If you have no Hero, no Villain, and no Conflict, you have no story.

The words above are simply explaining that to have something worthy of retelling, you've got to have two people in conflict. The Hero can be anyone, picking one side of the argument. The Villain can also be anyone, picking another side of the argument. And they must pull in opposite directions.

The stronger the conflict, the more impossible the odds, and the more incompatible your characters, the better chance for your story to work and to be read.

When starting out to plan your story, think of the two people who have absolutely no business conversing, let alone agreeing on anything. How about Hitler and Gandhi? The British Queen and a Soviet prostitute? The Beauty and the Beast? Oops, never mind, that one is already taken.

You get the drift.

Make sure of it. And better yet, have history between those two, and still make them incredibly incompatible. 

Here is the most recent example. A one-year-old baby and a mature evil magician. Harry Potter and Voldemort. They had no business to have any conflict between them. Harry really just was in the wrong place at the wrong time. No matter. They got linked, and an entire universe was born.

What's yours? Who are the people you can pit against one another? And what do they stand to lose if their goal won't be achieved?

Illustration by Maria Ines Gul