Zealous – Tuesday Use It In A Sentence #tuesdayuseitinasentence

She hadn’t been in a festive mood and hadn’t done any decorating all season, causing her neighbors to start calling her Scrooge. But when her soldier husband called the day before Christmas Eve and said he would be able to come home for Christmas after all, she was zealous in her efforts to get all the decorating done.

This day-late post is part of the Tuesday Use It In A Sentence prompt, “zealous”:

https://stephaniecolpron.wordpress.com/2021/11/24/tuesdayuseitinasentence-zealous/

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Messy Middles and Mystery Boxes

Story Empire

Ciao, SEers! Back in 2018, I gave a brief overview of story middles, touching on scenes and sequels and covering the falling and rising actions before the end of the novel. Today, we’re going to get a little more in depth and talk about what makes those middles so messy and what makes those boxes so mysterious.

The middle of your novel is where fifty percent of the activity takes place. It’s bound to get messy in there, especially if you don’t have a plan or if you deviate from it. Here are some things you need to make sure you take care of that will make your character’s life messy but, if you’re careful, will keep your novel tight and tidy:

• Stakes: external (physical), internal (emotional), and philosophical (beliefs and conflicts of values).
  Each of these need to continue to escalate.
• Make characters (especially the protagonists) suffer.
  This…

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