Simplifying Save The Cat: Understanding the Structure of a Novel
I have the book Save the Cat Writes a Novel linked on my resources page because it genuinely changed my view of writing when I first read it. Recently, I saw someone post that they didn’t understand Save the Cat and it was difficult for them to plot with this tool, so I wanted to provide my 2 cents on how to use this beat structure for your own novel.
First things first, Save the Cat is not a prescriptive exercise. Neither I nor the author of the book believe that you have to map out your book to each of these beats perfectly in order for it to be a good book. There are plenty of books, movies, and other types of media that resonate with readers and have successful runs without following Save the Cat exactly.
Rather, I encourage you to think of Save the Cat as an analysis of existing media. In research, this would be called a content analysis—the secret third research type, outside of qualitative and quantitative, that focuses on finding trends in existing media. Save the Cat is just the result of analyzing all the similarities in media that receives universal acclaim, then distilling these findings into something everyday writers can use for understanding their own work.
This book on novels is based off the original Save the Cat book for screenwriters by Blake Snyder, who came up with these 15 beats from looking not only at the most successful media, but the media that reaches the heart of audiences the best. Save the Cat takes the approach that, if there’s a book readers love and really connect with, it’s likely because it involves a few of the main elements that humans tend to love and connect with.
It’s that simple: Humans are predictable, and the things that give us an emotional reaction are predictable. Save the Cat pulls out these elements of successful books and drops them in your hand to take advantage of.
Does this mean every book is exactly the same, and if you follow Save the Cat, your book won’t be unique? No! The fun part about this guideline—and that’s all it is, a guideline— is that it creates so much opportunity for making your book a page turner. Are The Hunger Games, Dune, and Twilight the same story? No, but they all follow Save the Cat. It might not have been intentional by the authors, but these three stories found the root of what makes readers keep reading—what makes readers connect to the characters. That’s what Save the Cat is about.
Save the Cat is best used as a structuring tool, not necessarily an outline to adhere strictly to. It can be used for diagnosis and troubleshooting issues in a book. If your book doesn’t seem to work, laying it up against these beats might help to diagnose why.
Character transformation
At its root, Save the Cat is about character transformation. Think of your favorite books or movies. Do any of them have a character that’s exactly the same at the end as they were at the beginning? I guarantee they don’t. That’s because human nature is about transformation. When following Save the Cat, the characters should have two goals at the beginning of the book:
1. Their external goal, the story action that they are trying to accomplish (Save the Cat calls this the A Story)
2. Their internal need, the thing they need in order to heal their internal wounds, and often something that they don’t know they need (Save the Cat calls this the B story)
Then, the rest of the story is about confronting these two goals. As we move through the story beats, the character is forced to face their greatest fears, leading to that sweet transformation that makes readers feel satisfied.
Condensing the 15 beats
The official Save the Cat structure includes 15 story beats, but I tend to think of it more in chunks of seven. Why view Save the Cat as seven beats rather than 15? Well, I just don’t think the details are all that important at early stages of the book. Focusing too closely on the details can hold us back from exploring the story.
When using Save the Cat as a tool for diagnosis, the first step is to make sure the book hits the highlight moments, which I consider to be the list I’ve created here.
The Opening of the Story (Understanding who the character is)
The Inciting Incident (Something happens, protagonist reacts)
Break Into Two (Consequences of Inciting Incident, promise of the premise)
Midpoint (Lowest low or highest high, first climax)
All is Lost/Epiphany (The lowest the character could possibly be, moment of mourning, forced to make a change)
Break Into Three (New circumstances caused by the change made/action undertaken in the previous beat)
Finale and Resolution (Able to take action to solve the problem)
Here’s my explanation of these condensed beats. I’ll exemplify them through the stories of The Hunger Games, Dune (the Part One 2021 movie, not the book), and Twilight.
The Opening of the Story
My version of The Opening of the Story condenses these beats in Save the Cat: Opening Image, Theme Stated, and Set-Up. What this section comes down to, really, is showing the character’s “before” life. Before everything happens, before their life changes forever from the inciting incident.
