Conflict/tension - How do you build it?

[Never]

One of the problems I consistently see in my stories is a lack of tension, my characters are always a little to comfortable and life is treating them a little too well. Even when I introduce a character's goal on the first page and their obstacle on the second, I end up with this feeling of lugubriousness instead of actual tension. Other than introducing pure melodrama, (i.e.: the first paragraph is the protagonist hanging off the edge of a cliff while savages pelt them with rocks from above) does anyone have any suggestions on how to increase my pressure and tension early on?

 

[Guest]

It's been really great years at Lit.

Have a nice one.

 

[Weird Harold]

One of the problems I consistently see in my stories is a lack of tension, my characters are always a little to comfortable and life is treating them a little too well. Even when I introduce a character's goal on the first page and their obstacle on the second, I end up with this feeling of lugubriousness instead of actual tension. Other than introducing pure melodrama, (i.e.: the first paragraph is the protagonist hanging off the edge of a cliff while savages pelt them with rocks from above) does anyone have any suggestions on how to increase my pressure and tension early on?

A difficult question, it's probably the greatest failing of amateur authors -- they like their characters too much and don't feel comfortable thwarting their desires.

Outlining all of a characters goals and obstacles in one place is probably the wrong approach because it just gets the problem out of the way -- just "fill the square" for conflict in your story -- without really showing the conflict.

Introducing some internal dialogue to show the disparity between a character's internal doubts and surface confidence works in some cases. In others, you'll need to introduce some random interuptions to frustrate your characters when all is is going to plan.

In one unfinished story, I destroyed an entire city with an earthquake to frustrate the main characters' carefully laid plans to lose their virginity. I carried the random interruptions theme too far with that story, which is why it will forever remain unfinished and unpublished, but I did come up with a lot of ideas for how Murphy's Law can affect a relationship.

Even the best of couple sometimes "get their wires crossed" and misunderstand each other, and that is another source of tension and conflict for an author.

In the end, you just have to let yourself be mean or michievous towards your characters to build the tension in a story and stop protecting them from frustrations.

 

[Songcatcher]

So, how does this thread treat Scathead Thomass character?

 

[scheherazade_79]

Don't be afraid to let your character make mistakes. I know that sometimes it's tempting to create a character who's so wise, so strong, and so intuitive that they're almost God-like. Let them screw up once in a while - it builds up the tension nicely, and makes them ten times more appealing to the reader when they get themselves out of the impossible mess they've created.

 

[mrmgp]

One of the problems I consistently see in my stories is a lack of tension, my characters are always a little to comfortable and life is treating them a little too well. Even when I introduce a character's goal on the first page and their obstacle on the second, I end up with this feeling of lugubriousness instead of actual tension. Other than introducing pure melodrama, (i.e.: the first paragraph is the protagonist hanging off the edge of a cliff while savages pelt them with rocks from above) does anyone have any suggestions on how to increase my pressure and tension early on?

To keep myself somewhat honest, I don't write about the lucky ones who can get laid with little or no effort. My characters are the ones who have been unlucky in love. Burned repeatedly. Their self-esteem has taken blows. They aren't the ones that instantly make women's pussies get wet and guys cocks to bulge. Love doesn't come easy for them, and they don't automatically incite physical and sexual attraction in others, so the characters actually have to work at building a connection with someone. Shyness is prevalent. They aren't the "beautiful" people with the perfect bodies so commonly seen in porn--these people don't just develop automatic physical attractions that allows lazy authors to have them screwing each other within two paragraphs of them meeting.

Don't be afraid to take several pages having the characters actually getting to know each other, and having an attraction build from the common ground they share rather than lusting after each other simply for physical reasons. Most people don't just hop into bed with someone simply because of a physical attraction. They need an intellectual and emotional attraction. Slowly allow that intellectual attraction to build into an emotional attraction. Slowly allow that emotional attraction to build into a physical attraction. Slowly allow that physical attraction to build into a sexual attraction. Slowly allow that sexual attraction to build into the first tentative displays of affection that slowly gives way to the characters finally deciding to take their attraction to the bedroom.

