Of Sword Fights, The Himalayas, And so on… And so on…

Have you ever watched a scene from a movie where two sword fighters are going at it?

And then they begin to move up the stairs, one sword fighter, moving in reverse up the incline of the steps, danger closing in, his back against the wall of conflict?

Remember how you felt? Your chest growing tighter, you engaged with what was happening rooting for one or the other swordsmen.

It goes the same with writing fiction.

A great way to check whether your novel is moving in this upward direction, your words painting a picture that grips the reader’s attention, not unlike a roller coaster mounting, ever so slowly the various hills and valleys leading to the peak of the ride, is to ask yourself some questions.

What problem does my protagonist face?

What does she or need, or how will they solve their dilemma?

Once you have finalized a solution and they are on the road to achieving their goal other questions remain that you must answer.

What obstacles stand between my central character and she or he achieving her or his goal?

No obstacles? Then you must create some.

A narrative without any obstacles has no plot. And without a plot you essentially lack a story.

Your narrative becomes episodic. Each scene appears to travel in circles.

To be sure there are notable writers who have achieved success at this.

One author who does this well is Jeanette Winterson. Her novel The Passion demonstrates a great example of episodic writing that also engages the reader. But this is truly a unique style of crafting fiction.

Yet most engaging and entertaining books travel a causal path. They contain conflict, a consistent rise and fall of action.

Once you have identified and labeled the obstacles–and these need to be both physical and human–you then want to order them in increasing difficulty.

This leads to the cause-and-effect movement towards and arc. A series of equally difficult obstacles becomes boring.

Those that are linked, i.e. result from domino effect of this happened because this happened, or rather, the protagonist when on the way to the forum located in the Himalyas where he would fight for the key to unlock his family back in the prison, encountered a thorn that stuck in his foot.

After removing the thorn, and with his foot still sore, he continued on, determined.

A day later while climbing the mountain leading to the forum he found his way blocked by a bolder.

A sherpa familiar with the area and who held a map leading to the forum agreed to help move the boulder, but required pay.

Your heroine or hero reach in their pocket to find they had coins, but not in the currency required by the sherpa.

And so on. And so on…

This is how it goes.

And with each encounter or setback we, the readers, wonder will she or he, the protagonist make it?

We hope they will, feel sure they must, but how?

And it is in crafting the how that we, the writer, must interweave this back and forth motion of cause and effect, action and reaction, the uphill climb.