How Your Character’s Internal Conflict Can Help You Plot

Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

If you've been struggling with a plot, or you're looking for ways to deepen an existing plot, try looking at how your protagonist's internal conflict is driving her external actions.

A lot of focus gets put on the core conflict of a novel—the main problem the protagonist has to solve to win—and for good reason. It's the whole point of the book. But sometimes, when we look too hard at the external problems, we miss out on opportunities to let the internal problems muck things up. This is especially true in a character-driven novel, since that inner journey is what's driving the entire book.

While you can’t plot with a character arc, you can use it to create your plot, because what a character has been through and fears, if what determines how they face their problems and make decisions.

At the heart of every good internal conflict is a fear created by trauma.

Grow Up Already: Creating Character Arcs

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

A strong character arc will weave its way through the turning points of the plot.

A character arc is the internal struggle and progress a character goes through over the course of a novel that changes them in some way. It's usually connected to the internal conflict so that what they do (the plot) forces changes in who they are (the character arc). It can sometimes be confused with character motivations (a character worries over something so they act to prevent that something) but why a character acts is different from how they change because of their actions. Motivation drives the actions. Growth is the result of the actions.

But should the writer know where the character is heading/motives before the first draft? Is it bad if you don’t?" Heck no.

The 5 Turning Points of a Character Arc

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy 

The character arc is a strong tool for adding an emotional layer to a story.

For most novels, the character arc is a critical part of the tale. It’s the emotional layer that makes readers care about all the cool plots and exciting scenes we put before them. Readers enjoy seeing how a character grows, and how they handle the emotional trials of the story.

Just like a plot, the character arc has several turning points that fall at specific structural moments throughout the novel. There’s wiggle room as to where, but they generally fall along the same path as the plot, since the plot is what triggers or impacts these moments.

Making Sense Out of Character Wants and Needs

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Plot and character arc. External and internal conflict. Intellectual and emotional. There are indeed two sides to every story.

Confusion between a character’s want and need has sent many a writer down the wrong plot path, and I’ve run into quite a few who found themselves puzzled over how to use wants and needs in their novels. Are they the same thing? Is one the plot and the other the subplot? No, and no.

A strong want/need pairing shows an emotional hole in the protagonist’s life, and how resolving the plot allows them to fill that hole.

The protagonist doesn’t always know what they need, but they usually know what they want. That conscious goal (the want) drives the plot. It’s the unconscious goal (the need) that gets realized over the course of the story as the protagonist resolves and experiences that plot. The protagonist “goes through some stuff” and is changed by it. It helps to think of wants as the plot and needs as the character arc.

Want to Write Unforgettable Characters? Do this One Thing.

By Angela Ackerman, @AngelaAckerman

Part of The How They Do It Series 

JH: Quick—who are your favorite characters? Do you know why you love them so much? Angela Ackerman does, and she shares how you can write characters your readers will never forget.

Angela Ackerman is a writing coach, international speaker, and co-author of the bestselling book, The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression and its many sequels. Available in ten languages, her guides are sourced by universities, recommended by agents and editors, and are used by novelists, screenwriters, and psychologists around the world. 

Angela is also the co-founder of the popular site Writers Helping Writers, as well as One Stop for Writers, a portal to game-changing tools and resources that enable writers to craft powerful fiction.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

Take it away Angela...

The Inner Struggle: Guides for Using Internal Conflict That Make Sense

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Here’s an easy way to develop character arcs in your novel.

Years ago, I sat in on an amazing workshop at an RWA conference. Michael Hague's Using Inner Conflict to Create Powerful Love Stories was one of those workshops that discussed a topic I already knew, but he presented it in such a way that I saw a super easy way to apply inner journeys to my stories (something this plot-focused gal can always use).

While the workshop was about romance specifically, the pieces of Hague’s inner conflict template work for any character journey. He calls the overall arc the “journey from living in fear to living courageously.”

What "So Undercover" and "Miss Congeniality" Can Teach Us About Character Arcs

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

What happens when a great plot meets a character readers don’t care about?

I’m a huge fan of stories in all formats, from books, to movies, to TV shows and even games. But movies are particularly useful when talking about fiction. They condense a story into 90 minutes (more or less), and are more accessible than a novel that will take hours to read.

