alienation is not a natural human resting state; it’s a response to thwarted desire. Our duty as writers is not to erect lovely monuments to the lesser defense mechanisms but to dismantle them. Our characters must yearn and act upon their yearnings.

Plot, in other words, resides in establishing a clear chain of consequence. Not this happens and this happens and this happens. But: this happens, therefore that happens. And because that happened, this next thing happens. My scenes needed to expose hidden truths (Recognition), upend expectations (Reversal), escalate tension, and instigate further

Major characters deserve an entrance, not just for the reader’s benefit, but so that you (the author) can establish their stake in the story, how their motives will interact with those of the other characters.

the people I’m reading about (I don’t really think of them as characters) are behaving precisely as their motives dictate. Even the ones who act cruel and destructive have constructed a worldview in which their actions are justified, even heroic. The author’s job isn’t to absolve any of her major characters, but to reveal them in sufficient depth t

Consider our first encounter with Gatsby, that smile he flashes Nick Carraway, which, we are told, “seemed to face the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself,

dayenu—it would have been enough.

the true meaning of “chronology” in storytelling, which isn’t the chronological sequence of events in a story, but how the author decides to present these events to the reader.

What generates story is a chain of associations cleaved to a chain of consequence.

THAT’S HOW IT WORKS with strong characterization: the character’s actions register as the inevitable outgrowth of their core identity. It’s important to emphasize the word actions here, because (as Aristotle reminds us) it is action that determines fate.