Writers often think in terms of solutions. Your character has a problem, so you build the story toward solving it. It’s clean, logical, neatly-tied, and satisfying.
But here’s a twist that creates deeper, more human stories:
Don’t give your character a solution.
Give them a choice.
And not just any choice; a choice between two impossible things.
This Is the Heart of Real Conflict
In real life, we don’t always get to fix things. We choose which mess we can live with: which truth hurts less, which regret feels survivable.
Great fiction reflects that.
So instead of asking: “How can my character win everything?”
Try asking:
“What kind of loss are they willing to accept?”
“What will it cost to get what they want?”
“What are they willing to give up in order to protect what matters most?”
That’s where your story grows teeth and becomes emotionally and morally complex.
A Quick Example
Let’s say your character, Sera, wants to expose corruption in the empire that raised her, but doing so will ruin the career of the mentor who gave her everything.
There’s no neat way out.
If she speaks up, she’ll betray someone she loves.
If she stays silent, she betrays her own values.
You don’t give her a clever workaround. You force her to make a painful decision.
And whichever path she chooses, it changes her, and it changes the reader. And that’s what a good story is supposed to do.
Why It Works
✅ Raises emotional stakes, because suddenly, the conflict feels personal
✅ Prevents easy or predictable outcomes
✅ Reveals character through choice: what they pick tells us who they are
✅ Makes the resolution feel earned, not cleverly engineered
A Prompt to Try
Take the key conflict in your WIP, and ask yourself:
What if there’s no clear win here?
What if the character has to give something up, something important, to move forward?
What if this moment defines what they’re willing to live with?
Write it that way, then see how the story changes. (Warning: it will get messier… and better.)
If this post hit something true in your current draft, hit the ❤️ and share it with a writer who’s trying to “fix” their story… when maybe they just need a harder choice.
Because fiction doesn’t have to feel neat; it just has to ring true.
See you next week,
Tal Kilim