BookingIt

I took this class at ACFW. Agent Natasha Kern was the speaker and she kept me hooked. Basically, she taught us that what makes a novel great is this simple formula. I wondered what her class would be like HERE . Now I know. Our main character must have a great desire, one main thing that comes from their strongest virtue. This virtue must drive the main character. Conflict comes through the form of the character's biggest weakness, or sin. The character must be tempted away from their goals (something heroic deriving from their virtue) by their very own sins/lusts/flaws. She used the example of Scarlett O'Hara, who loves her home Tara and wants to protect it at any cost. She does horrible things but the reader forgives her because we understand her driving need is heroic. Even her love for Rhett is a conflict, because it clashes with her virtuous passion to save her beloved Tara. Another example was Julie Lessman's character Faith, in A Passion Most Pure. Faith desires to b...

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, self-control." After thinking about moral premise for a bit, I decided that it has much less to do with the theme of a story, and more to do with the characters. Now I haven't taken the class or read any books on this, just Kern's post , so this is my own interpretation. Part of moral premise is the virtue that absolutely defines your characters. Now, in reality many people are a little blurry when it comes to their own morality. Not to say we don't feel strongly about certain, and often different, morals but what I'm saying is that few of us are guided by one specific trait. I think our characters should be though, and this is one of the things that will drive the story. In my opinion, a main character should have a defining virtue. Does she thirst for justice in everything? Is he gentle to all? The list above is a great tool to pick out a single virtue to absolutely define and drive y...