Conflict—The Key to Rescuing a Sagging Middle

with guest Jessica Keller


 

Recently while serving as a contest judge for different writing competitions I’ve been noticing a common theme of a lack of external conflict. The writing would be excellent, but the synopsis would consist of a list of mundane activities that the hero and heroine would do throughout the book and then end with them in love. Huh?

Conflict, both internal and external, is the driving force of your story. Without it, all you have is a bunch of pages about a nice guy who likes a girl and unfortunately, that’s not enough to sell a story. Without challenge, we don’t care about your character—even if you spend a page describing how much he loves his grandma and how broad his shoulders are—we just don’t care about his story. 

The easiest way to know if your current story suffers from lack of conflict is to examine the middle of your manuscript. Does the story slow and slump? Consider adding more layers of conflict if you can answer yes to any of the following questions: Is your plot predictable? Does your main character achieve things too easily? Does your story climax happen too soon? Does your story lack tension? Fear not. Conflict is easy to add!

Today I’m focusing only on external conflict, which is essentially your plot. It’s what HAPPENS to your character, whereas internal conflict is what your character feels about how they’re dealing with what’s happening. External conflict often comes in the form of outward roadblocks to thwart whatever the main character wants. Most external conflict will fall into one of these:

1)    Person vs. Person – This does not have to mean a physical battle. In the story I’m currently writing its two people battling over a historic building in my fictional town. One wants to modernize it to make it more convenient and then other wants the save the building’s old charm which may make the business lose money. Two people at odds.

2)    Person vs. Nature – Storms. Sickness. Power outages caused by squirrels chewing through cables. The second book in my Goose Harbor series starts with the heroine in a deer vs. car accident. 

3)    Person vs. Society – Are they treated like an outcast in your town? Does the character suffer social anxiety? The board in  my fictional town starts to put pressure on the heroine who wants to save the history of the old building—to the point of getting the engineers in town to declare things unsafe. A community ganging up on a main character.

4)    Person vs. Technology – Often in fiction this is seen as battling robots and the like, but for Inspirational Romance it could be as simple as a control freak wedding organizer breaking her smartphone, a computer virus ruining a reporter’s front page article seconds before deadline, or a fax machine that mangles the important message saying the love interest in the story is wanted for kidnapping.

5)    Man vs. Animal – To borrow the tagline from Sharknado: Enough said.

Those are the main ways external conflict appears in our stories, but we don’t just throw a bunch of conflict at a character and consider the story done. It doesn’t work that way. If the hero wrestles a bear in the first chapter, hijacks a tour bus in the second chapter, and storms the White House in chapter three, the reader still doesn’t care because the stakes aren’t clear. Why is the hero doing these things? Who is in danger? What does the hero want? Why do we care what he wants? Believable characters and logical conflict gives a story purpose. Conflict for the sake of conflict is quickly labeled “episodic” (*shudder*) and we authors fear that word.

For the conflict in our stories to matter the obstacles our characters need to overcome must correlate directly to whatever our character is trying to achieve. So every time you’re tempted to toss a snowstorm at your character, stop and ask if that helps push the story goal or if it’s just wasted conflict that doesn’t serve the plot. It’s a lot to think about, but it doesn’t have to be difficult.

Pick your horizon. 

What does your character want most? At the onset of the story, what is their goal? That goal is now their horizon and as long as it stays out of reach, the story can continue. But it only stays on the horizon because of obstacles—if not for obstacles, the goal becomes easily reachable. 

For example, in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Macbeth kills the king because his goal is for his linage to inherit the crown. Everything that happens in the play puts Macbeth further and further from seeing that dream achieved. In Casablanca Victor Laslo is trying to leave Casablanca—thereby gaining freedom. Therefore the conflicts that keep occurring in the movie are all things that keep people from being able to leave Casablanca. 

If you have no idea what your character’s main goal is, then neither will your reader which will make conflict feel meaningless. At the onset of writing your story you need to know what your character wants most and then start throwing logical obstacles in their path to keep them from reaching their goal.

So back to our snowstorm—that would be a logical conflict if your heroine’s goal was to make sure her family was safe and her younger sister happened to be stuck in an abandoned lodge at the top of a mountain. Then a snowstorm makes for excellent conflict—especially if our hero is a weatherman who warned the heroine not to go out searching for her sister because he noticed something on the radar. See how we did that?

Do the math. 

I hate math just as much as the next writer, but there is a simple equation that will make certain your story never slumps. Ready? 

Goal + Problem/Obstacle = Conflict.

