I was doing a mundane chore – going through my email – as I thought about conflict driving a story’s action. The primary plot has loads of conflict driving the middle, but the secondary plot pales in comparison.
I know the secondary plot’s motivation, how and why it intersects with the primary plot, and how the protagonist reacts to it, but I couldn’t find a believable scenario that flowed into and synchronized with the ending.
Now I have that ending, and I can tune the secondary plot to support it. What a feeling of success and satisfaction.
I hope I don’t have to wait four years for the next bolt of inspiration.
