This is K.M. Wyland and you are listening to the 225th episode of the Helping Writers Become Authors Podcast.

So far December has been reboot my brain month.

I'm planning to start outlining my next book in January and right now I'm focusing on multiplying

my brain cells and tying up loose ends on a variety of projects, including research for upcoming podcasts and some cleanup on

old blog posts that got messed up when we switched to the new site design at the end of the

summer. It's been a nice break, but I'm champing at the bit

to get back to some actual writing.

Have you invited enough characters

to your story's climax? The latest post in the video

series on my blog talks about which characters need to be present in your

story's climax and how to get them there. To watch it, visit my website at

helping writers become authors.com. New videos are posted every Wednesday.

And now I hope you enjoy this week's podcast entitled How the Antagonist

affects Character Arc. We often think of the antagonist as an external obstacle to our

protagonist's forward motion. The antagonist is usually a physical entity,

something standing in the way of our protagonist's ability to achieve their physical goals

and perhaps even threatening our protagonist's lives or their physical well-being.

Consequently, it can be easy to forget that antagonists are just as important in driving

your character's personal arc as they are the plot's conflict.

Every story is made up of two integral halves.

One, the protagonist's pursuit of his outer goal,

which is the physical aspect of the story, that is the stuff we see happening,

...