Conflict: The Key to Success

As Donald Maass says in his book, How to Write the Breakout Novel, conflict and tension is key to keeping a book engaging. Maass says to have tension on every single page of your book. Now I'm not even sure that's possible, but according to him, if you manage to do it, then that will virtually guarantee the reader will keep turning the pages, and you'll have a successful story.

With my first two completed novels, KILLER OF KILLERS and THE VASE, there surely is a lot of conflict and a lot of tension, and almost on every single page. I suppose the pages that don't are pages where the conflict and tension is building up. So maybe I did succeed in that regard.

And in my WIP, John Dunn, Heart of a Zulu, I think I've succeeded even more. Because of the circumstances. There's tension in every facet of the story. Tension between the races, black and white, tension regarding how other whites view John Dunn, a white man married to a colored woman, and to fifty plus black women. Tension in the national relations between white controlled Natal, and the independent and militaristic Zulu nation.

And then there's the tension between Catherine Pierce, Dunn's first wife, who relates to her white half, and the Zulu wives of Dunn who know only their Zulu world. And there is the tension of the culture clash in every aspect.

Not to mention a full out war that breaks out. The story is set during the height of England's Imperial Empire, and there's tension brewing with the various natives, the Boers, and even among themselves in the way they proceed with colonization.

I've said before, if I included every character and every event that happened in real history, I'd have a very long book. Too long. But I don't want to write a thousand page book here. I will deliberately abridge the events and the people involved. I want to keep this thing underr 100,000 words, and under 400 pages.

That's all.

It's a Long Road

Much has been said about the publishing process being a long road. And it sure is. First it takes a year to write the book, and maybe another year to make revisions. Then another year to find an agent or a publisher. And then once you've signed a contract with a publisher, guess what? It'll be another year before you see your book in print! Wow.

Review Time

Yesterday, I reread my WIP from the beginning. I am preparing for the climax and conclusion of the John Dunn story, and while I'm researching the British invasion of Zululand, I decided to reread what I've written so far.

I got to page 110, and it read great. It flowed well, and was engaging. The side story of Catherine Pierce was very well established, and there is ample time remaining to finish her ordeal, although she has already come to terms with her husband's additional wives by now. (By now, I mean where I've reached in the story, which is 75,000 words.) Still she will have a major role when Dunn evacuates his people from Zululand.

I hope it stays just as engaging. I'll find out tonight.

No Time to Read for Pleasure

With all my reading for research, and writing my manuscripts, and revising them, too, I realized that I haven't read for pleasure in quite a while now. I can't even remember, off hand, the last time I did read for pleasure.

It's not like I'm one of those types of people who reads a new book every week or every month, but I have been known to read a book now and then. But since I became an author, that doesn't happen any more. And you know what? I do miss it. A little.

So will I ever get back into the phase of reading for pleasure? Probably. But it depends on whether I will keep writing my own books. And I'm not sure I will. Since I started my first book, I have been gung ho for writing. My first novel, KILLER OF KILLERS, which I love, by the way, I was fully charged. That mode was in full force for THE VASE. I just loved the concept, or the premise for that story, and of course, I still do.

Then for the sequel to KOK, KILLER EYES, I kept that phase alive, with the further exploits of Trent Smith, and possibly the conclusion to the Trent Smith story. (Because it won't be continued, unless it gets PUBLISHED!

And for John Dunn, Heart of a Zulu... Well, let's just say, since it's based on a true story, I felt that it was a story worth telling. It's been told before. The biography, John Dunn, The White Chief of Zululand, is out of print. I can't find it anywhere. Yeah, on Amazon, there's one copy available but for over four hundred bucks. Forget that.

And there was another book, I've heard, that featured the story of Dunn, by a writer named Oliver Walker, published in the 1940s. I finally ordered it. It's coming from South Africa and hasn't arrived yet. I'll see how that one differs from mine. But will it be reading for pleasure or research. Um... maybe a little of both.

Summer Over

I wanted to have the first draft of John Dunn done by now, but too much research prevented that from happening. I still have to finish reading about the war to really get a good feel of how I want to make it a part of the story, and a part of the story it really is.

Dunn had to fight with the British, and I want to make it a crunch time decision for him, but also a motivating one. Something has to happen to make him get off the fence. Yes, he wanted to stay neutral, and that is historically documented. Yes, he sided with the British, and yes they threatened him into doing it.

But to make the story more interesting, I am planning on a fictional event that really propels him to the British side, on top of the other stuff. But first... finish the research.

Back to Research

The one disadvantage of writing historical fiction, is you have to do a lot of reading before you write. I did the research on John Dunn's life in South Africa during the nineteenth century, and then I wrote the story including many of the events that have been documented. I used John Dunn's own notes, and even Cetshwayo's, but most of the information came from Donald R. Morris and his book called The Washing of the Spears.

And now that I am nearing the conclusion of my manuscript, which is the Anglo-Zulu War, I really better go back to Morris and absorb what he wrote about the British invasion into Zululand. I certainly am not getting everything that really happened into my book. There are so many characters involved on all sides, and a lot more factors that led to the war than what I'm putting into my story.

Because if I put everything in there, and everyone, it would distract from the story of John Dunn, and it would probably make my book over 600 pages or more. Forget that. I am striving to focus on Dunn's story, which of course does involve the war in a big way. But I want to be close to the historical truth, so I'll be back to reading for the next couple weeks, and then I'll finish my book.

Tragedy in Stories

A great story has tragedy. Usually, I would think, it's in the middle somewhere to keep the reader engaged and solves the problem of a story bogging down at that point. Unfortunately, a tragedy involves the untimely death of a beloved character. Not always, of course, there are other kinds of tragedy.

In KILLER OF KILLER and in THE VASE, there are tragedies, and yes, right about smack dab in the middle of the story. So those stories don't bog down. In the John Dunn story, there is tragedy, but it's really in the end, when the war is going on and the book concludes. But it's not just a beloved character that dies, it's a whole bunch. Kind of like what happens in the beginning.

So, the John Dunn story begins and ends with the tragedy of war. I guess it's the opposite of the other stories. When I'm finished with this, I'll see how it compares. Maybe I'll change it. Bottom line, will it keep a reader engaged, will it make sense, and will it flow smoothly? We'll see.