I once read a book where this set-up section wasn’t provided, and as I continued reading, it became difficult to gauge the main character’s reactions and understanding of what was happening in the story. I had no way of understanding how she was actually being changed by the story. When all you see is change, you have no way to gauge the end point compared to the starting point. In order to understand the end, we have to understand the beginning.
One suggestion I like from this section is to give the character a mini-quest in the first few chapters of the book, with a little mini-inciting incident. The real inciting incident can happen close to the beginning of the story, but it can also happen a little later, as long as there is movement before it arrives—as long as the reader is learning how to understand the character. In The Hunger Games, the true inciting incident is the reaping, when Katniss volunteers for her sister, but the mini-quest at the beginning is when she goes hunting with Gale. The mini-inciting incident here is when Gale asks her to leave with him; by saying no, she seals her fate forever without even knowing it. This section before the reaping shows us everything we need to know about her life, so that when she faces the Hunger Games, we understand what it means to her. And the author, Suzanne Collins, does all of this by giving the character a mini-goal with a full arc in the first few chapters: getting ready to go hunting, going hunting, going to the black market, and then getting ready for the reaping.
The Inciting Incident
Save the Cat calls the inciting incident the Catalyst. This is one event that changes the character’s life forever, the thing that sparks the story events. It has to be something that the character can’t turn back from. They cannot go back to their life before the inciting incident. Otherwise, what’s the point?
Katniss’s sister’s name is called at the reaping. Arrakis is given to the Atreides. Edward saves Bella from the car crash.
Notice that none of these inciting incidents involve the characters making a decision to get involved in something new—because the inciting incident is something that happens to the character, something that they must react to.
Then, Save the Cat has the Debate beat, a moment where the protagonist has to decide what to do. Katniss decides to volunteer for Prim. Paul decides to move to Arrakis. Bella decides to look into the mystery of Edward Cullen. The inciting incident happens, and then the protagonist reacts.
My interpretation of the beats for these stories is slightly different from the official Save the Cat analysis, but the basic structure is the same—event happens, protagonist reacts.
Break Into Two
Break Into Two is what happens after the decision is made. The protagonist is dropped into this entirely new world, sparked by the inciting incident. In my condensed version of these beats, this section also includes Fun and Games. This section consists of the first half of the second act.
Fun and Games, for me, has been one of the hardest beats to wrap my head around. This beat encompasses the “promise of the premise,” the characters playing out the impact of the inciting incident. Katniss prepares for the Hunger Games and then enters them, Paul explores life in Arrakis and his family attempts to settle into their new role as caretaker of the planet, and Bella researches vampires while getting to know Edward.
The Break Into Two section has either an upward or downward path. This is important, because if tension is not building, then the reader will be bored. With a downward path, the reader is thinking, How will they get out of this mess? And with an upward path, the reader is thinking, It’s too good to be true—something’s gotta give. The upward and downward path can be seen as a connection to the character’s original goal: Are they becoming closer or farther from what they wanted when starting this journey?
Katniss wants to keep her family safe, and to do that, she wants to win the Hunger Games. As she continues through the Hunger Games, it becomes more and more clear that she cannot win. Though she has a few high moments, she is continuously reminded that the career tributes are more powerful than her, and she keeps taking blows that make her weaker—burns, trackerjacker stings. Katniss has a downward path as she gets farther from her goal.
Paul’s ultimate goal throughout the 2021 Dune movie is to avoid the destruction and wars that he sees in his visions. But his short-term goal is to help his family establish their presence on Arrakis and support the liberation of the Fremen. On Arrakis, Paul’s family faces many challenges. The equipment they have is falling apart, there is an assassination attempt against Paul with the hunter seeker, and they learn that Arrakis presents such unique challenges it’s a miracle anything can survive there. Paul’s visions continue to become more intense and he is haunted by them. Paul has a downward path.
The moment Bella sees Edward, she wants him. In the Break Into Two section of her story, she learns from Jacob that Edward’s family might be vampires; as she continues to look into vampires, she also gets to know Edward. Bella has an upward path as she gets closer to her goal of knowing Edward and becomes more infatuated with the idea of becoming a vampire herself.
