Growing a Good Story:
The Garden Variety Plot in the Digital Age

Katherine Phelps


The house of fiction has not one window, but a million, that there are in fact five million ways to tell a story, each of them justified if it provides a "center" for the work.
Wayne C. Booth [Boo61, p. 24]

Plotting an Initial Map of the Territory

The purpose of this chapter is to investigate what needs to be understood about plot in order to support fuller, richer opportunities for computer-mediated storytelling. This will include a re-examination of the definitions of plot, how plots are built and what happens to plot in the unique situations created within an interactive multi-pathing environment.