Conflict

Creating Conflict and Sustaining Suspense

by Lee Masterson

"Dan stood on the wet paving, his arms limp by his side, his jaw hanging in
horror, as he peered through a crack in the curtains. Before him a man crept
towards the figure of his wife as she lay on the sofa.

"Leave my wife alone," his mind screamed silently. His mouth formed the words
but no sound would come.

On the sofa his wife smiled and opened her arms invitingly. Dan did not notice
his car keys drop from between his numb fingers. They landed in a puddle at his
feet with a dull jangle. At the sound, the stranger turned toward the window.
Dan's heart skipped a beat as he recognized the swarthy features of the man
inside his home..

He wondered how hard it would be to murder his best friend."

Did that little excerpt leave you wanting more? I hope so - that was the point.

Conflict is the driving force behind all good fiction. Without it, there is no story.
The good news is, creating conflict is much easier than you might believe.

Many new writers believe that adding conflict to a story is as simple as inserting
violence into the plot line. Nothing could be further from the truth. The conflict in
the example above is only present in Dan's emotional state. Physically, he has
not moved from the window.

Let me give you an example of writing without conflict.

Dan arrived home from work. He stepped out of the car and hurried up the drive
to escape the rain. Through a crack in the curtains he spied his wife awaiting his
arrival. She was curled up on the sofa, a serene little smile on her face. His car
keys fell from his grasp and he stooped to pick them up, before hurrying into the
house.

Now, tell me - would you like to see 400 more pages like this?

Did you happen to notice that Dan's point of view is exactly the same in both
examples? He is still outside, peering through a crack in the curtains, watching
his wife on the sofa. The difference is, I have created tension and suspense by
adding emotional conflict about what Dan is seeing and feeling.

Also in the first example, I have added the hint that it is raining. This is to
introduce a sense of physical conflict. Dan's first impulse should be to run into
the house. He ignores this impulse and endures the physical discomfort,
because he is emotionally preoccupied.

In the second example, there really is no reason for the reader to want to
continue. Nothing special or unusual is happening to the characters. Nothing
untoward is going on. Where is the point in continuing to turn pages?

Risk

In the first example above, Dan is trying to deal with the conflicting emotions of
watching his wife with another man. The final line, however, introduces an
element of risk. Morally, murdering a man is incomrehensible to most people.
And yet, faced with a big enough emotional dilemma, Dan considers the risk.
Most importantly, we touched on a nerve inside Dan that shows the reader why
he is acting and feeling the way he is.

Inserting conflict for the sake of it becomes pointless unless the character is
facing a certain degree of risk. In this scenario, Dan could be imprisoned for the
rest of his life if he proceeds with the intent of murder. The situations and
feelings that your characters must live through should still feel believable to the
reader.

If I had written that Dan simply walked into the house and punched his friend in
the face, the risk becomes non-existent. Dan has nothing to lose (except maybe
his wife) and the reader has no reason to continue reading.

Empathy

Most people can relate to Dan's feelings of helplessness and hopelessness

while he stares into the window. This situation also encompasses some
peoples' deepest fear, so the suspense is more poignant because of this.

But, even though Dan is contemplating murder, most people can empathize with
him, because the dilemma he is in is one that people can relate to.

Imagine how you would have felt if Dan had raced inside, thrown off his coat
and joined in with trysting pair? The conflict is diffused, the empathy is shattered
and the reader is thrown off balance.

When creating a scene, bear in mind that your readers want to see the
protagonist win. But there is no point in winning at all if the stakes were never
high enough to make them care about your hero in the first place.

Raise the Stakes

Okay, Dan's wife is having an affair with his best friend. Is this enough conflict to
keep a reader turning pages in anticipation for 400 pages? Probably not.

Sure, Dan is contemplating murdering his best friend. But he hasn't actually
done anything. He's still staring into the window, remember? Is this enough to
keep a reader enthralled for another 400 pages? I doubt it.
Once the initial shock of the first conflict is over, the reader is going to want
fresh conflict to keep the suspense high.

It's time to raise the stakes.

