On Wed, Mar 27, 2002 at 10:47:17PM -0700, David Johnston wrote:
Easy is boring.
An interesting story is one that has conflict and difficulty in it.
Read a romance novel and you'll note that the loving couple doesn't get
together harmoniously and wander around as various people applaud their
relationship, tell them how good they look together, and give them gifts
of lingerie and kitchen appliances. Fanfic authors often make the mistake
of making things easy for the characters when they should be straining
their brains to make life as difficult as possible for them right up until
the happy ending.
A counterpoint:
Yes, it's boring when everything is too easy for the characters involved.
It's also boring when everything is too hard. Both tend to make the story
predictable.
If, however, I simply can't predict whether a given situation is going to
turn out well or badly for the characters, then _that_ makes the story
interesting.