Save the Cat Beat Sheet for Novels: 15 Beats With Word Counts

Q: Does Save the Cat work for novels?

Yes, with adjustments. Jessica Brody's *Save the Cat! Writes a Novel* (2018) adapts the beats for fiction, using percentages of total length instead of screenplay pages.

The Save the Cat beat sheet is a plotting method that breaks a story into 15 beats, each placed at a set point in the story. Screenwriter Blake Snyder introduced it in Save the Cat! (2005) for films, and Jessica Brody adapted it for novels in Save the Cat! Writes a Novel (2018), replacing page numbers with percentages.

This guide explains each of the 15 beats, where it falls in a novel, and how many words in that comes to. There's a beat sheet template to copy, an example mapped onto one novel, and a look at when the method helps and when it gets in the way.

At a glance

The 15 beats sit on top of three-act structure. They name the moments inside each act
In a novel, beats are placed by percentage of the total length, not by page
Some beats are single scenes (Catalyst, Midpoint); others are stretches of many chapters (Fun and Games, Bad Guys Close In)
The name comes from Snyder's advice to give the hero an early moment, like saving a cat, that makes the audience like them

Save the Cat! is a registered trademark. This guide isn't affiliated with it; the official resources are at savethecat.com.

The 15 beats, act by act

Act One

1. Opening Image (0–1%). A snapshot of the hero's life before the story changes it. It sets the tone and gives the Final Image something to contrast with.

2. Theme Stated (5%). Someone, usually not the hero, says something that hints at what the hero needs to learn. The hero doesn't get it yet.

3. Setup (1–10%). The hero's ordinary world, their flaws, the people around them and what's missing. Snyder suggests listing “six things that need fixing” in the hero's life.

4. Catalyst (10%). The event that disrupts the hero's life. This is the inciting incident in other models.

5. Debate (10–20%). The hero hesitates, resists or questions what to do. It shows the cost of going forward.

Act Two

6. Break into Two (20%). The hero makes a choice and enters a new world or a new situation. The old life is left behind.

7. B Story (22%). A new character or relationship arrives, often a love interest, friend or mentor, who will help the hero learn the theme. What Is a Subplot? covers the B-story as a subplot.

8. Fun and Games (20–50%). The “promise of the premise”: the stretch readers picked the book for. The hero explores the new world, with ups and downs.

9. Midpoint (50%). A false victory or false defeat. Stakes rise, the clock may start ticking, and the A and B stories often cross.

10. Bad Guys Close In (50–75%). Things get harder. External enemies regroup, and the hero's own flaws start doing damage.

11. All Is Lost (75%). The lowest point. Something or someone is lost, often with a “whiff of death,” a hint that something has died.

12. Dark Night of the Soul (75–80%). The hero reacts to the loss and hits bottom emotionally, before finally understanding the theme.

Act Three

13. Break into Three (80%). The hero finds the solution, often through the B Story or the theme, and decides to act.

14. Finale (80–99%). The hero puts the solution into action and confronts the main problem. Snyder breaks it into five steps: gathering the team, executing the plan, the high tower surprise, digging deep down, and executing the new plan.

15. Final Image (99–100%). A mirror of the Opening Image, showing how much has changed.

Save the Cat beats by word count

The table puts each beat into three common manuscript lengths. Beats with a range cover a stretch of the book; the word count shows where it starts.

Beat	%	50,000 words	80,000 words	100,000 words
Opening Image	0–1%	0–500	0–800	0–1,000
Theme Stated	5%	2,500	4,000	5,000
Setup	1–10%	500–5,000	800–8,000	1,000–10,000
Catalyst	10%	5,000	8,000	10,000
Debate	10–20%	5,000–10,000	8,000–16,000	10,000–20,000
Break into Two	20%	10,000	16,000	20,000
B Story	22%	11,000	17,600	22,000
Fun and Games	20–50%	10,000–25,000	16,000–40,000	20,000–50,000
Midpoint	50%	25,000	40,000	50,000
Bad Guys Close In	50–75%	25,000–37,500	40,000–60,000	50,000–75,000
All Is Lost	75%	37,500	60,000	75,000
Dark Night of the Soul	75–80%	37,500–40,000	60,000–64,000	75,000–80,000
Break into Three	80%	40,000	64,000	80,000
Finale	80–99%	40,000–49,500	64,000–79,200	80,000–99,000
Final Image	99–100%	49,500–50,000	79,200–80,000	99,000–100,000

To see which beat your draft has reached, paste it into the word counter with your target length as the goal and compare the percentage it shows with the table. Snyder's original screenplay targets are based on a 110-page script: Catalyst on page 12, Break into Two on page 25, Midpoint on page 55, All Is Lost on page 75 and Break into Three on page 85.

Save the Cat beat sheet template

[Story]
Title:
Target length: (___ words)
Genre: (one of the ten Save the Cat genres, see below)
Theme: (what the hero needs to learn)

[Act One]
1. Opening Image, 0–1%:
2. Theme Stated, 5%:
3. Setup, 1–10%:
4. Catalyst, 10%:
5. Debate, 10–20%:

[Act Two]
6. Break into Two, 20%:
7. B Story, 22%:
8. Fun and Games, 20–50%:
9. Midpoint, 50%: (false victory or false defeat?)
10. Bad Guys Close In, 50–75%:
11. All Is Lost, 75%:
12. Dark Night of the Soul, 75–80%:

[Act Three]
13. Break into Three, 80%:
14. Finale, 80–99%:
15. Final Image, 99–100%: (how does it mirror the Opening Image?)

