In real life, people should strive to solve their problems through compromise, level-headed talks, and mature actions.
But in fiction, the complete opposite is true! No one wants to read about a happy family solving their minor issues happily. We want to read about terrible things happening to downtrodden people. We want CONFLICT.
Aren’t humans weird?
During the last stream, we went over the three different kinds of conflict: initial conflict, rising conflict, and main conflict.
For short stories, you can get away with just having one. But in a novel, you usually need at least those three. We mapped out Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone within those conflicts, and came up with a bunch of other stories too.
Here’s what we came up with:
You can watch it here or scroll down to read.
Initial Conflict (grabs the reader)
Formula: NAME is a CHARACTER who wants to DO SOMETHING, but OBSTACLE, until RELIEF.
1) Harry Potter is a boy who wants to go to wizard school, but his aunt and uncle stop him, until finally someone comes from the school to forcibly get him.
2) Zoe is an elephant who wants to break out of the zoo, but none of the other animals to, until one day when a sly monkey named Fran arrives and helps her.
3) Rodrigo is a man who wants to keep a family of fish people residing in his house a secret, but his skeptical friend Pablo wants to get in the house to visit, causing Rodrigo to bar entry until the two promise to keep the family secret.
4) Martha is a spinster who wants to find companionship but has grown too old until she meets Frank at a retirement community and realizes they share a common love – backgammon.
5) A cat named Félicette wants to do more with its life, but as a stray on the streets of Paris during the Cold War, options are few until a pet shop takes the cat in and a French official from the French space agency is looking for some cats.
6) A greatly enthusiastic man named Tim wants to see his country succeed, but outside his residence, the falling of bombs keeps him from achieving his goals until a “prophet” named Bob comes forward and establishes peace.
Rising conflict (keeps the reader interested)
Formula: When DOES THAT, he/she wants to DO SOMETHING MORE, but OBSTACLE, until RELIEF.
1) When Harry goes to wizard school, he wants to make friends, but he makes enemies with Draco and Snape, until he meets Ron and Hermione.
2) When Zoe and Fran break out of the zoo they want to live like humans, but everywhere they go they’re chased by police, until they learn how to speak English.
3) When Rodrigo and Pablo spend time with the fish people, they want to help them return to their natural home, but there are shark people in the village who want to eat them, until they finally leave in the middle of the night.
4) When Martha and Frank become lovers, they want to be happy together, but Frank tells her his secret that he has a terminal illness and won’t live for long, until Martha says she doesn’t care and they grow even closer.
5) When Félicette is adopted by the space agency, she wants to train for a chance to go to space, but another cat named Felix continues getting in her way, until the day of the final test where she beats him in the contest to determine who will go to space.
6) When Tim meets Bob, he wants to help him keep the peace in his country, but the “prophet” just wants to convert Tim to his religion, until Tim finds out his motives to take over the country himself and rule with a new iron fist.
Main conflict (what the reader would probably say the story is about)
Formula: When DOES THAT, he/she wants to DO SOMETHING MORE, but OBSTACLE, until RELIEF.
1) When Harry makes friends they find out about the Sorcerer’s Stone, and they want to stop Voldemort from getting it, but no one believes them, until they confront him for themselves.
2) When they learn to speak English and live like humans, they want to have jobs and live in houses, but they are miserable when they do so, until they decide to go back to the zoo… with some changes.
3) When they all run away together to the fish people’s swamp home, they want to evade the other predators along the way, but they end up losing some members of the fish family, until they finally arrive at their home.
4) When Frank trusts Martha, he wants her to help him reconcile with his son, but he hasn’t seen him in years and doesn’t know where he lives, until Martha tracks him down.
5) When Félicette finally goes to space, she wants to do a good job and accomplish all her experiments, but aliens get in the way, until she makes contact with them and makes history.
6) When Tim finds out about Bob’s real goals, he wants to inform the country and stop him, but everyone is worshiping him as a new god, until Tim decides to start his own rival religion.
Any one of these stories sounds like it could make for a great book, and the reason for that is because of the conflict. Conflict is what drives the story forward and it’s what sustains reader interest. Without it, no one will care about your story because there’s no tension in what will happen.
You can see that each conflict raises the stakes and brings it to a higher level, but each of them has the holy trifecta of: a desire, an obstacle, and a relief.
All three are important, but the relief but be the most significant (and usually most forgotten). Without it, your story is just skidding in the mud going nowhere. You need something good (or bad) to happen to your characters to bring them to the next part of your story.
If you can map out your own story using the three conflicts above, then you might be on your way to writing an engaging book!
After that exercise chat voted we write this prompt by cheeseguy3412: You’ve always been more comfortable sleeping under the bed, or in the closet. Today, you discovered why: You’re a monster. Fortunately, this comes in handy now and then.
If you want to join us and help write a story by trolling in chat, or share your own writing for feedback, then we’d love to have you. We stream on Twitch every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday at 7:30pm-10:30pm (U.S. Eastern Standard Time).
And you missed the stream, you can still watch Rubbish to Published, the writing exercises, or the writing prompts on YouTube, or watch the full stream reruns.
Hope to see you next time, friend!
Scott Wilson is the author of the novel Metl: The ANGEL Weapon,
forthcoming November 2018.
Featured image: Pakutaso