Dan Chaon Plot Quotations

Plot was always secondary in my mind.

I start with an image, then I go from the image toward exploring the situation. Then I write a scene, and from the scene I find the character, from the character I find the larger plot. It's like deductive reasoning - I start with the smaller stuff and work backward.

Plot and scene are still the hardest things for me, though I think they're the building blocks of what makes a story work.