Midpoint
The Midpoint is the culmination of the events of Break Into Two. Whether an upward or downward path, the story cannot continue along that path forever. The storyline reaches a climax—either the top, for an upward path, or the bottom, for a downward path.
Katniss, recovering from trackerjacker venom, learns that Peeta is still on her side and wants to help her stay alive. Before this moment, Katniss was on the path to being okay with Peeta’s inevitable death because she thought he was going to turn on her. With this new information, though, she is now in a lowest low climax because she knows that in order to survive, she will have to make sure Peeta dies.
At Paul’s midpoint, the Atreides are attacked. He and Jessica are kidnapped, and after they escape they see from afar what remains of their entire life now engulfed in flames. It’s clear why this is a lowest low.
Bella gets Edward to admit, out loud, that he’s a vampire. He shows her his sparkling skin and she falls deeper into her infatuation with vampires. Bella’s midpoint is a highest high.
All is Lost/Epiphany
My version of the All is Lost/Epiphany beat encompasses Save the Cat’s Bad Guys Close In, All Is Lost, and Dark Night of the Soul beats. These beats all merge together in my mind because, as one unit, they have one general function: raise the stakes, cause the protagonist to fall, and force the protagonist to face their greatest fears in their lowest moment.
This beat includes three main events:
Lowest low
The All is Lost/Epiphany beat is the true lowest low—so even if the character had a low climax in the Midpoint section, this beat must take them even lower. This is the point when, truly, all is lost. The character sees no way out of this situation; the only way to continue is to change the part of themselves that is holding them back.
Event > reaction
Remember the structure of the Inciting Incident where something happens to the character, and then they react to it? This beat is the same; something happens to cause the character to react. Since this is a true lowest low, what follows is a mourning period (Dark Night of the Soul). Then, the character reacts.
Protagonist changes
This is the moment that the protagonist is forced to change. They have been resisting this change. During Break Into Two, they were trying their best to fix things their way, without having to face their need. During this All is Lost/Epiphany beat, the protagonist finally learns the lesson they need in order to transform, which gives them the courage and energy to finish out the story.
Katniss’s All Is Lost moment is when Rue dies. Rue represents what Prim means to Katniss; she represents innocence, tragedy, inequality. As a reaction to her death, Katniss mourns her by covering her body with flowers, something that tributes have never done for other tributes. For the first time, Katniss had been participating in the Games by destroying the career tributes’ food, but now she’s reminded again what it’s really about: killing innocent children. This person she has come to love is dead, and she wants to do something about it.
After Paul and his mother escape from the Harkonnen, they are rescued by some of the Fremen and Duncan Idaho, only for the Sardaukar to find them and launch another attack. Stakes are raised; the Atreides are no longer hidden. Duncan Idaho, someone who is important to Paul and the last remaining member of the Atreides besides Paul and Jessica, is slain by the Sardaukar while protecting Paul. Paul only gets a very short mourning moment for Duncan Idaho before him and his mother escape in an ornithopter and are met with a violent sandstorm. This is when Paul has his Epiphany moment—the first point in the story where Paul actually uses his vision to do something in his current life. He has a vision that he interprets a meaning from, deciding to turn off the orinthopter and allow it to move with the storm, saving their lives. The Lisan al Gaib is prophesied to bridge the present and the future, and Paul has just done this for the first time.
In Twilight, James hunts Bella and captures her mom; Bella, distraught and believing someone she loves will die, goes to save her. In her Epiphany moment, she learns it was a trap all along and her mom was never in danger. In the fight to save Bella’s mom, James hurts her in many ways, taking away her health and almost her life.
In Save the Cat, the Epiphany is not an actual beat. It is a tool that can be used to help the character transform during their lowest low moment. I like to focus on it when editing books because I find it to be a very useful moment for the character. The Epiphany can come in many forms, but what it comes down to is the character learning new information that affects how they go about fixing the problem once and for all.
Break Into Three
Just like Break Into Two, Break Into Three is the following of the action/decision made in the previous section.
In The Hunger Games, it is announced that two tributes can win this year, and Katniss immediately seeks out Peeta. Peeta is what gives her a new focused purpose to continue in the Games; she now wants to keep him alive. This action jumpstarts a new turn of events for the book.