At the start of your story something happens to create the story question. For example, in a typical romance its girl meets boy, so the story question is—will the hero and heroine achieve their happily ever after? Conflict: Girl doesn’t like boy. Or girl’s family hates boy. Or girl and boy’s main character goals are at war with each other (think about the building that one wants to modernize and the other wants to keep historical). 

Warning. A small author soapbox on romantic conflict: An argument does not equal conflict. Don’t use a misunderstanding that can easily be cleared up by your characters actually talking to each other as the crux of your story. This annoys readers. Greatly. There are Amazon review pages teeming with one star reviews ranting about how the entire book could have been one chapter long if the characters would have just talked together. You can avoid getting those reviews by adding in realistic external conflicts.  

Repeat.

I’m a firm believer in the theory that conflict belongs on every single page. If it’s a romance novel it works best if their goals put the heroine and hero in conflict with each other from the get go. There shouldn’t just be one or two moments of conflict, but a string of them that build. Start with the smallest conflicts first and build to the biggest one (climax). Your character should be victorious over some obstacles, but they should also be defeated by some of them as well. The main thing being, they don’t give up.   

Readers get to know our characters because of how they respond to these conflicts and that is why they care about them. Write your story and layer conflicts in a way that makes the reader start to doubt that the happy ending they’re hopping for can ever happen. Well done conflict creates doubt. Doubt breeds curiosity. And curiosity keeps readers flipping pages late into the night. 

Questions? 

Leave a comment today for a chance to win one of three copies of The Widower's Second Chance. 

       
Learning To Love…Again 

Idyllic Goose Harbor, Michigan, offers a fresh start for broken-hearted Paige Windom. In addition to securing a teaching job at the high school, she'll fulfill her dream of helping at-risk teens in a nearby inner-city mentoring program. But Caleb Beck, a handsome yet overprotective widower and the center's founder, doesn't want Paige anywhere near the place. He's afraid she'll get hurt—just like his late wife. Paige knows she can do a lot of good—for the kids and Caleb himself. If only she can show him how to let go of his fear, maybe they'll both find a way to reopen their wounded hearts. 

Goose Harbor: Love is in big supply on the shores of Lake Michigan.

Available from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Harlequin.

Bio:  
                         
Jessica Keller holds degrees in both Communications and Biblical Studies. She is multi-published in both Young Adult Fiction and Inspirational Romance and has 100+ magazine and newspaper articles to her name. She’s also a contributor to the popular writing focused blog The Write Conversation. You can find her at www.JessicaKellerBooks.com, on Twitter @AuthorKeller, on Tumblr, or on her Facebook Author Page. She lives in the Chicagoland suburbs with her amazing husband, beautiful daughter, and two annoyingly outgoing cats that happen to be named after superheroes.

How to Write Believable Villains

 with guest Jessica Keller.

There are so many blog posts out there about how to get to know the hero of your story. Interview him, they say. Sit down and have a chat. Spend time learning his secrets and past hurts. So much time is given to the hero but know what? No one thinks about the poor little villain. The truth is the first step to writing believable villains is to brew some coffee/tea and pull up a seat at a secluded table to visit with the villain of your current manuscript. Just maybe go into the meeting with a knife tucked in your boot….he IS the villain after all.



 

Warning: This post includes spoilers for Disney’s Frozen and Star Wars, although if you haven’t seen the later, I urge you to come out from hiding in your bunker. Anyway. Continue reading at your own story-spoiling risk.

Everyone has been Frozen crazy lately (I promise not to burst into song. Okay, I’m singing about a snowman. But you have my permission to press mute). One of the aspects of the movie that I really loved was the villain (Hans) was not the normal obvious badie. At first we have a hard time not liking Hans. Sure he’s a bit cheesy (someone else tell me he reminded you of Donny Osmond … just me? Um, I never said that then) but he’s perfectly supportive of Anna until we see his true colors very late in the game. While we end up disliking him greatly, Hans is a great villain because he has motivation and layers that many of the other Disney villains lack. Which got me to thinking. What makes a really great villain?

When my debut Home for Good released one of the things I wasn't expecting to hear feedback on was the bad guy. But again and again, readers wrote to me and said they loved that they couldn't figure out who the villain was until the reveal. Crafting villains doesn't have to be difficult. I always keep these five rules nearby when I'm writing:

1) Do not make them cartoonish.

Twisting their mustache and cackling whenever things go according to plan is not allowed (embroider that on a pillow if needs be). Evil for the sake of being evil is incredibly difficult to write without the character becoming a cardboard cutout. It’s far more chilling to make an vile character that has actions and behaves in a way a typical person would react given the right set of circumstances and a hard enough push. Think about it, what’s more scary: some pure evil abstract character who is trying his hand at world domination for no reason in particular or the-neighbor-you-have-bbq's-with-who-really-is-a-murder-type who just walked past you in the grocery store?

