master point of view they can share the messages they want to share and bring their stories to life. 

Dorothy Gale''s trip from Kansas to the Emerald City-in print, on screen, and on stage-has enchanted audiences around the world for more than a century. But what is her magical adventure really about? And can studying such classic tales help today''s writers improve their craft?

In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum: A Story Grid Masterworks Analysis Guide, Shawn Coyne answers these questions and more. In Oz, Coyne finds a pitch-perfect illustration of the Heroic Journey 2.0, his revolutionary take on Joseph Campbell''s monomyth. Coyne exposes the essential ingredients that define the book''s life-or-death Action Story, coming-of-age Worldview Story, and transcendent Heroic Journey.

Writers who take up the challenge and put the Heroic Journey 2.0 to work will craft stories that resonate across time and cultures and provide the emotional catharsis their readers crave.

By the end of Baum''s book, Dorothy has survived a worldview-shattering moment and committed to go on, creating new meaning in her life. Your journey as a storyteller begins with the same commitment to make meaning in the world, and this Guide will set you on the right path.

Undertaking any big project, but especially a book is a daunting proposition. The way to make it less scary is to have a map for the journey, and ideally, some experienced fellow travelers to ride shotgun—friends who know the road well and can help you make it to your destination. That’s what we are aiming to provide.

We’re two editors with over twenty years of experience between us, writing and editing many types of nonfiction. In the pages that follow, we distill some of the lessons we’ve learned in the trenches applying Shawn Coyne’s Story Grid methodology to the work of our clients, all of whom are leveling up their skills as nonfiction writers.

We’ve chosen to use several masterworks—with the most considerable emphasis on The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin and In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan—as the maps to guide us throughout What’s the Big Idea?

Although Baldwin and Pollan write on different topics and in different styles over half a century apart, both men had an enormous cultural impact. They extended that influence to a broad popular audience with these works. We could have chosen many other titles, and we’ll include examples from some others where it’s helpful.

After reading this short, macro-principles primer, you may want to take a microscopic dive into Big Idea nonfiction by looking at The Story Grid Masterwork Guide to Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, which provides a scene-by-scene analysis of another exemplary title. We hope you’ll be inspired to find your own favorite masterworks to learn from and apply Story Grid Methodology yourself. We’ll provide some tips on how to do that too.

With Baldwin and Pollan as our touchstones, we’ve organized this book around a series of questions and answers that will explain how and why Big Idea books work.

Is it possible to write a nonfiction book that changes minds or even changes the world?

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell sold 1.7 million copies in its first year of release, and today remains a perennial bestseller.

What made it go viral? 

What made it stick? 

On the 20th anniversary of The Tipping Point’s publication, two Story Grid editors decided to dissect Gladwell’s masterwork to find out what made it a cultural touchstone.

Leslie Watts and Shelley Sperry analyze the macro structure of the book and each individual scene to understand how Gladwell uses scientific evidence, charming anecdotes, and compelling characters to bring complex ideas to life. The breakdown of each scene reveals the essential questions Gladwell asks and answers and . . . . 

This Story Grid Masterwork Guide is a unique tool—a deep dive into the mind of a master storyteller designed to give you the tools and confidence to set off on an intellectual adventure and write a book that will transform your readers and stay on bookstore shelves for years to come.  

Bilbo Baggins, an altogether respectable hobbit, had never done anything unexpected-to say nothing of heroic-until he met a wizard in a blue pointed hat. After that meeting, Bilbo embarked upon an adventure, recorded in the pages of The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien, that captured the imagination of readers around the world.

With unparalleled skill, Tolkien forged scenes of physical courage, revelatory self-transformation, and spiritual transcendence that do more than entertain-they help us make sense of the world.

In this Story Grid Masterworks Analysis Guide, Shawn Coyne examines Bilbo''s transformation and Tolkien''s craft through a powerful new lens, the Heroic Journey 2.0, revealing how stories help us survive, thrive, and find meaning individually and as a species. Using this lens, writers will learn to create the emotional catharsis readers crave and tell stories that cross barriers of time and culture.

Bilbo''s unexpected journey beautifully illustrates the human imperative to keep going, to break and remake our worldviews in a search for truth. But in the end, readers and writers may agree with Coyne that, "There is no final truth, only the creative act of meaning-making in the here and now."