Adding conflict into your novel: list post

As we all know, introducing varying levels of conflict throughout your novel is important, and to help you all out, I’ve written a quick list post detailing ways to add it into your novel. Although not all of the below will be relevant to your own writing, hopefully the list will help to highlight the many ways you can ramp up the tension in your novel, and will help you to come up with your own.

As you can see, conflict doesn’t have to come from a catastrophic event, and can be as seemingly insignificant as a stomach virus – perhaps your protagonist passed the virus onto her crush, who in turn, missed the prom.

A secret kiss

A fight

A lost object

An argument

An enemy

A death

A natural disaster

Self doubt

A specific rule or regulation

An injury

A rivalry

Rallying against those in charge

Head vs Heart

An illness

A fire

A bad omen

A breakdown (physical or mental)

A breakdown in communication

An animal attack

An obstacle

A revenge attack

A trip or a fall

A car accident

A robbery

A marriage

A divorce

A parent enforcing the rules

Morality vs desire

A secret

A gunshot

A power cut

A broken down vehicle

An ex-boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife/friend

A broken object

A missed train or bus

Feel free to add your own ideas into the comments!