Craft Articles
Join us in exploring others’ craft and building our own.
Here you will find explorations of mentor texts – articles that dive into specific craft elements in published books, interviews with authors, and tips on growing and improving as a writer.
Disclaimer: Some posts include bookshop.org affiliate links. Use the links to support KidLit Craft and local bookstores, at no additional cost to you.
Browse the Blog
Rebecca Weber: Writing Conflict, Chapter by Chapter
“I pay a lot of attention to conflict or stakes for driving the plot. Obviously, every book has an overarching conflict, but each chapter should have its own smaller conflict, too. Creating tinier tense moments throughout the book keeps the reader turning the pages.”
Keeping Things Real: Writing Authentic Realistic Fiction for Middle Graders
But engaging middle school readers requires more than an interesting plot—the characters and their experiences must feel authentic to and reflective of the complicated world in which the readers live.
Building Engaging Stories Through Conflict and Tension: Something to Say by Lisa Moore Ramée
If you only give your readers one conflict after another without tension in between, you are in danger of exhausting, and maybe even boring them, to the point that they lose interest. Tension turns the page.