2) Play on real/current fears.

Why did the Joker in The Dark Knight chill us to the bone? Because even though Gotham is a fake city it feels like we’re watching a post-9/11 world much like our own. It terrifies us because it could become possible. Look at global news stories and take them a step further (hijacked planes, biochemical warfare, engineered food, the list goes on).

3) Make your villain intelligent and challenging.

A stupid and easily overcome villain just means that your hero was equally stupid. It’s just says your hero can’t handle anything harder. Craft a villain that makes the reader think there is no hope for the hero. When a hero is forced to go above and beyond to overcome a villain it makes your hero more credible in the end and his journey worthwhile. Along the same lines, give your villain interesting and meaningful things to say. Make them both compelling and convincing. One of the greatest things you can do as an author is to have the reader believe that the villain has a valid point in his motivation.

4) Give them qualities that are sympathetic.

The best villains are the ones we as readers—despite everything—feel a connection with. Remember, no person is all good or all evil. Just as much as your hero should have flaws, your villain should have some admirable qualities. Does your villain, like President Snow from the Hunger Games, enjoy cultivating roses? Or does he provide care for his sickly sister? Rescues abandoned pug puppies? Possibly he’s like Darth Vader and the love of his children holds him back in the end. Give the villain some secret like this that the hero can discover—then you can explore if your hero is the type of person to use the villain’s vulnerability as leverage or not.

5) The villain should have sufficient motivation.

The villain wants something, or needs something to occur, and they have a belief that what they are doing is necessary in order to accomplish their goal. I once heard the saying, “Everyone is a hero of their own story” and that thought has stuck with me. See, no one views themselves as the villain. Repeat that.

No one—not even your villain—thinks they're the badie. Your villain thinks he’s the good guy!
 
Remember that as you write. In his head he has formed justification for why he does what he does. His reasons may be completely delusional but to him they’re very real. And these motivations must come across on the pages. As a reader I must be able to process that maybe I would have chosen a different path than your villain has, but I understand why the character is the way he is and feels the need to take the actions he does.

If you master these five, then you’ll have one excellent and compelling villain. After that, you can play around adding deeper layers. Think Darth Vader (in the original trilogy) his character arc serves as a lesson for what will happen to Luke if he doesn’t get his act together. Or, the musical and book Wicked serves as an excellent example of seeing your villain in a different light. One of my favorite examples of this is the show Once Upon A Time where the viewers have been able to see fairy tale villains in a new light and root for many of them to get happy endings (FYI: I’m 100% Team Captain Hook). Constantly ask yourself while writing: if given different circumstances to view them through, would my villain still be a villain?

Who is your favorite (or the best) villain in a movie or a book? What makes them stick with you? What have you found most annoying about villains in books? Did I miss an ingredient to a good villain? What would you add to the list?

________________

I'm currently working on book two of my TimeShifters series (which includes massive amounts of time spent with the villain to end all villains) but want to give away a copy of the first book, Saving Yesterday to someone who leaves a comment today. Here's the back cover:

Her blood holds secrets she never knew existed.

Despite the fact that she acts as a parent to her alcoholic father, Gabby Creed feels pretty normal. But her life is turned upside-down on her seventeenth birthday when a bracelet appears on her wrist and sucks her back through time.

Turns out she’s not even a little bit normal. She’s a Shifter—a protector of humans and of history itself. And she’s not alone. The other Shifters believe Gabby is special, even more special than the mysterious Michael Pace. Oh, and the Shades—seriously creepy creatures who feed off of human despair—are determined to capture her.

It’s all a lot to absorb. So Gabby’s grateful to have Michael as her Trainer—or she would be if she could get her rebellious heart under control. Then again, if the rumors about her blood are true, saving yesterday will be the least of her worries.

________________

Jessica Keller holds degrees in both Communications and Biblical Studies. She is multi-published in both Young Adult Fiction and Romance and has 100+ magazine and newspaper articles to her name. Her latest release is a Young Adult Fantasy - Saving Yesterday. You can find her at www.JessicaKellerBooks.com, on Twitter @AuthorKeller, on Tumblr, or on her Facebook Author Page. Jessica is also a contributor to writing focused blog: The Write Conversation. She lives in the Chicagoland suburbs with her amazing husband, beautiful daughter, and two annoyingly outgoing cats that happen to be named after superheroes.

