Wednesday's Writer's Tip On heroes and heroines #amwriting

Still finding gems to help a story grab reader's attentions and make for a good story using How To Write Mysteries by Shannon OCork. This time there's something she said about heroes and heroines that struck home and something every writer should know.

Give your focus character problems and keep them in trouble. Why? This keeps a reader turning the pages. Make these problems small ones that can be solved but then have the solution lead to another problem. There are two areas where this can occur. There are the outside areas and the inside the character problems. I never realized I've used this method until I read this book. How does this work in genres other than mysteries.

I write a lot of romance as well as mysteries and realized keeping the goal in mind one could rev up the tension by solving one problem that leads to another one that may seem minor. I'll look at two books here.

Murder and Mint Tea was the first mystery I wrote. It's a sort of when will someone kill this not very nice woman. The heroine's first problem involves a broken leg. This led to her son finding a tenant for her first floor apartment. This tenant brings trouble into the heroine's life and each time she thinks she has found a solution another bit of trouble pops up. When the tenant is murdered now the heroine must find who killed her and how can she protect her near and dear when each of them owns one of the murder weapons.

The other is a romance The Doctor's Dilemma. Here the hero has a number of problems. First he doesn't like to stay in one place and works as a temporary doctor. Then he inherits infant twins from a dead foster sister. As he solves the problems of them, a vanished sitter, falling in love with the heroine who wants a settled life. being in a town where he has friends who want him to stay. Each time he solves one of the problems, another results from that solution.

So think about this when you're writing and keep your hero or heroine solving small problems that lead to the big one and the final solution.