I'm on the verge of writing my first (well the first I hope to publish) novel. Yet, I'm in a difficult spot here. Here is my idea: A teen who has been told he is wrong about his feelings for his barely related cousin gets upset and seeks help from the meanest girl in school, his best friend, and a teacher who thinks he's a werewolf on the inside to commit 'wrong' acts all over the school (such as selling condoms outside of class, writing backwards on their homework, coming to class half naked). Of course I've decided on a lot of conficts for the story. But the problem is, I can't seem to find a way for all of them work themselves out. The conflicts are: 1. A therapist who hounds the teen (his name is Zack) constantly about his relationship with his cousin is out to get the group for Zack publically humilating him. 2. Zack tries to romance his cousin, but his cousin is the most popular girl in school and she's torn between Zack and her vanity. 3. The meanest girl in school (her name is Alice) has a father who is a teacher in the high school. When Alice ends up having sex with Zack's best friend (Beetles), they try everything they can to keep it a secret. 4. Zack's dad pressures Zack on his grades and growing up. 5. The teacher who thinks he is a werewolf, as a warning to the whole group, is fired for his relationships with each of the children. The conflicts were easy to think upo since the story demanded them, but I want plan this whole think out before I write, but I stuck on the ending. Any suggestions?
Conflicts are a (or the) means to keep up suspense and support plot development, but I fear you're in danger of replacing plot with conflicts here (been there, done that, ended up with a nice stack of loosely connected episodes...). What's the general message the story should transport? Which is the main conflict, and how could you resolve that one in a both suprising and still true-to-the-story way? You can still leave yourself leeway, as you've got all the sideplots to explain how the story progressed there. Focus on the one conflict, and once you're satisfied with it's resolution, go from there and tie up the others. Then the ending will come by itself.
What's more, you should remember to work characterisation into your conflicts. Conflicts can either limit or advance characters; it's all up to the writer. Ensure that your characters don't just serve as vehicles for the conflicts, going in and out of them casually. Their unique natures as characters should serve to shape the conflicts, and by the same merit, the conflicts should serve to shape their characters; they should come out of the conflicts changed and affectd.
Master Sen, This is the information that helped me with all these types of problems. It might help you also. Click here.
agreed - that was a very helpful link! Its always good to see how someone with more experience develops ideas - its what i've been struggling with recently. Very interesting to see some basic decision making flow almost naturally into a fleshed out plotline.
I've just done a very similar thing to the link - exploring a plot line by writing what is almost an internal discussion about it down on paper. Very pleased with how things fall out.