One great example is how a pair of similar movies showed how important a strong character arc is to a character-driven story.

The movies—So Undercover and Miss Congeniality.

So Undercover is basically Miss Congeniality with sorority girls, and the concept is so similar the weaknesses of one (and why) stood out like a palm tree at the North Pole.

So Undercover is about...

Compelling Character Arcs in 4 Easy Steps

By Laurence MacNaughton, @LMacNaughton

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: Character change can be a vital part of a novel, even if it's a gung-ho plot-driven story. Laurence MacNaughton shares how to craft a compelling character arc in four easy steps. 

I'll let you in on a secret: readers want your character to change.

They know, deep down, that your character is unhappy with the status quo at the beginning of your book. Something is terribly wrong in your character's life, and things can't keep going on this way. Something's got to give. Readers fervently hope that your character will rise to the challenge and become a better, happier person.

In other words, what your readers want is a character arc. But how do you create one? Believe it or not, there is an easy way. Here's how to create an arc in any story.

Just Another Day: Writing the "Slice of Life" Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Some stories are more challenging to write, and crafting a slice of life tale is one of them. Here's an updated look at what makes or breaks a day in the life of a character novel.

I have an uncanny ability to read a lot of the same types of books over a short period of time with no intention of doing that. Maybe I'm just in the mood for that type of story then and pick up books that are similar.

Because of that, I often get interesting perspectives on what makes stories of a certain type work and why they didn't.

This happened a few years ago with several slice of life stories. The ones where the focus is more on a character's journey through a period of time, and not so much about that one big bad problem that needs to be resolved.

Slice if life stories can be a lot harder to pull off than your typical plot-driven novel, because character growth isn't all that exciting in and of itself. It's the results of that growth, and the struggle to achieve that growth within a particular situation that's intriguing.

Five Stops on Your MC’s Inner Journey

By Dorian Cirrone, @DorianCirrone

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: A strong character journey can be a powerful element of a story. Please help me welcome Dorian Cirrone as she visits the lecture hall today to share her technique for creating memorable character arcs in her novel.

Dorian is an award-winning writer of books for kids and teens. Her most recent book, The First Last Day (Aladdin/Simon and Schuster) has been translated into five languages and was featured on Bank Street College’s Best Books List and New Mexico’s Battle of the Books list.

Website | Goodreads | Facebook | Twitter |

Take it away Dorian...

Do Your Characters Have the Right Flaws?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

“Characters must have flaws” is one of the cornerstones of fiction. Flaws create more interesting people, they give you the foundations for your character arcs, and they help you write more relatable stories. But just having flaws isn’t enough. You want the right flaws that will best serve your story.

So what are the “right” flaws?

Flaws that help illustrate aspects of the story you want to explore.

3 Reasons You Don't Need a Character Arc

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Not every protagonist needs to learn a lesson or grow as a person. 

Character arcs are a wonderful part of many stories, but not all novels need them. That might surprise you since so much of the writing advice out there (even on this site) extols the virtues of a strong character arc. It’s good advice if your story contains and will benefit from a character arc. If not, it’s advice that won’t help you and might even hurt your story.

Let’s look at three reasons you might skip that arc in your novel:

What "Malcolm in the Middle" Can Teach Us About Characters

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

One of the things I like about Netflix is the ability to watch shows I missed when they were on the air. One such show is Malcolm in the Middle, and my husband and I recently finished watching the entire series. It’s a decade old at this point, so for those who aren’t familiar with it, Malcolm in the Middle is a quirky sitcom that ran from 2000-2006, telling the over-the-top tales of “A gifted young teen who tries to survive life with his dimwitted, dysfunctional family.” (Their description, not mine). Malcolm is the middle child (more of less) in a family of four boys, a genius who would much rather be normal and fit in with his peers.

6 Ways Netflix Can Make You a Better Writer

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

It might seem odd to watch TV to improve your writing, but Netflix* is a fantastic tool for writers. Not only does it give us a way to escape when we need a break, but it allows us to see complex stories unfold in a way that easy to study them. Binge watching packs a lot of storytelling examples into a weekend.