"A rolling boom of thunder heralded a flash of lightning and the rain gave way to
a barrage of stinging hailstones. Dan shook his head, his daze lifted, and
backed away from the window. He ran through the blinding hail back towards
his car, his mind working furiously. He had always kept a small gun in the glove
compartment, but he no idea whether or not it was loaded. A quick check
reassured him that it was.

He swallowed down the tears that threatened to overcome him at the thought of
shooting the two people he loved most in the world and ran back to the house."

So now Dan is no longer simply contemplating murder. He's really going to do it!
This forces the reader to start asking questions. Will he do it? And if he does kill
them both, will he get caught? How will he ever escape a double homicide
charge?

Not only does this increase the tension of our little story, but it throws the reader
into a kind of dilemma, too. Is it possible to still feel empathy for a protagonist
who is about to become a cold-blooded killer? Your reader will simply have to
keep reading to find out.

Rising Complications

Once Dan kills his wife and best friend, where does a writer go from there?
Once the trysting couple are dead, then what? Of course, Dan will need to
contend with escaping the long arm of the law, he'll have to face his own
conscience ...

Or we could lead the reader into a situation that is even more menacing than the
first.

"Dan crept into the living room, arm outstretched, gun wavering uncertainly
before him. With an effort, he stilled his shaking hand and took another step into
the room. The entwined couple on the sofa had not yet noticed his entrance. He
took a deep breath, steeling himself against the nausea that bubbled up from
the pit of his stomach and poised his finger over the trigger.

"... and so, darling, if you push him down the stairs, it will look like the perfect
accident."

"Will you help me with the... you know... the body?"

"Of course. No one will ever know. I'm too high up in the force to be questioned
about an investigation like this. "
Phew! Just when the reader thought it might not be okay to like a homicidal
husband as a protagonist, it turns out that his cheating wife and best friend are
plotting to kill him anyway.

The problem is, he knows that they want him dead and he can't go the police -
not now that we know the friend is a member of the police force. Who would
ever believe his story over the word of an officer?

Is it likely the reader will continue to turn pages to find out how he manages to
beat these odds?

Creating conflict should be as simple as continuing to ask yourself questions

during every scene - and then forcing yourself to be honest about the answer.

Ask about the actions of your characters

Is your hero reacting in a realistic way to the conflict you have thrown at him?
Would he really do that?

Ask about the situations you have written

Would he really go and get a gun?
Is the situation really desperate enough to contemplate murder?

Ask about the continuity

Does this scene move the story forward?
Should I stop the story to describe every piece of the scenery to my readers so
they get the mental image clearly?
Is a scene showing Dan sitting on the loo for forty minutes, humming the theme
song to the Simpsons going to increase or decrease tension?

But most importantly, ask questions about your readers

Why should the reader care what happens to your characters?
Why should the reader keep turning those pages?
Why would the reader want to read what happens next?

Conflict in Fiction
By Tina Morgan

Inserting conflict into your fiction is not quite as simple as inserting a fist-fight
into the storyline. Conflict in fiction can be as diverse and as individual as you
are. It can also be used effectively to heightened tension and increase
suspense.

In many cases, the conflict within the story is the driving force towards the story
goal. The need to overcome the conflict is often the central focus of the hero.
The means to overcome that same conflict can then become a path to victory for
the protagonist.
Yet not all conflict must be gut-wrenching, wrist-slashing, eye-popping
suspense. Often, the more subtle forms of internal emotional conflict can impact
upon a reader far more deeply.

My own first reaction to the word conflict is to think of violence, but what is the
real definition of the word?

According to Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, it is:

1) To come into collision or disagreement; be contradictory; at variance or in

opposition; clash

2) Discord of action, feeling or effect; antagonism or opposition as of interests or

principles

3) A mental struggle arising from opposing demands or impulses

Conflict in a story does not have to be light sabers or laser guns, automatic
weapons or explosions. It can be as simple as what clothes will our protagonist
wear in the morning, or as deep as how far should modern science go? Conflict
can also be an internal process. No matter where your story's conflict arises,
every story must contain an element of it.

