Goals, Conflict,Tension, and Stakes

With goals your characters have nothing to do. Without conflict and tension, there's nothing to get in the way or cause a reader to worry. Without stakes, there's no reason to care. Here are some articles that cover how goals, conflict and tension, and stakes create strong plots.

A sampling of articles on goals

• Goal - Conflict - Stakes. Why You Need All Three
• Three Questions to Get to the Heart of Your Story
• Two Questions to Ask for Stronger Character Goals and Motivations
• The Source of Our Story
• Oh, Woe Is Me: Giving Your Characters a Goal
• Goals: Does Every Character Need the Same One?
• Goals! Are You Making Them Too Obvious?
• Running on Autopilot: Working With Unconscious Goals

See all articles on goals

A sampling of articles on conflict

• What's the Problem? The Four Classic Conflict Types
• Forcing the Issue: Adding Conflict to Your Scenes
• How to Escalate Conflict in Your Novel
• Stop That Fighting! Conflicts Aren’t all About the Punches
• Shh! It's a Secret: Raising the Tension and Conflict in a Scene
• The Inner Struggle: Guides for Using Inner Conflict That Make Sense
• Building Your Core: Internal and External Core Conflicts

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A sampling of articles on tension

• Setting up the Tension in Your Novel
• What Downton Abbey Can Teach us About Tension
• Whoa, That’s Tense. Raising the Tension in Your Scenes
• Three Ways to Add Tension During Revisions

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A sampling of articles on stakes

• Seven Ways to Raise the Stakes in Your Novel
• Up, Up, and Away! Raising the Stakes
• What's at Stake? How Do You Make Readers Care About Your Story?
• So What? Making Readers Care
• Up the Stakes by Narrowing the Focus
• Decisions, Decisions: Character Choices That Matter
• Raising the Stakes: Revising to Keep Readers Reading
• Revising to Raise the Stakes

See all articles on stakes