Build a chapter-by-chapter book outline mapped to three-act structure, the hero's journey, Save the Cat, or a simple story shape
I need a chapter-by-chapter outline for a book, mapped to a real story structure instead of a loose list of scenes. My premise: [BOOK_PREMISE] (the story's premise, main character, and goal) The structure I want to follow is [STRUCTURE:select:three-act structure,hero's journey,Save the Cat beat sheet,simple beginning-middle-end]. The genre is [GENRE:select:fantasy,romance,horror,mystery or thriller,science fiction,literary fiction,young adult]. I want [CHAPTER_COUNT:number:8-40] chapters total. Build a chapter-by-chapter breakdown across [CHAPTER_COUNT] chapters using [STRUCTURE]. For each chapter, give a one-line summary of what happens and name the structural beat it serves, such as the inciting incident or the midpoint, matched to whichever structure I picked. Use the beats that belong to [STRUCTURE], not a mashup: Save the Cat has its own fifteen named beats, the hero's journey has its stages, and three-act structure has its turning points, so don't relabel one framework's beats with another's names. Place the major beats where they belong proportionally. The midpoint should land near the actual middle chapter, not wherever it's convenient, and the darkest moment belongs in the final third, not chapter four. Fold [GENRE] expectations into the beats themselves: a mystery outline should show where clues and red herrings land, a romance should track the relationship's push and pull alongside the main plot. Flag any stretch of the outline that feels thin or repetitive, and say why it's thin, whether the character has no goal in those chapters, no obstacle, or nothing changes between the start of the stretch and the end. That tells me what to fix before I start drafting instead of just where to worry.
Range: 8 - 40
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Get Early AccessA chapter list without a structure underneath it tends to sag in the middle, the part where most manuscripts stall. Three-act structure, the hero's journey, and Save the Cat all solve that by naming what has to happen and roughly when, so a chapter-by-chapter outline built on one of them holds its shape instead of drifting.
Describe your story in [BOOK_PREMISE], covering premise, main character, and goal, then pick [STRUCTURE] and [GENRE]. Set [CHAPTER_COUNT] anywhere from 8 to 40 depending on how long the finished book runs. Each chapter in the outline gets a one-line summary and the structural beat it serves, plus a flag on any stretch that reads thin before you've written a single scene.
Once the outline exists, the plot twist generator can complicate a specific chapter, and the story synopsis generator condenses the finished outline into query-letter form. A working title makes an outline easier to hold onto, and the book title generator covers that. Build the outline out chapter by chapter in the Dock Editor.
Load the template into the Dock Editor, or paste it into ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini, then fill in [BOOK_PREMISE] with your story's premise, main character, and goal. This is what every chapter beat gets built around.
Choose [STRUCTURE] from three-act structure, hero's journey, Save the Cat beat sheet, or simple beginning-middle-end. Each maps chapters to a different rhythm of beats.
Choose [GENRE] so pacing and tone match reader expectations, a mystery moves differently than a literary novel even inside the same structure.
Set [CHAPTER_COUNT] between 8 and 40 depending on your target book length. A shorter YA novel needs fewer chapters than an epic fantasy.
Look for any chapter or stretch marked as thin. That's usually where the plot needs an added complication or a character decision before you start drafting.
Staring at a blank outline document is its own kind of writer's block. Set [STRUCTURE] to three-act structure or beginning-middle-end for a straightforward map through the whole book.
Hitting a daily word count is easier with a chapter list already mapped out. Set [CHAPTER_COUNT] to match your target draft length before November starts.
Save the Cat's beat sheet has a loyal following in commercial fiction. Set [STRUCTURE] to Save the Cat beat sheet to get chapters mapped directly to its named beats.
A manuscript that stalled partway through sometimes needs to see its own shape from the outside. Run this tool against your existing [BOOK_PREMISE] to spot where the outline runs thin.
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