How to Handle Conflict and Tension

Many authors have a troubling writing condition I call Tension Deficit Disorder or TDD. This condition frequently occurs with new writers, writers who are struggling to move beyond the basic levels of writership, or those who write for own enjoyment. Tension brings out the best and the worst in all of us, and if that is true of real human beings, it should also be true of characters. If you have developed TDD you may experience such symptoms as difficulty plotting novel-length stories, struggles to write scenes where anything of actual story-worthiness happens, worries about the pacing of your drafts and a general reticence to put your characters into hot water. You created your characters, your darlings, your babies, and of course you want them to be happy, fulfilled, loved and successful in their story world lives. That is what all parents want for their children. All well and good, but that recipe makes for rather dull reading. If you truly love your characters you will want them to suffer. But this suffering is not without its merits, because through their suffering they will become better people and when they succeed in their post-suffering world (also known as the end of the story) readers will be delighted. There's hope for TDD! You don't have to suffer any longer. Your job is to make your characters suffer, not you! Don't fall into the lull of low tension scenes where all goes well. Put your suffering into your novel and save the joy and happiness for your own life.