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How to FIX the Middle of Your Book! #author #writer #writing #writingtips #books

10 Aug 2026 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:12

In this concise instructional video, the speaker explains why the middle of many novels feels flat: the protagonist and antagonist repeat the same conflict move across multiple scenes, creating a stagnant tension loop. The core problem is a lack of escalating stakes—each beat must raise the cost or intensity compared to the previous one. To diagnose and fix this, the speaker proposes a simple nightly exercise: open a slow scene, write three sentences describing (1) the antagonist’s action, (2) the protagonist’s response, and (3) how the antagonist then raises the stakes. By applying this across several scenes, writers can spot where the tension stalls and adjust the beats to continuously increase conflict. The video ends with a call to subscribe and like for more writing advice.

Chapters

Everybody tells you the middle of your book is where it sags. Almost nobody tells you why. So let me try to explain it here. Your middle feels flat because your protagonist and your antagonist are trading the same move back and forth over and over for 4, 5, 6, 7 scenes in a row. So picture it. I grab your wrist. You pull away. I grab your wrist again. You pull away again. Nothing is happening because it's the same tension just on repeat. A book doesn't stay alive by continuing. It stays alive by escalating. So if I grab your wrist, the next beat can't just be me grabbing it again. I have to raise it. I have to twist the arm. You go for the door. I block the door. Every single beat has to cost more than the one before it. Here's what to do tonight. Open your manuscript to a scene that feels slow and write down in 3 sentences what happens. What does the antagonist do? How does the protagonist respond? And what does the antagonist do to raise the stakes? And then look at that across several scenes. It should be constantly raising the stakes. This is how you'll find what's wrong with the flat middle of your book. But of course, it's not just your middle that's broken in your book. So subscribe and like for more writing tips.