Whatever the stakes we’re trying to create, if the reader isn’t feeling it, we’re not doing our job as novelists. We’re going to examine big stakes and big tension by considering those scenes that make the spine tingle! It can be a real challenge to convey big feelings across the page and really communicate them viscerally to a reader. Especially when we’re going for fearful, intense, creepy, or dark scenes when we all know it’s going to work out just fine for our hero–she is the HERO, after all! A master storyteller will have readers feeling it just the same. Register for this creative writing workshop to take your protagonist’s stakes to new levels.
How should you introduce your characters? We each bring an example showing how to use action or narrative exposition to introduce your character to your reader. Remember just like everything in writing your description should do more than just describe your character.
How do we address character motivation? Do we struggle with it? When do we work it into our stories? How can you get to know your character better in order to develop that motivation? What are the three layers of motivation? And how do you plan for your characters motivation over a series? What happens when your character has competing motivations?
What is narrative drive? And why is it so important to your story? How can you craft drive with characters choices, cause, and effect? What happens when your character comes alive? How does it affect your plot, their agency, and the surprising inevitability of your story? And finally what are some ways you can develop these narrative drive skills?
Want to know what it takes to write a good opening? How do you hook your reader and get them invested in your story? How do you create character empathy and what are the action steps that you need to take in order to write a great opening?
