When it comes to your characters, make them lie. Make them hide who they are. They need to slowly reveal the true self, and they will do everything to defend who they believe they are.
Tag: generating story tension
Oct 23 2013
Conflict—Giving LIFE to Your Fiction
Bad decisions make GREAT fiction. I know it’s tough to not write about fully evolved/self-actualized characters, but those guys are B-O-R-I-N-G. We like to watch people grow, probably so we might glean some hint of how to grow, ourselves. The more messed up a character is? The more INTERESTING they become.
Aug 01 2013
What "Finding Nemo" Can Teach Us About Story Tension
Storytelling is in our blood, it binds us together as humans. On some intuitive level, everyone understands narrative structure, even little kids. All good stories have a clear beginning, middle and end. Ever try to skip parts of a story with a toddler? Even they can sense on a gut level that something is wrong if we miss a fundamental part of the story.
Apr 15 2013
Great Fiction Goes for the GUTS
- By Kristen Lamb in Uncategorized, Writing, Writing Tips
Every scene, every bit of dialogue must be uncomfortable. Fiction is the opposite of our human nature. Human nature is to avoid conflict at all costs. To write fiction? We must dive into the Miserable Messy head-first. Create problems at every turn (not mere “bad situations” but conflict).
Mar 19 2013
5 Common Mistakes that Will KILL Your Novel
- By Kristen Lamb in Uncategorized, Writing
Even literary fiction involves some outside force that is causing the contemplation, depression, rebellion, etc. Whether it is the decline of the aristocracy and rise of the middle class (Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time”) or implosion of society and humans turned cannibals in Cormac McCarthy’s Pultizer-winning The Road, we always have an outside pressure and an antagonist to drive the story momentum.
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About Kristen Lamb


Kristen Lamb is a #1 best-selling author, international speaker, blogger, and branding Jedi who briefly dated Cthuhlu freshman year. (They broke up—Cthulhu was a bit “clingy,” and Kristen didn’t realize that a “long distance” relationship really meant inter-dimensional travel.)
Her highly acclaimed mystery thriller, The Devil’s Dance, is in no way related to the amount of true crime podcasts or tv shows she consumes. Also, no animals (other than maybe some chocolate bunnies) were harmed in the creation of her new horror anthology---written in the tradition of Alfred Hitchcock and Black Mirror---WTH Did I Just Read?
She’s the creator of the perennial branding and social media guide book, Rise of the Machines–Human Authors in a Digital World. Additionally, she is the author of the #1 best-selling books We Are Not Alone–The Writer’s Guide to Social Media and Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer.
When she’s not on the road speaking at conferences or teaching online writing seminars, she is rescuing kittens and bringing coffee to the guys in the NSA van parked in front of her house.
Writer, kitten-rescuer, and NSA subject since 2005.