The type of conflict used in each story depends largely on your target audience.

age
sex
special interests
genre
Publications

small press
large publisher
self-publishing

Certain genres and age groups will limit or restrict the type and depth of conflict
the writer can explore. Special interest publications allow the writer to target a
more specific conflict. YA novels and stories will limit the degree to which you
can explore sexual conflicts and physical violence, but will heighten the
importance of emotional conflict. A primarily male or female audience will vary in
the type and style of conflict. A Christian publisher is more likely to focus on
internal conflicts, rather than physical or sexual conflicts.

The type of conflict your novel has is part of what determines its genre.

Romance novels require the primary conflict to involve two people struggling
with a romantic relationship with/without sexual tension. By this, I mean the type
of conflict that touches the reader emotionally, rather than intellectually - really
"tugs at the heart-strings". The audience's age level will determine the amount
of sexual content and tension. Because the romantic conflict is the primary
conflict, it cannot be resolved until the end of the story.
Mysteries require an external conflict where a crime or disappearance must be
solved. However, that does not exclude internal conflicts within the main
character's nature or personal relationships. Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum
is a delightful character with a lot of internal conflicts between her own
emotions, family and career choices.

What makes a thriller is a high stakes conflict. Here is where my definition of

conflict finally holds up. The nature of the thriller is the risk of extreme bodily
harm or death to the protagonist and/or those he/she cares about. The danger
can be from other people in the form of terrorists, murderers, psychopaths, etc
or a violent act of nature: flood, tornado, hurricane, earthquake or volcano.
Violence is at the very heart of the conflict.

Science fiction and fantasy are two of the most versatile genres. The conflict
can range from sword and sorcery or space opera to questions about the
morality of creating artificial life or cloning. While different publishers prefer
different sorts of conflict, there is room for any variety of style and type. Literary
stories are the antithesis of my incorrect definition of conflict.

Literary stories revolve around the internal conflict and how the character deals
with it. The external circumstances and the character's actions are the setting
for delving into the character's internal thoughts and the journey they take to
decide upon their action or inaction.

All of these genres can be combined effectively. Often, combination - or cross-

genre - stories are harder to market but some of the best novels I have ever
read have included cross-genre settings and conflicts.

Conflict is the essence of Drama

Conflict is the essence of drama. Got none? Then you got none. It’s the primary
ingredient that weaves together all the other elements of a novel.

You a Seinfeld fan? What do you immediately remember about the show? The
characters of course. But what created those characters? Actually, no, not the
jokes, although damn they were funny. The characters were instead put in relief
by non-stop silver bullets flying among them. It wasn’t a show about nothing—it
was about war.

Don’t believe me? Watch it (or any favorite) again with an objective eyeball. All
good shows…all good drama…is boiling with conflict. Bubble, Bubble

But confusion abounds as to exactly what it is. And no wonder, for ‘conflict’ is a
pretty watery word, drawing into it an entire spectrum of dramatic elements that
inhabit both the width of a page and that of a book.

You can't write a good book without it

The terrible backlash of this confusion is that you really need to intuitively
understand it in all its guises. The sweet dreams of many a would be writer have
been muddled and lost in their lack of an essential feel for it. If you do grasp the
full breadth of the watery word, then you, your publisher and your reader will be
much happier with your book.

So let’s break em’ down and bag em’. Good news is it’s really not that hard. A
few gritty examples so you believe (most examples are from film or television—
more people know them and the principles illustrated are the same).

Conflict—Wide Angle Internal (Character Growth)

Internal conflict is the dilemma facing the character inside and its impact on that
character. Writers typically choose internal conflicts that arouse a universal
emotion in people, whether it's inner need, desire, belief, or turmoil.

Like us, a novel's characters have little holes in their lives, bits of their tapestry
somehow torn, experiences that scarred them. This is their vulnerability, and
what they must confront as a direct result of what happens to them in the novel.
The resolution of this confrontation, whether it's constructive, destructive,
successful or not, allows us to see how a character has grown.

A strong internal conflict can make a good story great.