A beat sheet example

Edie's Atlas, a 30-chapter novel of about 85,000 words that we made up for TypeTak's craft guides, fits the 15 beats like this. Maggie Ames, 32, takes her grandmother's ashes and old road atlas from Ohio to a fishing town in Maine, against her father's wishes. The chapter numbers are examples chosen for this guide.

Beat	Chapter	What happens
Opening Image	1	At her grandmother Edie's funeral reception, in the back room of the family hardware store, Maggie nods at whatever her father decides
Theme Stated	1	Len Hobbs, Edie's old friend, says, “Edie never asked anybody where she could go.”
Setup	1	Frank runs the store and the family. A birthday card for him from “R.” in Maine goes in the trash unopened
Catalyst	2	The lawyer hands Maggie Edie's road atlas, a photo from Ardley, Maine, and a note: “Ask for Ruth Calloway”
Debate	3–5	Frank says no, and Maggie hasn't driven on an interstate since a crash at nineteen
Break into Two	6	She leaves at dawn in Edie's Buick, the urn buckled into the passenger seat
B Story	6–14	Her cousin Tess, 16, hiding in the back seat, keeps asking what Maggie wants, and won't take “whatever” for an answer
Fun and Games	7–14	The motels Edie circled in pencil, a diner waitress who remembers Edie, Frank's nightly calls
Midpoint	15	In Ardley, Ruth sees the photo and shuts the door. False defeat: the woman they came for won't talk
Bad Guys Close In	16–22	Maggie learns the cards came from Ruth. Frank drives up to take the urn home
All Is Lost	23	Ruth tells her she is Frank's birth mother, and Edie raised him. Frank hears it and walks out
Dark Night of the Soul	24–26	Maggie wants to drive home and smooth it over, as she always has
Break into Three	27	She decides: the ashes go off the harbor wall tomorrow, with Ruth there, whether Frank comes or not
Finale	27–29	At the harbor wall, Frank comes and stands next to Ruth
Final Image	30	Maggie drives home on the interstate, Frank in the passenger seat

The midpoint here is a false defeat, not a false victory. Snyder allows either: what matters is that the stakes go up and the story turns. The B Story arrives with the Break into Two, as Snyder suggests, and Tess carries the theme: she keeps asking Maggie what she wants, which Frank has never once asked. The beats are targets, not rules.

The ten Save the Cat genres

Snyder argued that stories fall into ten genres, each with its own requirements. Brody kept the same ten for novels.

Genre	What it's about
Monster in the House	A monster, a house the hero can't easily leave, and a sin that let the monster in
Golden Fleece	A road trip or quest toward a prize, with a team
Out of the Bottle	A wish, a spell or magic changes the hero's life, for a while
Dude with a Problem	An ordinary person caught in an extraordinary situation
Rites of Passage	A life change: grief, adolescence, divorce, addiction
Buddy Love	A relationship that changes both people: romance, friendship, pet stories
Whydunit	A mystery where the question is why, and the answer is about human nature
Fool Triumphant	An underdog who is underestimated and wins
Institutionalized	A group, a family, an organization, and whether to join, leave or burn it down
Superhero	An extraordinary person in an ordinary world that doesn't understand them

Edie's Atlas is a Golden Fleece (a road trip toward a prize, here an answer) with a Rites of Passage underneath it (grief, and leaving home late).

Common criticisms

It makes stories formulaic. Critics say the beat sheet has made Hollywood films feel the same. The fix is to use it to find gaps in your plot, not to fill in boxes.

It was built for films. A two-hour film and a 100,000-word novel move differently. Brody's percentages help, but novels have more room for subplots and slower stretches.

It doesn't fit serials neatly. In a long serial, readers need a hook in chapter one, so Setup, Catalyst and even the B Story crowd into the first chapters. Treat each part or arc as its own smaller beat sheet if that helps.

Turning beats into chapters in TypeTak

TypeTak is an AI writing editor where you write alongside an agent. When you've filled in a beat sheet, what you want is to turn each beat into chapters you can start writing, with a rough length for each.

Get a chapter plan from your beats. Ask the agent to write a chapter, and it first shows a plan card with an outline of what happens in order and a target length. You edit both before a word of prose is written.
See the beats across the whole story. Put each beat on the Board as a card, grouped by act, to check that Fun and Games isn't swallowing Act Two.
Know which beat you've reached. Paste your draft into the word counter with your target length as the goal, and it shows how far along you are as a percentage.

Which beats to keep and which to bend is your call. For the structure underneath the beats, see Three-Act Structure; for the mythic version, see The Hero's Journey.

FAQ

What are the 15 beats of Save the Cat?

Opening Image, Theme Stated, Setup, Catalyst, Debate, Break into Two, B Story, Fun and Games, Midpoint, Bad Guys Close In, All Is Lost, Dark Night of the Soul, Break into Three, Finale and Final Image.

Does Save the Cat work for novels?

Yes, with adjustments. Jessica Brody's Save the Cat! Writes a Novel (2018) adapts the beats for fiction, using percentages of total length instead of screenplay pages.

What does “save the cat” mean?

It's Blake Snyder's name for an early scene where the hero does something kind, like saving a cat, so the audience likes them and wants to follow them. The book and the beat sheet are named after it.

What is the Dark Night of the Soul in Save the Cat?

It's beat 12, right after All Is Lost, around 75 to 80 percent of the story. The hero reacts to the loss, hits emotional bottom, and finally understands what they need to change.

Is Save the Cat the same as three-act structure?

It's built on three-act structure. The Break into Two and Break into Three beats mark the act breaks, and the other beats name the moments within each act.

Sources

Beat sheet: Blake Snyder, Save the Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need (Michael Wiese Productions, 2005)
Novel adaptation: Jessica Brody, Save the Cat! Writes a Novel (Ten Speed Press, 2018)
Official resources: Save the Cat! — Novel writing