Writing/Plotting Your Story Like A Legal Brief

USING THE 4-POINT I.R.A.C METHOD TO WRITE YOUR STORY

By: Virna De Paul

Imagine the scales of justice. Now imagine one side of them filled with the characters, facts, and issues of a criminal case, all neatly laid out in court transcripts and in the appellant’s opening brief. If the other side of the scale is filled with characters, goals, motivation, and conflict for a book, the scales would be balanced. Why? Because the same method can be used for writing a criminal appellate brief (legalese for keeping a bad guy in jail) and for planning and plotting your fictional novel.

Ever heard of IRAC (and, no, I don’t mean the country)? Let me explain….

I have found that my brief-writing skills have given me an edge when plotting and writing my romantic suspense stories. Any truly compelling story is going to cater to the reader’s dual needs for security and excitement. You give the reader security by establishing “the rules” or “reader expectation” early on and sticking to them. And you give the reader excitement by creating a world and characters that they can relate to.

Just as I want judges to be moved by what a crime victim has experienced, you want your readers to be moved by your plot and characters. You want them to experience what your character is experiencing. You make them see what those characters see. You make them feel what those characters feel.

And you make them unable to put your story down because they have to find out what happens next. You start with characters that have a clearly defined past and present, and you use those facts and plot points to transport the characters to a different place by the end of the book. But you always keep in mind that at least two of your characters are adversaries, just like the defense and the prosecution. Each party has real and compelling needs, but one can’t get what he/she wants without frustrating the other.

You know where the characters have been and where you want them to go, but you must make the journey both believable and compelling for your reader. You can do this by using the IRAC method to write your romantic suspense:

IRAC Method: Issue, Rule, Analysis, Conclusion

IRAC

Brief Writing

Story Building

Statement of the Case

Lays out the procedural history of the case

WORLD BUILDING (See Rule below)

Statement of the Facts

Lays out the factual history of the crime

BACKSTORY (See Rule below)

Issue

The issue raised; what error is alleged to have resulted in a unreliable judgment?

What are your character’s issues??

1) What is the internal issue creating the hero and heroine’s romantic conflict? [internal conflict, incorrect core belief*]

2) What do they want? [external, concrete goal]

3) Why do they want it? [motivation]

4) How are they trying to go about getting it?

5) What’s stopping them from getting it [external conflict]

*Your protagonist and antagonist should have competing goals, in that what one is doing to achieve their goal is actually causing the other person’s conflict.

Rule

What legal precedent has been set on this issue?

Create the parameters for dealing with your character’s issues.

1) What does the hero’s/heroine’s/villain’s present world look like? [World building]

2) What events or people had a significant impact in their past?

[Backstory]

3) What events or people have a significant impact in their present? [Plot/subplots]

4) Do they have any physical limitations?

5) Do they have any emotional limitations?

Analysis

How does the legal precedent apply to the facts?

Craft the story within the confines you’ve created.

1) Inciting Incident

2) Turning Points

a) How can you give the hero/heroine/villain what they want?

b) How can you stop them from getting what they way?

3) Black Moment

4) Climax

Notes:

Keep in mind that two of your three main characters (the hero/heroine/villain) are always working towards frustrating the other’s external goal.

Keep in mind that for much of the book, your hero and heroine’s incorrect core beliefs will be rubbing each other in order to create romantic conflict.

Conclusion

What conclusion should the judges draw and should they reverse or affirm the judgment?

End the journey

1) All the characters have changed. Their world has changed. Their emotional limitations have changed. They’ve grown in some way.

2) What is the hero’s/heroine’s/villain’s pressing issue now?

3) What do they want now?

4) What does the hero’s/heroine/s/villain’s present world look like?

*I first heard the term “incorrect core belief” from Susan Meier, one of three great teachers at the Low Country RWA Master Class Retreat. She, Nina Bruhns, and Jennie Crusie talked a lot about plotting based on screenwriting/Michael Hague’s screenwriting structure.

About Rules/Reader Expectation:

When I am working on a criminal appellate brief, one thing never changes: the characters, the facts, and the issues have already been determined. They are all laid out for me in the court transcripts and in the appellant’s opening brief, where he/she is challenging something that happened within the “four corners” of the appellate record. If it doesn’t appear somewhere within those pages, he/she can’t raise it (at least he/she isn’t supposed to). And I don’t respond to it—because in the appellate context, it doesn’t exist. (Rest assured though that there are other procedures for addressing these “inappropriate” issues.)

As a colleague of mine once said, I need to abide by these rules, but I also want to make my brief “sing.” I want to emphasize the facts in a visceral way that will help the judges understand that what the appellant did impacted someone’s life in a real and tragic way. There are tricks for doing this, both psychological (referring to the defendant as “appellant” rather by his name, but always humanizing the victims) and mechanical (use active voice rather than passive, describe the story chronologically, etc). But in the end, I am hampered by the same limitations that the appellant is. I can’t go outside the record. I have to work with what I have. I can’t make things up that don’t exist. I don’t cross the line between persuasion and exaggeration. I follow the rules.

In fiction, you create your own rules through creating your own world, your voice, your character’s back story. These rules must be abided by in order to stay true to reader expectation. However, you take these rules and craft your story and make your characters sing. So they pull the reader into the story.

So he/she can’t put the book down.