How to Turn a Lackluster Middle into Page-turning Excitement

A writer revising the rough draft of a novel stalls in the middle where he finds some quirky, secondary characters, one of whom is a potential "romance plot" suitor, a couple of magical and mystical settings, several subplots of enchantment, various minor characters and… not much excitement. Appraising the long, dull corridor spanning the entire Middle, the writer despairs both at how to keep his revision ideas organized and, more importantly, how to amp up the tension and excitement.

Each secondary character and setting, subplot and minor character holds the potential for tension and excitement especially when paired against what the protagonist wants. This takes stepping back from the rough draft to dig deeper into the other characters individually, discovering their importance to the overall meaning of the story beyond helping the protagonist get to where she needs to go and devising goals and aspirations that interfere with the protagonist's goals and aspirations. This means you need to get to know these other characters as well as you know your protagonist.

In the rough draft, these secondary and minor cardboard characters served you while writing the protagonist's storyline. Now, in the revision, is their time to shine. Antagonists rule the middle and are there to teach the protagonist what she needs to know in order to prevail at the climax at the end. This learning is not easy and is fraught with dangerous and often unkind challenges.

Fill out a Character Profile for each character, defining goals in direct opposition to what the protagonist wants while also mirroring traits the protagonist is oblivious of and needs to confront and overcome over the course of the entire story.

(For more: Plot Whisperer and Blockbuster Plots books for writers and PlotWriMo: Revise Your Novel in a Month video series.)

The Universal Story and the Sea

Where I live, the tide determines whether I walk on the beach with sand between my toes or high atop cliffs following the shoreline. At high water, the tide builds to 6 feet with waves crashing against the cliffs and the beach under water. At low water or low tide, waves ebb all the way back to zero feet, exposing the sand and revealing tide pools in a rock plate that juts out into the bay.

The waves ebb and flow in much the same way every day. Two low tides in a 24 hour period. Two high tides. Waves come in an hour later today than they did yesterday. Waves go out. The parameters remain the same. The difference is the interaction or relationship between our moon, sun and the planets  we travel with through space.

You can physically feel the difference in the energy created at low tide compared to high water. As the tide builds and waves begin crashing against the cliffs, the energy all along East Cliff builds right along with it.  At low water, the energy wanes as waves gently lap and then altogether disappear.

Low tide holds the same sort of energy as do scenes of reflection before a story begins and then again after a trauma or a crisis, a major turning point -- more introspective, contemplative scenes without much external conflict and where the protagonist is not feeling threatened = below the line scenes.

High tide is like high action, movement, noise, chaos in the middle of a story where anything and everything can happen and does and then again in the build-up to the climax -- all above the line scenes on the Plot Planner. (For examples of working Plot Planners and The Plot Whisperer Workbook: Step-by-Step Exercises to Help You Create Compelling Stories has all the planners and trackers you need -- one workbook per story.)