I recently critiqued a fantasy novel that had one of the best magical systems I’ve encountered, high-stakes conflict, and promising characters and themes. But by chapter 5, something felt off.
While it had plenty of conflict, the tension couldn’t build because the writer repeated the same underlying pattern in most conflict scenes between the protagonist and the love interest: She tries to get answers, he blocks, she gives up.
I call this “The Surface Variety Illusion”. It’s when a scene appears different on first glance (different locations, setups, dialogue, etc.), but has the same underlying structure and outcome.
Stories Are Systems, Not Event Lists
Stories are not just events tied together by “this happens, then this, then this”. Think of them as systems of cause and effect. If Character A wants something, but Character B always responds in the same way, and Character A tries the exact same tactic again, the outcome will be the same, and your story won’t move forward. This creates a loop.
Look at the difference when the system actually evolves:
Round 1: She asks for the truth. He refuses. She accepts it.
Round 2: She investigates on her own. He deflects. But maybe something in his behaviour gives her a clue (what/where to look for, who to ask, etc).
Round 3: She confronts him with what she found. Now he has to give her a partial truth to hide the bigger lie.
In Round 3, the power has shifted, and he has to change his approach because she changed hers. That’s the engine running.
The solution is not to add more conflict, but to change the character’s tactic, which in turn changes the outcome.
Smuggled from the Stage: Changing Tactics
“Changing tactics” is something I know intimately from my acting days, and it’s one of those things that transfers directly to fiction writing. Take this novel’s protagonist. Her go-to tactic was always to ask politely. The love interest would block her, sometimes even threaten her, and she’d give up. Every time. But what if we take the example above and, after the second time around, she’d looked for information elsewhere and used it to pressure him instead? It would still fit her character, but completely change the scene.
How to Diagnose Your Loop
If your middle act feels like it’s dragging, try this. Look at your major confrontations and strip away the dialogue and the atmosphere. Look at the bones of the scene and ask yourself:
What does my character want in this specific moment?
How does the other character resist?
What is the outcome?
If the outcome is the same three times in a row, you’re in a loop.
I see this a lot in character-driven fiction specifically. We love our characters, so we want to stay true to them, so if someone is timid, we write them acting timidly. But people adapt and even timid people get desperate. Stubborn people get tired, and the most patient person you know will eventually snap. Let your characters evolve through the story. They don’t have to be the same person at the end of it.
In your next rounds of editing, look at your scenes: Do you see any patterns? If so, go deeper instead of just polishing the dialogue and trying to tweak things around (yeah, I know it seems like the easier path, but it’ll come and haunt you sooner or later). Let the pattern break. That’s where the momentum lives.
As a developmental editor, I’m helping writers see and break patterns like this and it’s one of my favourite aspects of the job.