The three essential elements of writing a novel no one is telling you

I have been a full-time developmental editor for twenty years. It is a long time, and I have edited close to 1,000 books. One of the things that happens after editing so many novels is that you start to see patterns.

It all becomes a kind of gut feeling.

One thing that occasionally happens is that authors come to me unhappy with another editor’s work. Sometimes this is just a scummy editor stealing money and doing a poor AI-driven job, but not always.

What I have noticed is that some inexperienced editors will focus on fixing small structural issues, or the more obvious story elements, rather than hunt out the bigger problem. Being generous, I think this is because they are keen to be seen to have something constructive to say. You see, often, the real issues are buried deep in the story, and they are difficult to successfully diagnose and easy to miss if you don’t know what you are looking for.

I feel part of the reason for this is that, as a community, we have failed to give really good writing advice.

Many writers, and untrained editors, seem to lack a clear understanding of what really makes a novel engaging and memorable. They have been sucked into a world of ‘top ten lists of writing advice’ and TikTok shorts from authors and editors.

It is not just this ‘easy to make’ content that is to blame. It goes deeper than that.

For years, it seems to have been a rite of passage for authors to create a book about writing. You will often pick up one of these books, such as Stephen King’s On Writing, and feel as though you are being given a special insight into the writing process. The keys to success, so to speak. After all, Stephen King is a superstar writer; surely some of his luck will rub off if we follow his rules, right?

The problem is that these books can miss the real problem that faces writers and, instead, focus on the issues that plagued that particular author.

The result is that, without even knowing it, the advice given in these books, blog posts and social media content is of limited use, at best.

Every writer’s journey is unique.

We all come to these writing books at our own moment in that journey. One day, understanding the telling, not showing, might open a door, but on another, it becomes advice you have heard a thousand times.

Take On Writing by Stephen King. It is a well-read and often-quoted book for writers. It identifies twelve things as ‘problems’ that writers need to fix. Here are just three examples:

• Excessive use of adverbs.
• Using the passive voice.
• Poor pacing.

Now, don’t get me wrong, these are things you should avoid if you want to be a better writer. These are solid writing tips. If you are doing any or all of these, then your work will be better if you stop.

Following King’s guidance will make you a better writer.

But here’s the problem: if you are hiring an inexperienced or untrained editor, there’s a good chance they are scanning your manuscript to fix these types of problems. You are being short-changed.

And as a writer, if you think fixing these issues will lift your book to a publishable standard, you are mistaken.

These are tips to fix bad writing habits; they are not fundamental approaches to writing great novels. You can fix as many of these little problems as you like, but if your foundation is crumbling, then your book will still be boring.

What you are not being told is that there is a way to think about writing a novel that will fundamentally improve the way a reader interacts with your work. Instead, you are being sold a series of quick fixes.

Why?

I think that the reason more people are not talking about the fundamentals is twofold.

The first is that people often don’t fully understand the concepts. They might have heard them mentioned, but they have never internalized how much impact they have on a novel.

The second is that, unlike the nice ‘top ten lists’, the advice you need to hear is complex and requires time to explain. More importantly, it takes years to perfect. It is not suited for a quick TikTok video.

It is a shame, since the problems I am about to address represent the vast majority of issues I have come across in novels I have edited over the years. I have worked with hundreds of novels that failed to build strong foundations.

So… as a professional whose job it is to make books better, I’ve set out below the things you really need to understand about writing an engaging novel.

Motivations and Goals

Have you ever read a book and got to a major set-piece scene, perhaps a battle, where the main character is in real jeopardy, only to think, ‘I don’t really care what happens’?

Or… you are reading a novel, and it just seems flat and uninteresting. Things are happening, events are unfolding, and you, as the reader, just don’t care.

The chances are that if this is how you feel, then the author has failed to establish the main character’s goals and motivations. Only by having a clear understanding of a character’s wants and needs will a reader connect and care.

