How to keep the reader engaged in a novel where "not much happens"?
(Hope I don't get an answer like this).
I'm writing a novel where "not much happens," instead, it focuses on things that could happen. In other words, the protagonist does not directly experience love, death, or heartbreak; these things are just about to happen to her (but the novel ends before they do).
(Here is the opening scene in case you are curious).
In all the novels I've read so far, at least one person dies, or at least one person finds love or loses it.
So, I was wondering if there succesful novels where "not much happens." But most of all, how to keep the reader engaged if I decide to write one like that?
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1 answer
"Something happening" doesn't have to be earth-shaking. If the character wakes up, something "happened." It's been a long time since I read it, but in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch, about a prisoner in a gulag, nothing much "happens." He doesn't escape or get sprung from prison. He doesn't die or fall in love. But it's still a powerful book.
If your character wants to do something and is thwarted by some obstacle, there's your plot. That's something "happening." The obstacle can be internal or external. The character can try or not try. The character can succeed or fail. But if there's conflict, there's plot.
So if your story is building up to something big happening by means of many little things happening along the way, there's nothing wrong with that.
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