Even better, since much of the original programing has only ten to twelve episodes a season, they’re written more like a novel than a TV show. Netflix expects viewers to binge, so a series often plays out as one long movie, not a series of loosely connected episodes. And for most people, it’s less time consuming to watch ten episodes than to read ten novels—and much easier to return to a scene you want to study further, or pause the show to take notes.

The Easiest Way to Create Conflict

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Writer Unboxed had a great article over the weekend about a fun tool to develop stories. John Vorhaus showed us how asking a few simple questions gets to the heart of your idea, and I wanted to expand on one aspect of that regarding conflict.

Great story conflict is when what we want doesn’t get us what we need. Michael Hague gives fantastic workshops on this same concept, and I’ve talked about it here before with how the character arc illustrates the story’s theme while the plot arc illustrates the story’s goal. External versus internal, each pulling the protagonist a different direction.

The Wheels of (Character) Change

By Bonnie Randall 

Part of the How They Do It Series (Monthly Contributor)

This week Janice and I are tag-teaming on a theme: change, and how difficult it is to do things differently.

The most compelling characters are the ones who are flawed, and flaws are often borne out of deeply-cast deficits—weaknesses that could be different if only the character were willing to make different choices. As an addictions counselor, I have intimate knowledge of the process of change and the six distinct stages a person visits when they embark on (and succeed at) doing things differently (because sometimes they get stuck—and your most interesting characters will too).

What “The Profit” Can Teach Us About Characters and Change

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Character growth can be tough to write, because people don’t change unless they want to, and have to. It’s always an outside trigger that causes it, because people do what people want to do. Unless there’s something wrong, there’s no reason to change.

Creating realistic and believable character growth in our stories requires those outside triggers to force our characters to change. Too little pressure and the change feels contrived, too much and readers start wondering if our protagonists will ever learn.

Crazy as it sounds, the TV show The Profit is a fantastic way to study how and why people change, and can be a valuable resource for writers.

Second Fiddle, Sweeter Music—Using Secondary Characters To Give Your Novel A Bigger Feel

By Bonnie Randall 

Special Guest Author 

Two things I love as a writer and a reader: deep, emotionally wrought stories, and authentic, rich characters. I am a firm believer that a novel is only as deep as the characters who populate it and, having spent a lifetime reading, a fair chunk of it writing, and devoting a lot of time studying reflections of those who craft great prose, the following are my thoughts on employing secondary characters to give your book greater, richer depth.

How to Find Your Character’s Breaking Point

By K.M. Weiland, @KMWeiland  

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: There are few things in writing more enjoyable than the moment you strip everything away from your protagonist and leave them open and vulnerable to the world (okay, maybe that's just me, but trust me, it's great fun). K.M. Weiland joins us in the lecture hall today to share some tips on how to get our characters to--and past--their breaking point. And why this is so important to our stories.

K.M. Weiland lives in make-believe worlds, talks to imaginary friends, and survives primarily on chocolate truffles and espresso. She is the IPPY and NIEA Award-winning and internationally published author of the Amazon bestsellers Outlining Your Novel and Structuring Your Novel. She writes historical and speculative fiction from her home in western Nebraska and mentors authors on her award-winning website Helping Writers Become Authors.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | Pinterest | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indie Bound

Take it away K.M...

5 Steps to Better Character Arcs

by Marsmet via Flickr/CC

By Jordan McCollum, @JordanMcCollum

JH: Please join me in welcoming Jordan McCollum to the blog today to chat with us about crafting better character arcs. Characters who grow and change are usually the ones readers remember, and she'll share a few tips on how to get the most out of your arcs.

An award-winning author, Jordan can't resist a story where good defeats evil and true love conquers all. In her day job, she coerces people to do things they don’t want to, elicits information and generally manipulates the people she loves most—she's a mom. Jordan holds a degree in American Studies and Linguistics from Brigham Young University. When she catches a spare minute, her hobbies include reading, knitting and music. She lives with her husband and four children in Utah. She offers free writing guides, including a guide to character arcs, and blogs about writing craft and the creative life at JordanMcCollum.com.

Take it away, Jordan...