The goal is what a character wants, and the motivation is why.

For example, in The Lord of the Rings, Frodo’s goal is to destroy the One Ring. His motivation is to protect the Shire.

However, knowing the goals and motivations is not enough; you need to go one step further. Not only must the reader understand what the character wants and why, but they must also understand the problems the character needs to overcome to be successful and the consequences of failure.

That’s…

• What they want and why.
• What they have to overcome.
• What happens if they fail.

Only by having all these elements will you be able to create an engaging narrative arc.

Going back to The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien establishes four things the reader needs to understand:

• What does Frodo want? To destroy the Ring.
• Why does he want it? To save his home and the people he loves.
• What stands in his way? Powerful enemies, an almost impossible journey, and the Ring’s corrupting influence.
• What happens if he fails? Sauron wins, and the world Frodo wants to protect is lost.

When I am editing a book, I use a two-pass approach. In the first pass, I am looking for potential problems (normally based on how the story makes me feel), and in the second, I am looking for the evidence of potential problems I have identified.

One thing I like to do is apply questions to a story and see what the answers produce. So, if I feel I might have a goal/motivation issue, I use the following question:

What does the main character want most in the world and why, what do they need to overcome to get this, and what are the consequences of failure?

If the reader can answer all the elements of this question, then you have set up the narrative framework for your novel. However, if any of these are missing, then there’s a potential problem.

As a writer, you should be able to answer this question at every point in your novel.

This is the first thing that all engaging novels must possess. However, once a reader knows this, the next element to establish is the character arc.

Character Arc

Have you ever read a novel that just feels a bit slow or flat? You are reading the story, and the character is experiencing events. It is all just plodding along, but the narrative seems to be a bit trivial and sluggish. You are just not feeling engaged.

In this situation, the novel may well be missing a character arc.

The feeling you are looking for is best described as ‘flat’. It just seems to move along with no real urgency or engagement.

For a novel to feel alive and to have a sense of progression, often called movement, the main character must feel like they are changing.

Think of it like this…

The character must start as one thing and end as something new. For example, you might have a character who starts naive and unaware and ends up experienced and streetwise. In the process of the novel, the events that the main character experiences must be seen to incrementally change and mold the character into something new. They are slowly moved from one state to the other.

This seems like a simple paragraph, but it is the blueprint for creating an engaging story.

This ‘character arc’, and it is something we, as readers, are sensitive to on a subconscious level.

Let’s go back to Frodo in The Lord of the Rings.

Frodo begins as an innocent hobbit who believes the world is a safe and comfortable place, but his journey forces him to confront suffering, responsibility, sacrifice, and moral complexity, transforming him into a wiser but permanently wounded individual.

Frodo starts as one thing and ends as another.

If a novel has a character who is not changing and growing, then we (as readers) will ‘feel’ this, and the story will lack movement and momentum.

It will feel flat.

It is easy to say that a character must change through a novel, but how is that actually done? How do you, as a writer, know when and how to show this change?

The answer is via conflict.

Conflict

The best way to think about conflict is as the thing that is stopping your main character from achieving their immediate goal. Let’s say your character wants to escape from the dungeon, but there’s a pack of goblins in the way.

Getting past the goblins is conflict.

There’s something important to understand here: conflict can involve violence, but this is not always the case. Anything that stops your character from achieving their immediate goal is conflict.

Conflict generally falls into two broad categories:

• External conflict: Obstacles outside the character’s control, such as other characters, society, nature, or circumstances.
• Internal conflict: Psychological or emotional struggles within the character, such as fear, guilt, conflicting desires, or moral dilemmas.

So what’s conflict got to do with the character arc?

Well, the best way to think about it is that conflict is the engine that will drive the change.

Here’s the essential thing to understand. For a character to change their internal landscape and beliefs, they need some kind of catalyst.

This catalyst comes in the form of conflict. This means that without conflict, there is no change.

