Tag: Becca Puglisi

Fight, Flight, or Freeze? Psyche 101 for Writers

Writing Tips

by Becca Puglisi, @beccapuglisi

Fight or flight.

I think we’ve all heard this phrase. It refers to the way each person is hard-wired to respond to real or perceived danger. Psychologists have recently added another option, giving us three ways we might respond to threats: we fight back, we flee, or we freeze up. This happens in life-or-death situations, but it also occurs on a smaller scale whenever we feel endangered:

  • At the mall, when you see someone who mistreated you in the past
  • At work, when the boss criticizes your work
  • At a party, when a friendly conversation takes an uncomfortable turn
  • At school, when you hear an ugly rumor someone has started about you

So whether the situation is potentially fatal or just a little threatening, you’re going to respond in one of those three ways. What does that look like? Here are few possibilities that cover a range of intensity:Continue reading

Setting as a Vehicle for Conflict

Writing Tips

Setting

by Becca Puglisi, @BeccaPuglisi

I’m sure you’ve heard the saying that a good book should have conflict in every scene. This is wise advice, since well-written conflict begets tension for our characters, which can be passed on to readers, who will sense a rise in energy as they feel that nervous, jittery sensation signaling them that something is going on. We all want readers to have that heightened awareness and interest when they’re reading our stories, and a good way to bring that about is through conflict.

While the most obvious source of conflict is an antagonist who opposes our hero and his goal, it’s simply not reasonable (or sensible) to drag him into every chapter. As a result, we have to find other struggles that make sense for each scene. It may not seem like the most intuitive choice, but I’d like to propose that the setting is one of the handiest sources of conflict, for a number of reasons. First, every scene has a setting, so it’s already built into your story. And with the sources of conflict inherently included in each location, there’s no need to fabricate them—no lengthy set-up involved to put these difficulties into your protagonist’s path. If you’re wondering what sources of conflict I’m referring to, consider the following:Continue reading

How Morals and Basic Needs Influence a Character’s Positive Traits

Writing Tips

by Becca Puglisi, @BeccaPuglisiBecca Puglisi 2

 Since Angela Ackerman and I wrote our last book, The Positive Trait Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Attributes, I’ve been thinking a lot about personality traits and how they’re formed. Flaws are incredibly important for a character to have—and, let’s be honest: they’re really interesting to read about. But one of the main reasons we fall in love with characters is because we want them to succeed, to achieve their goals and overcome their flaws; this is where the positive attributes come in. The fact is, every character needs both positive and negative traits, and these traits need to be chosen thoughtfully.

When it’s time to create your character and figure out what his traits will be, you should take into account many factors that influence their development: genetics, upbringing and caregivers, past wounds, environment, peers—all of these things absolutely cause certain traits to organically emerge for a character. (For more information on how these factors influence trait development, please see this post on the topic.) Today, I’d like to zero in on what I believe are the two biggest influencers on trait formation: morality and basic needs.Continue reading

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