Conflict—Wide Angle External (Role of the Antagonist)

Internal conflict adds meaning and complexity to the external conflict, but it's the
external conflict that forces a character to make internal choices and changes.
And the key to a story’s tension is that a character has choices to make. Which
will it be? What will be the fallout? For readers to care about a story the choices
and the resolution must have consequences for the main character

In the broad perspective, a novel's need of an antagonist is really the main

character's need of something to force him or her to make choices. Characters,
like ourselves, don't easily take difficult paths. No thank you. If we're not forced
to, we simply don't.

One of the best ways to force a character into choices is to develop an

antagonist who will naturally jab into the root of a character's internal conflict
and who's goal is opposite that of your hero (the hero, by the way, doesn't need
to explicitly know their goal). The 'antagonist' doesn't have to be an evil outlaw
with a sweaty hat, it can be a storm or society or a new job or a worm.

Conflict—Medium Shot (Bumps rising toward a Climax)

On the way toward your hero's goal a series of conflicts or obstacles occur that
prevent him from reaching it. If you have a bad guy these often result from run
ins with him or his minions. Each external mini-conflict or bump must drive down
to the root of a character's internal conflict, slowly teaching the character a life
lesson or giving them the option to change.
In Finding Nemo, for example, Marlin's external goal is to, well...find his son,
Nemo. Mini-bumps along the way include leaving the safety of the coral reef in
the first place and later fighting sharks. These events tear away at Marlin's
weakness: his lack of courage.

An important component of suspense at each mini-climax is choice. If there's no

doubt at all as to how a character will proceed at each junction then the plot is
without suspense and the character without conflict.

A character's decision must proceed from powerfully conflicting alternatives if

we are to read with empathy instead of mere curiosity. We are fascinated by a
character's actions largely in light of the actions rejected and the stresses
endured as a result.

Conflict—Close Up of a Page (Spoken)

Try to instill emotion, tension and conflict into every conversation and on every
page. Imagine what boring neighbors Jerry and Kramer would be if whenever
they met everything was wonderfully smooth instead of eternally ripe with
argument and banter. For Seinfeld these little battles are either starting points or
nuances of the episode's big 'battle', and you'll have a difficult time locating a full
minute without them. Perhaps more importantly they put Jerry, Kramer and the
rest in stark relief and in doing give us the opportunity to (kind of) love them.

Take a closer look at any good book, film or TV show and you'll be shocked at
just how much page to page or minute to minute conflict you'll find.

Conflict—Close Up of a Page (Subtext)

Whenever we deal with people with whom we have conflict, whether love or
hate, how much of what we think and feel do we really say? Usually not
everything, for one reason or another. But our feelings get through in subtle
ways—off handed remarks, body language, and through the very mood of our
actions.

These subtextual motions are an underlying dialogue in themselves and usually

more compelling and effective to use in your story than having a character
blather out exactly what they're thinking at every particular moment. Situations
in stories, like in life, are far more complicated. In Casablanca, for example, Rick
and Renault's entire relationship is subtextual (rent the classic and see for
yourself).

Conflict—the Buddha’s Perspective

We're not attracted to stories without conflict simply because we can't learn
anything from them. They are empty of the seeds that might nurture our own
growth, in whatever direction that might be. Of course we love to read happy
stuff in books too, but only after the hero has traveled his or her difficult path of
personal growth and finally reached the reward for their journey.
Write Now: Expanding Your Conflict

By Jess Lebow

How to Get More Bang for Your Buck

All right, it's time to get back down to the nitty gritty.

If you've read this column before, then you've heard me talk about the importance
of conflict. Without it, you have no story. It's as simple as that.

But just having a conflict isn't enough. And not all conflicts are created equal.

Take, for example, the difference between the conflicts in these two movies: Star
Wars and Speed.

In Star Wars we have a band of rebels working together to overthrow the forces of
the oppressive Empire. In Speed, we have a bomb on a bus. Now, I know what you
are saying. This isn't really a fair comparison -- and you're right. One of these
movies has had a lasting impact on an entire generation, perhaps more than one
generation. Some may say that the other has passed from the public consciousness
entirely.

But that's exactly the point I'm trying to make. On the surface, both of these
conflicts are fundamentally sound. Both create a sense of urgency. Both have a
clear division between good and evil. And both made plenty of money at the box
office.