Let’s go back to the character arc. We know that in an engaging novel, the character is going to start as one thing, and then, through a series of incremental changes (triggered by conflict), they are going to end as something different.

The reader can ‘see’ these changes, giving your novel a sense of movement. This is your character arc.

Let’s return once more to The Lord of the Rings.

One example of conflict to consider is the Ringwraiths.

Frodo is pursued by the Ringwraiths and must survive the journey to Rivendell. Before, Frodo is a sheltered, innocent hobbit who knows little about the dangers of the wider world. After, Frodo understands the seriousness of his situation and begins to accept the responsibility and danger that come with carrying the Ring.

The second example involves Gollum.

Frodo must decide whether to trust Gollum, despite knowing he is dangerous and obsessed with the Ring. We see that before, Frodo believes Gollum deserves death because of the terrible things he has done. However, afterwards, Frodo recognises Gollum’s suffering and develops compassion, understanding that even those who have done terrible things may deserve mercy.

The last example is Mount Doom.

Frodo must overcome the Ring’s corrupting influence to destroy it, but ultimately cannot bring himself to do so. At the start, Frodo is determined to complete his mission through courage, endurance, and personal sacrifice. Afterwards, Frodo has experienced the limits of his own strength. Although Middle-earth is saved, he is left physically and emotionally wounded, unable to return to his former peaceful life.

You can see that the combination of these conflicts alters the main character. Frodo begins as an innocent, sheltered hobbit, but he becomes more responsible, compassionate, and experienced, as well as deeply wounded.

Before I finish, let me say something important about change.

You will sometimes have situations where a character’s internal landscape will not change. It will be the same at the start and end of the book.

I call this the Batman Problem.

Whenever you read a Batman comic or watch a film, you will see that Batman starts and ends as the same character. So how do you create movement and a character arc in this situation?

The answer is that there are two additional forms of change.

The first is that the main character learns something new about themselves. The change comes in the main character’s knowledge, and the reader sees that change.

The second is that the reader learns something new about a character’s internal landscape, and this changes their understanding of the character.

So, in simple terms, you can have the character learn something about themselves or the reader learn something about the character.

Let’s loop back to Batman for an example.

In The Dark Knight movie, the Joker repeatedly tries to make Batman abandon his moral code. He believes that, with enough pressure, Batman will become as willing to kill as the criminals he fights. This reaches a revealing moment when the Joker falls from a building and Batman saves him. Despite everything the Joker has done, Batman will not let him die. In this moment of conflict, Batman understands that saving him also means accepting the possibility that he will escape and hurt more people.

Batman’s core belief has not changed, but our understanding of it has deepened.

It is easy to refuse to kill when there is little reason to do so. Holding to that principle when it means saving your most dangerous enemy reveals the strength of your conviction and the cost of maintaining it.

The movement here comes through revelation. We already knew Batman had a rule against killing. Now we have seen that rule survive an extreme test. The conflict takes something we know about him and makes us understand what it actually demands.

Final Thoughts

As you can see, it is easy to make a list of ‘tips for writers’, and these do have a place. What I would suggest is that, though these tips carry value, they are not as impactful as people would like to believe.

The reality is that there is no set of tips that will lift your novel to the next level. Instead, you need to be thinking of your story from a more elevated position.

You must:

• Establish a character’s goals and motivation.
• Create a realistic character arc.
• Use conflict to change your character.

If you are able to put these three things in place, you will create the foundation for an engaging and interesting story.

If you want to start evaluating your current novel today, I would suggest that you do the following…

Look at the opening chapters and ensure you are answering this question…

What does the main character want most in the world and why, what do they need to overcome to get this, and what are the consequences of failure?

Then answer this question…

What is the start and end state of my character?

Once you have this, answer the following…

What are the three (or more) key moments of conflict in my novel?

Then…

How is my character altered by each conflict?

The answers to these questions will give you a kick-start in understanding what you need to do to lift your novel.

I hope this helps.