As a result of Paul’s decision to crash the orinthopter, both him and his mother are safe for a short period. They travel across the sand to the rocks, where they encounter a group of Fremen, thrusting them into a completely unfamiliar set of circumstances.
Because of her decision to save her mom and confront James, Bella is now dying and risking becoming a vampire. Edward saves her, propelling both of them into the new territory where they are in love, Bella knows he is a vampire, and their lives are irrevocably connected together.
When they reach the Break Into Three beat, all three of these characters are changed from who they were at the beginning of the story; Katniss has been ignited by Rue’s death, Paul has given into the one thing he was avoiding (following the path of his visions), and Bella now wants to become a vampire.
Finale and Resolution
Save the Cat has two beats here, Finale and Final Image. Save the Cat even separates the Finale into a 5-point structure. It’s not necessary to get into the details of the Finale here, but Save the Cat does a great job of identifying what makes a good finale and how to create satisfaction for the reader at the end of the story.
In the Finale and Resolution section, the character acts. The Break Into Three beat pushed them into a new set of circumstances, and now they are faced with finishing the job, fixing the problem that they set out to fix in the first place. They couldn’t fix it in the Inciting Incident beat because they weren’t ready. They didn’t know how. But now, after experiencing the events of the book and having gone through change, they are presented with the ultimate test to prove themselves.
Katniss, of course, offers to Peeta that they both die after the announcement is made that now only one tribute can survive. They decide that it will be two tributes or no tributes. For the entire story, she has been watching cruelty happen alongside indulgence, and she has been building up this desire to take control of her own destiny. So she does.
Paul is challenged to a duel to the death to secure his place with the Fremen. The Paul at the beginning of the story may not have gone through with it. But this Paul has seen death, destruction, and tragedy. He is learning that his path as Lisan al Gaib cannot be avoided. And he knows that he must join the Fremen because that’s the vision that he has seen for himself. So he finishes the duel by killing Jamis, the first death by Paul’s hand—changing him forever.
Bella’s finale is more subdued; after the events of the book so far, she knows that she wants to become a vampire. Through Edward, she has come into herself more and has gained self-confidence. She attends the prom with him, something she would not have done at the beginning of the book, but Edward gives her strength and happiness.
Then, the final piece to any book is the resolution. That one final image that shows where the character ends the story. It’s a good practice to show a parallel to the beginning of the book here. Putting the characters in the same places and situations as the beginning helps to show how much they’ve changed since then. Katniss returns to District 12, Paul joins the Fremen just like the vision that he saw at the beginning of the movie, and Bella returns to high school.
Some things stay the same, but the characters have been changed forever.
As an editor, I like these Save the Cat beats because they’re simple and effective. If a book doesn’t hit these beats, then it’s not likely to work very well. In my opinion, some of the smaller details of Save the Cat can be negligible or rearranged, but these seven highlights are the ones that keep a book on track.
If your book doesn’t follow these beats, no worries. It’s not something to panic over. It doesn’t automatically mean the story doesn’t work. The only way to tell if something truly works for readers is to get it into the hands of readers. What a developmental editor can help with is analyzing the structure of your book not only to find where it lines up with the beats of a structure like Save the Cat, but also to identify where it works and where it doesn’t, regardless of compliancy with a pre-existing structure.
I recently did an edit for a book that essentially had two endings. One was a false ending that was more expected for the reader, and the other was unexpected and closer to the end of the story. Each of the endings fulfilled about half of the Save the Cat structure, but together, they felt satisfying because the highlights were still touched on across both endings. I was able to pick apart the function of these two endings and look at them as one whole that contributes to the themes of the story and the character arc. Sticking strictly to a beat structure isn’t what’s important; what’s important is the impression the plot events as a whole leave on the reader. These beats act as a starting point for identifying how to make that impression on the reader.
In the end, the most important part of structuring a book is getting feedback and exploring your story. Save the Cat is just one guideline that can help facilitate this exploration.
Interested in developmental editing services or have a question for the blog?
Send a message and let’s chat!
