As his best friend – an alcoholic old Hollywood star – begs for death, a young reporter sees his own fate and takes a dramatic step to rewrite the story of his life.

A spotlight went on when I saw myself in my friend begging for death....A few days later when I rejected alcohol at my first AA meeting, a floodlight came on - illuminating my inteior flaws. The party was over. I knew I would never drink again (except for the night 4 years later when a guerrilla comandante on a volcano shoved a glass of Castro's rum at me - but that's the next book),. ?Now came the hard part. ?Years of repair. Of rebuilding a strong self. ?My heroe's journey was gritty, ponderous at times. ?Like most are. Perhaps all. One of my heroes ws a man who builts schools out of adobe and dug outhouses in Guatemala. It was only after he died that I discovered he had won a bronze star in WWII by charging a machine gun nest. But I digress...

Alcohol unleashed the lightning bolt in me. Now I had to harness its energy. It took four more years in that little farm town, rebuilding my spine by absorbing their stories. Flinally I reacheda point of decision - stay and marry my bluegrass singer girlfriend or - grateful for the experience - move on to pursue dreams I had never given up.

By the way - thanks you all for pitching in on this exercise.

Twinckler,

Think of the main character's completion of the inner journey (in your case it should be him overcoming alcoholism) as a requested for him to complete the outer journey, be it what it may. The greatest stories about the greatest heroes of all time force the hero to overcome a character flaw before they are allowed to achieve their main goal or outer journey goal.

As DPG pointed out, alcoholism is a character flaw for your MC,? now come up with a good outer journey goal for the 'A' plot in the story.

Twinckler:

I know only too well from personal experiences in my family, among my friends and in my work how destructive and demoralizing alcoholism is to the lives of tens of millions of people.? ?I have a deep respect for anyone who has beat the odds.? It takes a heroic struggle for an alcoholic to achieve and maintain sobriety.

But...

When it comes to drama, alcoholism is almost always a character flaw that does more than threaten a character's health and happiness; it prevents the protagonist from achieving some goal beyond sobriety.? Like hold a marriage together, keep a job, salvage a career.

Consequently, achieving sobriety is a necessary means to a necessary end; it is not the end of the story itself.? Rather, it entails the resolution of a character arc? that is necessary to achieve an overarching objective goal.

Based upon what you have said, I can see that you can salvage a lot of material from you own personal experience for a compelling "B" story; that is, a subplot about your deeply conflicted relationship? with the Hollywood has-been.? But the subplot must be in service of the "A" story, the struggle of the protagonist for sobriety as a necessary step (or should I say 12 steps?)? to achieving some objective goal after he has achieved sobriety.

Therefore, I suggest that for the story you aspire to write "takes a dramatic step to rewrite the story of his life" needs to be defined more specifically.? It needs to be translated into a specific objective goal that he can only achieve after he achieves sobriety.? And the logline needs to be framed accordingly.

fwiw

Twinckler:

I know only too well from personal experiences in my family, among my friends and in my work how destructive and demoralizing alcoholism is to the lives of tens of millions of people.? ?I have a deep respect for anyone who has beat the odds.? It takes a heroic struggle for an alcoholic to achieve and maintain sobriety.

But...

When it comes to drama, alcoholism is almost always a character flaw that does more than threaten a character's health and happiness; it prevents the protagonist from achieving some goal beyond sobriety.? Like hold a marriage together, keep a job, salvage a career.

Consequently, achieving sobriety is a necessary means to a necessary end; it is not the end of the story itself.? Rather, it entails the resolution of a character arc? that is necessary to achieve an overarching objective goal.

Based upon what you have said, I can see that you can salvage a lot of material from you own personal experience for a compelling "B" story; that is, a subplot about your deeply conflicted relationship? with the Hollywood has-been.? But the subplot must be in service of the "A" story, the struggle of the protagonist for sobriety as a necessary step (or should I say 12 steps?)? to achieving some objective goal after he has achieved sobriety.

Therefore, I suggest that for the story you aspire to write "takes a dramatic step to rewrite the story of his life" needs to be defined more specifically.? It needs to be translated into a specific objective goal that he can only achieve after he achieves sobriety.? And the logline needs to be framed accordingly.

fwiw

I can't for some reason make comments in the right box so here they are in the review box: dpg, the inciting incident is the moment I saw my friend begging for death. The antagonist is the bottle. Resolution is finding your own power after losing that of the bottle. an old story that is the nut of the big picture story of the transformation I went through during the 7 years in that farm town. So hard to capture this in a log line. What a remarkable exercise.

Glad your brother prevailed. My story is a bit different. I was a born alcoholic and didn't see myself until I saw my friend in his death throes.