 

[logophile]

My characters have a lot of internal stuff get through, all the time. They think too much, and they do it right out there for the reader to see. Most of my short stroke stories even have an element of this, as they are encountering something they really want, but are hesitant to allow it to happen. Some really stuggle with it while others let it go more easily, but often they don't want to seem like "that kind of girl."

I do a decent job at this because I live that same struggle almost everyday! Do you have an internal conflict that comes up for you regularly? Try giving that characteristic to one of your characters and see if it helps.

 

[Never]

On refection, it might have been a good idea to include that I don't write porn.

That said, thank you for the suggestions.

 

[gauchecritic]

Who said tension has to arise from conflict? Tension can come from lots of other places too. Anticipation, balance (which by definition is dynamic and therefore tense), loss and probably loads more that I can't be arsed to put down.

You can create tension (of a kind) in the pace of your story or in the parts that you don't write but which affect your character.

You can have unseen tension which affects how your character might behave.

I'd say though, that before you can instroduce tension your readers would like something or someone to attribute it to. Go for intro first let tension arise.

 

[Weird Harold]

On refection, it might have been a good idea to include that I don't write porn.

Despite the example I used of an act of God used to frustrate plans to get laid, I wasn't consciously talking about sexual tension. Earthquakes work equally well for stopping Joe Milquetoast from mailing his cable bill as they do as coitus interuptus.

But my main point was that an author can't protect the characters and build tension. A long series of small set-backs or obstacles build tension as well as character better than a single large conflict.

 

[elsol]

*burp*

a) Character flaws for the protagonist

b) The antagonist

c) Well developed personalities for the supporting characters


C is probably the most important... personalities clash even when they're on the same side.

What the protagonist wants is not necessarily what the supporting character wants... think of it in a romance novel.

She (being somewhat sexist here) wants marriage, a strong relationship, yadda, yadda, yadda, and HIM.

HIM wants her... marriage? Haven't given a thought! Strong relationship? Him likes her, her likes Him, isn't that a strong relationship of mutual likes?

The supporting characters DON'T have to agree with the protagonists and can have agendas of their own.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[BlackShanglan]

Have a well-thought-out character arc for each lead character. Know what that character's goals and desires are, and know to what degree you intend to fulfill them. Then give careful attention to where they may conflict, either with the other lead or with the world as a whole. Also consider what themes you're trying to enunciate in the work. Ask yourself how your characters can develop to work the theme and how central conflicts can be created that both stress the characters in interesting ways and contribute some significant symbolic development to the themes. A key thing in all of this is having characters who need to grow or change in some way, or who need to recognize and reveal key parts of themselves. Once you know how the character needs to develop, you've got a much more clear idea of how conflict can create that development.


You can also think about the classic question: "What's the worst thing that could happen in this scenario?" Sometimes that's the best thing to throw at the characters. Personally, however, I think it's best to read that in light of who the characters are and to read "worst" as "worst in terms of utterly frustrating their key goals or most important ideals." The worst thing that could happen is probably for the planet to explode, but you're looking for an answer more like "his wife finds out about his affair with the secretary half an hour after he decides to rededicate his life to her and never see the secretary again."

I will put in a last word for creating character situations that have inherent conflict. Yes, I'm addicted to that, but there is a reason. If you make the conflict between the leads something that is inherently part of who they are, then you've got a great deal to work with whether your leads are a couple destined for romance, soldiers shoulder-to-shoulder in a trench, or a superhero and his nemesis. By making them people with key, gut-level differences - a rebel and a traditionalist, a fighter and peacemaker, a hero and a politician, a hard-core skeptic and a person of deep faith - you not only generate conflict, but also help draw the work into a broader discourse where you're talking not only about specific characters, but about how those elements of society and of each person must somehow come into balance with each other. That's always the most interesting sort of conflict - the conflict rooted not just in what is physically happening in the story, but in what happens in all people throughout life and history. When it's great, it's about a war being fought within each person, the great divisions within human character that trouble all people.

