You are here#9: Plot: Conflict and Scenes

#9: Plot: Conflict and Scenes

By KLCtheBookWorm - Posted on 07 March 2010

You've got your road map for your story? Now you're ready to start planning conflicts, and from conflicts build scenes. I think in scenes when plotting out my stories; brainstorming until the entire work plays like a movie in my head. It happens almost automatically now, so if I miss something or have made things more confusing trying to explain, please let me know.

Conflict is the smallest element of the plot. It is what gives you the action. Levin breaks down conflicts into: "A character wants something. But he can't have it, because of an obstacle. That character now has a conflict. If the obstacle he faces is in the environment or embodied in another character, the conflict is external. If the obstacle is within the character himself, the conflict is internal." (Get That Novel Written 52)

The beginning of your story must either set up the conflict or show it in full swing, depending on how much space you have to work with. A novel has more room to set things up. I'm working with a short story so the conflict has to start at go, otherwise you won't be able to get anything else. And the stakes have to keep getting higher the further the story progresses. What does that mean? It means that the importance of the want or desire becomes even greater for the character and the obstacles in the way keep getting more difficult. You can't make things easy for your characters; that makes boring stories. And don't be afraid to give a character what they want if getting it leads to a larger desire.

Looking at my story: what does Charley want? She has no memory of this life with Jack and Hannah, so she wants her memory of the last four years back. What is the obstacle to this desire? Her amnesia and Jack.

Oh yes, the villain of the piece. You must always remember the villain's agenda, even if nothing is shown from the villain's point of view. Jack's agenda will be to keep Charley from regaining her memory of their last four years together, because it doesn't exist. And he must keep her away from the Biker Mice who will jog her memory.

So we have some internal and external conflict going on here. The internal, Charley's amnesia serves another purpose. It keeps the reader sharing Charley's "Twilight Zone" atmosphere. External will provide the stimulus to keep the story moving.

So let’s look at the outline I did in the brainstorming tutorial of the opening scene.

Charley's dream

Flashback to "Mouse and His Motorcycle", the bros on the beach

Use Charley watching dream and not quite knowing what to make of it

Waking up

Jack is sharing her bed

He gets upset with the mention of the bros but moves quickly to cover it up and explains Charley's amnesia.

Yes, Charley's dream is a separate scene, a small scene. Big scenes are where the character is in conflict and taking action. Small scenes let you dramatize and show but without conflict. Narration is the brief summary needed to get from one scene to the next. In this case, I'm using the small dream scene to lead into the big scene, which is Charley waking up, and confront her this-feels-so-wrong life.

Charley starts off on a weird note full of questions. Why is she dreaming about seven-feet-tall mice in biker clothes? And why does the dream feel so real? Why is Jack in her bedroom? But is this her bedroom? She doesn't recognize anything. And Jack acts weird when she says something about the dream: tense, edgy, and angry. But he explains it all away with telling her she has amnesia. And that the doc said that the quickest way to get over it is to get back into her daily routine. Getting back to the normal routine is the key to meeting my first part of my road map--showing Charley's life as Jack's wife and Hannah's mother--and emphasizing how different it is from her regular life.

"Once the author has put her character in conflict, the next step is that the character take action in order to resolve the conflict, that is to over come the obstacle and get what he wants. ... When the character takes action to resolve the conflict he will either resolve the conflict while creating a new one in the process, or intensify the original conflict, or both." (Levin 52) To put in very simple terms, each scene should open with the character facing an obstacle, either in themselves or embodied in another character. The character takes action to solve the obstacle. And at the conclusion of that action and the scene, you have four choices:

the character solved the conflict (which should be saved until the climax),

the character solved the first conflict but now has a new one to face,

the original conflict has gotten worse, or

the original conflict is worse and there is a new conflict to face.

Finding her memory will become a background concern as Jack's strange behavior becomes a threat to Charley and Hannah's safety. And I need to throw in a sighting of the bros. Just so the reader realizes we're still in the Biker Mice universe and not some freaky alternate reality in which "Rock & Ride" never took place. Charley takes the doctor recommended steps to restoring her memory and settles down into housewife chores while Jack disappears to work. This would be the character taking action. She and Hannah go to the grocery store and are followed by three bikers. She manages to lose them but now a new question has entered the picture: why are they following her? When Jack learns about this sighting, the anger he showed earlier explodes. He starts ranting about moving out of Chicago. I need to endanger Hannah in some way, so Charley will intervene and gets beaten for it. So now the original conflict has intensified; Charley still has no memory and missing it is jeopardizing her life. And there is a new conflict, Jack's abuse.

Now Charley faces a pivotal decision, to stay with Jack or leave him. I can't see Charley in any situation swallowing abuse, so she's going to leave him. But where will she go; Jack said the Last Chance Garage was gone. Or is it? As you move into the next scene, keep the steps in mind and you just keep working your way until the end of the novel. The stakes must continually get higher for the character. You have to let your readers know the importance of the outcome of the events is for the characters involved. Think about how many times in the episodes, somebody has a line of dialogue over how Chicago will be destroyed if Limburger wins. It's the same principal. This is another way the plot grows in intensity.

Ending the scene, the action must come to an end. This doesn't mean that the conflict is resolved but that the step the character took must have come to an end. Just stopping with some white space or a divider of some sort does not cut it. Let's look at an example scene set-up.

Boy is bullied at school.

He waits to ambush the bully as the bully walks home.

If we stopped here, it would be very unsatisfying to the reader. But if it was continued:

The hero swings his fist.

The bully blocks the punch.

Depending on the genre you're writing in determines how much of the fight you show. It's the same as the law in physics: every action has an equal but opposite reaction. Your character takes action, there must be a reaction to that action and the action must come to an end.

For a more visual example of conflicts and growing intensity and moving from one scene into a new one, go rent Speed and watch it again. Yes, I am serious. This movie is probably the best example Hollywood has ever made of believable escalating intensity. Bomb's on the bus. Jack has to get on the bus. Jack finally gets on the bus. The bus driver gets shot. And it just keeps getting worse.

Homework: Rent Speed. (At least I'm assigning fun movies.) Look at the conflicts of your story. Are they internal or external? If external, are they embodied in another character? Do you know your villain's agenda? How can you make things even worse for your character?

And thanks to Cat for helping with this Tutorial.

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