Messy Middles and Mystery Boxes

November 24, 2021 by jowensauthor 2 Comments

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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