I didn't particularly like Speed, but I'll bet that was one of the easier pitch meetings
ever: "So, there's a bomb on a bus, and if the driver slows down below 55 MPH, it'll
explode. Our hero has to find a way to dismantle the bomb or get everyone off the
bus without slowing down." Great. It fits very neatly into the rules of what a conflict
is supposed to be. It's easy to explain, and really, if you look at it purely in terms of
conflict, it's a pretty good premise.

Star Wars, on the other hand, isn't so easy to explain in two sentences. Sure
someone can find a way to sum it up, but two sentences would only just whet your
appetite. It couldn't possibly begin to hint at the subtleties and complexities in the
huge Star Wars universe.
That's the difference between these two movies. In one, the conflict is very
focused. The bomb drives the bus and the heroes to do what they do. In the other,
the conflict is very broad, and it drives entire star systems to action.

Now, I'm not saying that one of these conflicts is better than the other. (Though, I
would say one of these movies is better than the other, but that's another
story.)They are just different. Sometimes you just want to tell a story about a bus
being blown up. The universe can wait until later. Other times, though -- like when
you're developing a whole world -- you need something that lends itself to
expanded content.

When you create a conflict that encompasses the entire universe (or world, for that
matter), you create a motivation for a very large group of people. Say the state of
Washington declared war on the state of Oregon. This is a big conflict and it
impacts a lot of people. You can come up with a whole bunch of other, smaller
conflicts underneath this conflict, and all can relate to the larger one. Maybe I live
in Washington but my brother lives in Oregon. My state is at war with his, but I'm
not at war with my brother. What do I do? Even better, what if I'm a soldier in the
Washington National Guard and my brother is in the Oregon National Guard. Now
we have to shoot at each other. Now, you could tell the story about me and my
brother, and no matter how it comes out, you still haven’t solved the overarching
conflict. So you'd have to tell another story, or perhaps several. And, maybe, you'd
never even solve the larger conflict of the war between the two states. You could
just keep telling stories about families torn apart, people who don't believe in the
war, someone who grew up in Washington but moved to Oregon as an adult and
now doesn't know which side of the conflict she should be on. The larger conflict
feeds the smaller ones, and if you work it well, you can get a lot of material out of a
single idea. It's like a set of nesting tables, where each one fits inside the other
until they all make one cohesive whole. Good stuff.

You can use other ways to expand the conflict besides dealing with the scope of the
conflict, though. One way involves adding an extra piece to the puzzle, such as
something the protagonist wasn't aware of that he or she discovers while in the
middle of solving what seems to be a relatively simple conflict. Take Star Wars. In
the first movie, a tractor beam snares the Millennium Falcon and pulls it into the
Death Star. They set out to solve a simple problem: Bring down the tractor beam.
While doing so, though, they discover that the princess is being held in cell block D.
In essence, what you'd be doing here is tacking on a related conflict, making the
first conflict larger than what it initially seemed.
Another way to expand conflict is to make the perceived solution to the problem
cause an even bigger problem. Let's say our protagonist has to defuse a time bomb
(sticking with the Speed theme). It just so happens that our hero used to work on
the bomb squad, and he takes out his trusty wire cutters and snaps away. But our
villain was crafty, and he booby-trapped the bomb, and as soon as the hero clips
the first wire, the timer starts to tick down faster! Now, not only do we still have a
problem, but we also have an even larger problem. In this second example, you're
really trying to make a simple solution far more complicated. You want to muddy
things up a bit by making life harder for your protagonist. You can probably think of
a million ways to accomplish this feat, but you need to be prepared to cause some
serious discomfort to the character with whom you will be spending most of your
time.

Another way to make life more difficult for your hero is by simply having him make
a poor or risky decision. Think back to the movie Risky Business. Tom Cruise gets
into trouble because he hires a prostitute, and, as a result, a bunch of unsavory
types clean out his parent's house while they're on vacation. To solve his problem,
Tom turns to becoming a pimp himself, potentially inviting in bigger, more severe
problems to deal with the one he has. You could call this method "upping the
stakes." It's sort of like the song about the old woman who swallowed a fly. She
swallows a spider to catch the fly. But then this genius has a spider problem instead
of a fly infestation. Eventually (if I'm remembering the song right) she swallows a
goat and dies. As authors, we could all do well to have our characters follow this old
lady's example. As long as you stop short of the goat, you'll have a great story.