Or, alternatively, make a man fall in love with his horse. That works too.

Shanglan

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Almost all the tension in my stuff is within the characters themselves. What happens to them in a story is just an extrnalization of that internal tension.

I don't know anyone in real life who's absolutely at peace with themselves, and if I did, I couldn't write about them. We're all dissatisfied with something in our makeup, and ultimately whatever challenges or adventures we have externally are expressions of the battles we fight within to try and heal ourselves. That holds true in a fuck story as much as in serious literature, in my opinion.

A character who isn't internally conflicted is just not interesting to me, no matter what kind of stuff happens to them.

 

[wishfulthinking]

I honestly don't know, and it is never something that occurs to me (BTW character development is one of my weakest points )

But 1 thing I have learnt is to watch the mood I'm in when writing depending on the effect that I want. Eg, happy - everyone gets sex and plenty of it. Grumpy little shit - no one's getting any! If you're not writing porn (or erotica ) I might liken it to a Barbie commercial versus car insurance.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

One of the problems I consistently see in my stories is a lack of tension, my characters are always a little to comfortable and life is treating them a little too well. Even when I introduce a character's goal on the first page and their obstacle on the second, I end up with this feeling of lugubriousness instead of actual tension. Other than introducing pure melodrama, (i.e.: the first paragraph is the protagonist hanging off the edge of a cliff while savages pelt them with rocks from above) does anyone have any suggestions on how to increase my pressure and tension early on?

I write a lot of fant/sci-fi on my own, so the simple answer is to put 'em through Hell. I've done that many a'time. Have sex as a reward for surviving as much shit as they had to deal with or as a memory of a better time or whatever. It doesn't have to be melodramatic cliff-hanging, but a good serious of standard conflict can serve you well.

I mean, as you said, you feel that life is treating your character's too well, so have life not treat them well (simple reversal exercise you should try out in brainstorming story ideas). Have a big bout of stress, a jealous moment, a bank foreclosure, a distance problem, a serious of unfortunate events. You don't need to go to my extremes and have them raped in an alleyway, possessed by their own evil side, or sucked into Hell, but you can at least stop having things go your character's way until the climax.

Else there's what has been said. Have decent flushed out personalities and how they clash or glance off each other. That alone will generate some tension or at least excitement in even stroke. Even having two mutual playful personalities that sync well can provide an impetus if it is done well.

If that fails, do what I do and put them through so much hell it's practically comedic.

 

[Seattle Zack]

Try juxtaposing the narrative. Everything doesn't have to flow consecutively.

In a Lawrence Block book on writing, he described a story he had written where the main character had to dispose of a body wrapped in a carpet. In his conventional temporal narrative, he finally got to it in chapter three. His editor suggested using that third chapter as the first one of the novel ... after all, that's instant conflict and drama, right? Fill the rest in later.

Immerse your reader in an interesting conflict and he (or she) will forgive you almost anything later on, I've found. Try re-arranging your chapters.

 

[TheEarl]

I think conflict will come pre-packaged with your characters if you have them built correctly. Every character has flaws, idiosyncracities and foibles that will mean that things will not always go to plan. They will misread something, their timing will be just out, they will enter the room and pick up the bloodied dagger from beside the body just as the police chief walks in, etc, etc. Follow their flaws, not their strong points and you'll find yourself with a story that writes itself.

Having said that, throwing in a horrible event that's completely out of their control is fun too.

Don't be afraid to be mean. Nobody likes a character who gets their own way and solves everything first try. That's a Mary-Sue. Be a bastard to your creations; it's far more fun.

The Earl