One of the many features I liked was the ability to track character arcs and settings throughout my story. There is also a “litter box” which allows you to remove scenes and other information from the board but not delete them in case you want to use them later. In the Save the Cat! software corkboard, you can add almost anything you can think of including labels, images, and notes. However, it was much more intuitive for me to navigate than Scrivener. I’ve never used Scrivener, but I tried to learn it at one point and the corkboard style of Save the Cat! story Structure software has a similar feel.

There are four customizable themes plus the ability to customize the look of the corkboard. You can also customize the feel of your workspace with various theme and color options. Once you click on a screen card to write, you can expand the writing area so it feels similar to using Microsoft Word or Google Docs if that’s how you like to work. The screen is customizable so you can see as little or as much as you like. These give a great breakdown for using the boards, beat sheets, and loglines sections and a tour of the whole product. Just like most apps, Save the Cat! story structure software works with Mac or Windows.Īs a new user, I went straight to the how-to videos listed under the help menu. Here’s the default screen for a novel project. The default screen you get will depend on what you choose. When you open a brand new project, you can choose if you want to work on a novel, a movie, a 30-minute TV show, or a 60-minute TV show. The software is based on the structure discussed in the Save the Cat! books. Now that you know how Save the Cat! story structure works, let’s move on to the software. In this book, Brody describes the 15-beat structure every novel must include, regardless of genre: Years later, Jessica Brody wrote Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: the Last Book on Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need. What makes the Save the Cat! books so great is that Snyder identified ten genres that allow every movie ever made to be classified as one of the following: The moment we see the hero taking an action viewers will love is often referred to as the “save the cat” moment. For example, if he decides to save a cat from a burning building. The title comes from the screenwriting idea that the hero of the story must make viewers like him and root for him. The Save the Cat! movement started with an excellent book by Blake Snyder: Save the Cat!: The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need. I think it’s helpful for anyone who’s not familiar with Save the Cat! to have a quick rundown of the structure behind it.

Jessica brody save the cat