In the end, if you have complicated your conflict enough, the resolution becomes
even more satisfying (and your whole story right along with it). Take, for example,
a story about a guy who gets a flat tire on the freeway. If he gets out of the car,
pulls out the spare tire, changes the flat and moves on, then it's not a very
satisfying story. But should the new tire turn out to be flat after he puts it on the
car, and if he has to walk ten miles in the rain to the nearest service station, but
they're closed, so he goes to a farm house, where the farmer fixes his tire then
gives him a lift back to his car on a tractor -- well, now that's a much more
interesting story.

Homework: Create a conflict. Any conflict will do. Now come up with a way to solve
this conflict. But instead of just ending the story here, have your protagonist fail at
her first attempt, making matters even worse than they were before. Now see if
you can find a way to get her out of hot water.

 Character Development drives Conflict  

All stories are about people, even when they're about rabbits. And the stories that
move us most, the ones that stick inside years later, are those inhabited by
characters we can connect with and admire.
And no characters resonate more than those who in the course of a story learned
how to transcend their own flaws and weaknesses to do something great—this is
known as a Character Arc.

And by great I don’t mean saving the world, for often the quietest moments are the
ones in which characters find their greatness. The moments that truly define us are
almost always personal, times when we’re able to overcome our own limitations
and rise to be something more.

Character Arc—the rocky path of personal growth and development a character

undergoes in a story, usually unwillingly, during which the character wrestles with
and eventually overcomes some or all of a serious emotional fear, limitation, block
or wound.

In a character's development he or she might overcome:

o   lack of courage or inner doubts

o   lack of ethics
o   learning to love
o   guilt
o   trauma from the past
o   errors in thinking, etc.

Weaknesses, imperfections, quirks and vices make a character more real &
appealing.

o    They humanize a character. The audience can identify with them.

o    Flaws and imperfections give a character somewhere to go and
progress toward in the story.  
o    The development of a character is only interesting if they overcome
something.

A great example of a character arc – Tom Cruise’s character in "Rain Man."

Beginning – Cruise is a ruthless car dealer who kidnaps his autistic brother
because he feels cheated about not receiving any money from his father's will.

End of Arc – After a cross-country journey with his brother, he learns the
importance of family and turns down the money.

Role of a Character Arc

 Keeps the tension high and the conflict going.

 Serves as the “inner” conflict and is always mirrored by the story's “outer”
conflict.
o e.g. DieHard: Inner conflict = overcome internal weaknesses to be
able to get back together with wife; Outer conflict = fight bad guys
who have taken over wife’s building.
 The Arc is the internal change the hero goes through in a story.
o It can be positive change of character—a happy ending
o Or a negative or no change—which gives us a tragedy.
  Characters who remain essentially the same from beginning to
end are fatally flawed. They have learned nothing from their
experience and have shown no growth.
o Or the character is already ‘good’ and doesn’t change (e.g. James
Bond, Braveheart, John Wayne).

 Development of a Character Arc

 Personal changes in a Character’s Arc require smooth development—

changing is really hard.
 2D verses 3D character development
o 2D—Jumping changes in character create 2 dimensional characters.
o 3D—Show the natural, step-by-step development of a character.
 Show how the personal beliefs that cause internal flaws are
torn away little by little by forces within a character and by his
surroundings.
 Small conflicts/transitions as the character evolves from one
state of mind to another in a slow even pace until he is
compelled to make a life changing decision.

Conflict and Character within Story Structure

The Basic Three Act Structure

The simplest building blocks of a good story are found in the Three Act Structure.
Separated by Plot Points, its Act 1 (Beginning), Act 2 (Middle), and Act 3 (End)
refer not to where in time in the story they lie but instead fundamental stages
along the way.

