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Do the characters have any internal conflicts that continue or develop even when the external conflicts are not going on?
Perhaps those long stretches contain stuff that you don't need. Are there scenes there that your novel could do without?
Use minor conflicts to demonstrate flaws of character that the protagonist must overcome in major conflict.
Shorten the story. Maybe you don't really have a novel. If you really need it to be a novel add more subplots that need to feed into the main plot. Create obstacles that secondary characters must overcome, with or without the help of the MC, (prefer with) before they can commit to helping the MC.
Character development does not need to be boring. You can have chapters of development leading to the conflicts. Not only do you develop characters, you develop the setting and its importance in the plot. You build the tension, increasing the value of the resolution.
Things to avoid...
Avoid stand alone sub plots. All sub plots must contribute to the major plot. Don't just add in a mini-mystery to solve along the way to add pages. But do allude early on to a secondary character's potential problem with a minor villain, then later have the problem impede the secondary character to the point that they cannot aid in the MC's conflict unless the minor problem is resolved. Resolve the problem using some tactic that will not work against the major conflict. Ideally they are sufficiently different that the main character learns something useful but cannot use exactly the same tactics.
If your story has NOTHING that creates tension, then it's not going to hold the reader's interest. Nor that of a publisher.
You probably have more conflict in the story than you realize. Try to identify the characters' motives for what they do. If you can figure out their motives, you will see the conflict, even if it's just proving to a skeptical nay-sayer that they CAN succeed.
The word proc. doesn't give the right amount?
Clarification would be appreciated!
Ronnie
http://www.byzarium.com/guidelines.asp#formatting
Is this standard practice? Beats me, I've always used the processor count.
Others recommended figuring by counting every word on a number of lines, then counting lines on those pages (in those days, it didn't always come out neatly), dividing and multiplying accordingly. I was never satisfied with the results, lines varying so much within my manuscripts itself...
With word processing and count-at-a-click available, I usually round out below the figure I get for the final count, having reservations about what's being or not being counted...
What I meant about word counts:
If you go to a lot of publisher pages or writer information pages, it tells you that doing the word count by MS word doesn't give you an accurate number, because it doesnt count EVERY space. The web sites I saw pretty much explain it as when you are having a conversation with to characters, and the dialouge looks like
"Hi." he said.
She didn't reply to him.
its only rougly 7 or so words... but all the empty space between the two lines.. it still takes up space in a book, and space costs money. So they have you do some crazy equations... just look it up on google under "Calculating word count" or something to that effect, and you will see pages that give you many different 'formulas,' but it's all roughly the same idea. "This is what publishers want" they say.
And a good thing about it: Doing it this way gives you about a 7,000 word boost (if you're struggling with that.)