Justanothergirlsblog - =A Weird Girl=

How do you introduce an antagonist into a story? I'm stuck. They are important to the plot.

Introducing the antagonist…

The antagonist should be introduced in a memorable way that is useful to the story. However, first appearances and introductions can be different thing, and introducing them as a character versus introducing them as the antagonist can be two separate events entirely.

When you’re introducing the antagonist, you should keep in mind what the reader knows, and what they have yet to learn. Sure, maybe they know this person is the main character’s roommate, and they’re finding out that this roommate has helped their significant other cheat on them, but they don’t know that the roommate has held a grudge since high school which informed the decision to help them cheat. The antagonist’s introduction should be a strategic disclosure of key information. 

The introduction should also be memorable enough to evoke its own details in future scenes regarding the character. Perhaps what they say or do in their introduction should come up later. Their introduction should act as a bookend to their arc throughout the novel, so keep the ending in mind as you write their beginning. You must also be mindful that this is probably the first (or a new first) impression of that character on the reader, so you want to set the tone for their presence in the story and offer some preliminary character development for the reader to build on as the plot progresses. 

Here are some other resources you may find helpful:

Resources For Describing Characters

How To Fit Character Development Into Your Story

Making Characters Unpredictable

Writing Good Villains

Giving Characters Distinct Voices in Dialogue

Gradually Revealing Character’s Past

Tips on Introducing Characters

Creating Villains

How To Write A Good Plot Twist

How To Foreshadow

Tackling Subplots

Tips On Dialogue

Writing Intense Scenes

Tips on Writing Flashbacks

Describing emotion through action

A Guide To Tension & Suspense

Foreshadowing The Villain

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Masterlist | WIP Blog

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#3: 5 things to add more interest to Writing

Alright, real talk. Naturally a lot of writers overlook this part of writing but to me, I find it essential when it comes to writing fiction even though many times writers are already aware of these things. Your book may be doing fine with its technicalities but may lack interest. Below I’m going to list five ways to make your writing more interesting and hopefully, it does help out. 

1) Tension

One of the big reasons a story isn’t interesting enough is because of Lack of Tension. See, without this, none of the characters really want anything from each other so therefore no one is really prevented from achieving their goal. Might as well just resolve the conflict right there because nothing is holding them back, which if you can realize is not an interesting narrative. 

Your characters interests and goals should conflict with each other even if certain characters are on the same side because then readers are truly more interested to see the play of events. 

2) Purpose

When a scene has no purpose, it essentially just slows down pace and kills the momentum. Readers are interested in the story, not the other details of the story that really don’t add much importance. Usually also known as filler which is something that bores readers if they really don’t own any sort of purpose. 

3) Voice 

This is really important but extremely overlooked. Without any voice, it seems like the story is just laid out for the reader without any touch to it. Remember, the character is there because they can see the world different than anyone else. Really, without voice the story is just like a textbook. There’s no presence, no life, no humanity. Adding voice really sparks interest. 

4) Specificity

Specificity is like saying there’s a stack of books or saying there’s a stack of comic books and graphic novels messed up on the shelves. Or that there’s a painting on a wall vs a oil painting on the wall. These are really simple example but adding specificity helps really add to the character or the atmosphere. Specificity adds interest to the story, for example: A stack of books on the shelves really doesn’t say much but specifying that there are comic books and star war novels messily shoved into a book shelve defines the atmosphere and the character itself. 

5) Originality

So, when you write a story, write something that has a taste of originality rather than something familiar. See, what I mean by this is it is okay to write something relatable. Though not to the point its familiar with real life. Okay example, 

Think about reading a text where I, theoretically was the writer, that had a graduation scene describing waiting in line in a gown, shaking hands with the dean and taking my diploma. This is familiar so the reader’s first thought is “why am i being told this?” Everyone has a general idea on what a graduation is even if they never been to one so there’s really no point for me to writing that. To combat this, you can just delete it from the narrative itself, write it in a way where the reader wouldn’t be able to predict that sort of event.

Hopefully this does help and wasn’t super confusing. Peace.

Hey I absolutely love your blog! It's awesome & very helpful! Can you give some tips for enemies to lovers plot, it's research & story development? If you could I would really really love & appreciate that. Thank you so much for providing such amazing contents! ❣️💕💗💖🔥✨

Thank you so much! Your love is appreciated. 

Enemies-to-lovers resources...

I have a few articles you may find useful, organized by area of struggle:

Enemies to Lovers

Guide To Writing Enemies To Lovers

Enemies-To-Lovers Prompts

How to develop an Enemies-To-Lovers story

Enemies to Lovers Tips

20 Mistakes to Avoid in Enemies to Lovers

Romance Genre

20 Mistakes To Avoid in YA/Romance

Resources For Writing YA Fiction/Romance

Resources For Romance Writers

Tips On Writing Skinny Love

Skinny Love Writing Prompts

On Romantic Subplots

How To Write The Perfect Kiss

Romantic Prompts

Research

Useful Writing Resources | Part II

Guide to Story Researching

How To Make A Scene More Heartfelt

How To Perfect The Tone

A Guide To Tension & Suspense

Tips on Balancing Development

Development

Resources For Plot Development

Guide To Plot Development

How To Write A Good Plot Twist

How To Foreshadow

How To Engage The Reader

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Masterlist | WIP Blog

If you enjoy my blog and wish for it to continue being updated frequently and for me to continue putting my energy toward answering your questions, please consider Buying Me A Coffee, or pledging your support on Patreon, where I offer early access and exclusive benefits for only $5/month.

“Knowing yourself is life’s eternal homework.”

— Felicia Day

“Everything was screaming: the sea, the wind, my heart.”

— Yann Martel

“It may be the wrong decision, but fuck it, it’s mine.”

— Mark Z. Danielewski 

“Here’s the thing: The book that will most change your life is the book you write.”

— Seth Godin

“Invest in yourself. You can afford it. Trust me.”

— Rashon Carraway 

Writing Tip #235

If you want to get serious about increasing your writing output, you need to know what your baseline is. For a few weeks make a note of when you start writing, when you stop writing, the number of words you wrote, and where you were. Then analyze the information. You’ll quickly get a sense of if you write better in the morning or at night. If you write better at home or somewhere else (I know this isn’t as easy to do because of covid right now). Then when you can, write at the time and place that make you the most productive.

The course of true love never did run smooth.

William Shakespeare