Writer Acrobatics with Guest Jessica Keller

I hope you don’t mind the huge vat of coffee sitting beside me as we talk. I’m trying to stay up and alert enough to—in true Seekerville fashion—have fun banter in my comments but I’ll need copious amounts of caffeine for that because my five-week old baby kept me up most of the night. To take a page out of dear Ruthy’s playbook, here’s a picture of my cute daughter.

 

One thing having a child has quickly taught me is that I have to be flexible. Nothing happens on my timetable anymore. And know what? I’m okay with that (she’s lucky she’s cute).

Now, if only I could swallow that same lesson as easily when it comes to my writing career. 

The truth is you have to be nothing short of a contortionist to make it in this industry. Some of us really need to dig down and do some writer stretches and work on our ability to bend.

The fact is, if you want to be a published author you have to be flexible with your work, teachable in your spirit, and always willing to change aspects of your story.

How do we work on our flexibility?

1)    Seek tough feedback

"Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things." -Winston Churchill

Two years ago, I walked into my first writer’s conference. I sat down for my first ever agent appointment. She asked to see my first chapter and she maybe read the first three sentences before looking back at me and saying, “You have good ideas, but if this is your best writing, I don’t see publishing in your future.”

I had two options. I could allow that agent’s feedback to kill my dream, or I could use that feedback as a challenge. I chose the latter. I stuck the old manuscript in a drawer, and pulled out four recently published CBA books. I gave myself one month to read them all, mapping out their plots as I went. I took what I’d learned and wrote a whole new story.

Learning from criticism paid off. I won first in every contest I entered with my new manuscript and I had offers of representation from all three agents I sent proposals to. All in less than four months since the day an agent told me she didn’t see a future for me.

The best news? That manuscript that I wrote…It’s my debut novel, Home for Good.

2)    Be willing to have your story chopped

When I wrote Home for Good I hadn’t crafted it as a paperback romance. The manuscript was 78,000 words long and everyone knows that Love Inspired stories are much shorter than that. With the help of my super-woman editor Melissa Endlich, I had to hack away 23,000 words.
Words that I have carefully crafted, metaphors I’d felt like a genius for creating, and characters that I loved all had to fall on the chopping floor.

That experience showed me that I can’t be married to any one scene or chapter or character. Ever. 

3)    Be willing to change your story

The amazing Mary Connealy just had wonderful post about this about two weeks ago where she talked about moving her stories to different states and turning a manuscript about a big city romance into a small town one. But I can’t repeat enough how we have to be able to morph our story to fit what an editor might want. 

My debut was a romance, but I also write young adult. I have a young adult series that I’ve written and loved that was originally written in third person. I met with an editor and they said that they wanted first person stories – could I change my manuscript to be first person? You bet.
And know what? I think it’s ten times stronger now that it’s written in first person.

Another writer friend loves to write stories set during Regency, but the editors came back saying Regencies aren’t selling as well as they hoped but people are looking for Edwardian set books now thanks to Downton Abbey – would she be willing to rewrite the book set during the Edwardian period? Sure thing.  

4)    Stretch yourself

Lastly, we can become more flexibly by widening our own horizons. Take that class at the Y or that dance lesson through your park district. Stick to that goal of running a half marathon by the end of the year. I’m amazed how much new experiences stretch me and make me remember that being moldable can be a good experience.

All right, coffee’s on and I brought my Death by Chocolate Cake for everyone to share. Double helpings for anyone willing to help with diaper changes and feedings today!

 

I also have a prize basket for one of the people who comment today. I’m calling in my Mega Montana Prize Pack! Home for Good takes place in the Bitterroot Valley, Montana, so in the pack there is huckleberry jam, a white chocolate huckleberry candy bar, a stuffed mountain lion, a card with the Bitterroot flower on it, and a signed copy of my book.

 



As a child Jessica possessed the dangerous combination of too much energy coupled with an over-active imagination. This pairing led to more than seven broken bones and countless scars. 
She’s worked as a zookeeper, a librarian, camp counselor, horse wrangler, housekeeper, and finance clerk, but now loves her full-time work in law enforcement. Jessica lives in the Chicagoland suburbs with her amazing husband, beautiful daughter, and two annoyingly outgoing cats.

Blog: www.jesskeller.wordpress.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/jessicakellerauthor
Twitter: @KellerAuthor

 

Home For Good
"I made a promise to protect you."

But pregnant Ali Silver's husband broke his vow and walked away from her. After being injured in combat, Jericho has finally come home to Bitterroot Valley to make peace with his father and regain Ali's trust. But the single mom's keeping secrets of her own. And someone's killing off Ali's cattle and sabotaging her horse therapy business. Jericho will do whatever it takes to protect his wife and be a real father to his son. Because when it comes to love and second chances, he's one determined cowboy.