 In the Beginning you introduce the reader to the setting, the characters
and the situation (conflict) they find themselves in and their goal. Plot Point
1 is a situation that drives the main character from their "normal" life toward
some different conflicting situation that the story is about. 
 Great stories often begin at Plot Point 1, thrusting the main
character right into the thick of things, but they never really leave
out Act 1, instead filling it in with back story along the way.
 In the Middle the story develops through a series of complications and
obstacles, each leading to a mini crisis. Though each of these crises are
temporarily resolved, the story leads inevitably to an ultimate crisis—the
Climax. As the story progresses, there is a rising and falling of tension with
each crisis, but an overall rising tension as we approach the Climax. The
resolution of the Climax is Plot Point 2.
  In the End, the Climax and the loose ends of the story are resolved during
the Denouement. Tension rapidly dissipates because it's nearly impossible to
sustain a reader's interest very long after the climax. Finish your story and
get out.

Character Arc and Story Structure

 Act 1
o In the Beginning of a story the main character, being human (even if
he of she isn't), will resist change (inner conflict). The character is 
perfectly content as he is; there's no reason to change.

 Plot Point 1 – Then something happens to throw everything off balance.

o It should come as a surprise that shifts the story in a new direction
and reveals that the protagonist’s life will never be the same again.
 In Star Wars this point occurs when Luke's family is killed,
freeing him to fight the Empire.
o It puts an obstacle in the way of the character that forces him or her
to deal with something they would avoid under normal
circumstances.  
 Act 2
o The second Act is about a character’s emotional journey and is the
hardest part of a story to write. Give your characters all sorts of
challenges to overcome during Act 2. Make them struggle towards
their goal.
o The key to Act Two is conflict. Without it you can’t move the story
forward. And conflict doesn’t mean a literal fight. Come up with
obstacles (maybe five, maybe a dozen—depends on the story)
leading up to your plot point at the end of Act 2.
 Throughout the second act remember to continually raise
the stakes of your character’s emotional journey.
 Simultaneously advance both inner and outer conflicts. Have
them work together—the character should alternate up and
down internally between hope and disappointment as external
problems begin to seem solvable then become more
insurmountable than ever.   
  Include reversals of fortune and unexpected turns of events—
surprise your reader with both the actions of the main
character and the events surrounding him. 
 Plot Point 2
o Act Two ends with the second plot point, which thrusts the story in
another unexpected direction.
o Plot Point 2 occurs at the moment the hero appears beaten or lost
but something happens to turn the situation around. The hero's goal
becomes reachable.
 Right before this unexpected story turn, the hero reaches the
Black Moment—the point at which all is lost and the goal
cannot be achieved.  
 In order to have a "Climax", where the tension is
highest, you must have a "Black" moment, where the
stakes are highest and danger at its worst.
 During this moment, the hero draws upon the new
strengths or lessons he's learned in order to take
action and bring the story to a conclusion.
o Dorothy’s gotta get a broom from the Wicked
Witch before she can go home.
o Luke’s gotta blow up the Death Star before
fulfilling his destiny.
o Professor Klump’s gotta save face with the
investors of his formula and win back Jada.
 Act 3
o The third Act dramatically shows how the character is able to succeed
or become a better person.
o Resolution/denouement ties together the loose ends of the story (not
necessarily all of them) and allows the reader to see the outcome of
the main character’s decision at the climax. Here we see evidence of
the change in a positive character arc. 

Story Structure & the Buddha

Great novels—great stories—existed long before there were books about something
called Story Structure. The pattern of an enchanting yarn has been recreated again
and again through time and around the world in myths and tales. The rhythm of
these stories that so captures our imaginations reflects not marketing trends but
our collective struggle through life. Things that deeply resonate do so because they
tug at our inner workings. Structure is not a prison—use tips and advice on it only
as a map, but go down deep within yourself to find the road. Finding the road is the
most pleasurable part of writing. 

>> Find out more with The Hero's Journey in the Good Links Section

A Word on Plot

Don't let your focus be the Plot, which is the series of events and situations that
occur along the route of your story. The Plot is a natural outcome of the seeds of
your story—it emerges from your setup of the characters, their conflicts and the
setting they occur in. You'll write a more powerful, believable story if you focus on
seed planting long before you worry about the harvest.