are you a man who will say no?

the Observation Deck (day one): "raise the stakes"
I bought this a while back in one of my oft-begun, never-completed efforts to reconnect with Writer Me. It's a deck of cards each with a phrase that's meant to act as a suggestion, jumping off point, creative spur, etc. I think "raise the stakes" is a pretty interesting card to pull at the start of this new effort. Which I'm blogging on the theory that committing to writing stuff down here (as opposed to using a notebook or even the iceBook) will help keep me doing it or at least provide another incentive not to slack off. On the negative side-effect side, it'll probably bore the crap outta the small but... well just small readership of this blog. Sorry in advance.
Anyway, the "raise the stakes" entry in the the Observation Deck accompanying book talks about pushing your story elements to the next level. Which I think is a valid point. I've both written and read a lot of beginning fiction and many writers do have a tendency to "write what happened" even if what happened isn't very interesting. If you're writing about highly dramatic, highly charged situations, it's easier as a writer to make them engaging. It's often easier as a reader to connect to those situations. The downside is a tendency towards melodrama. Handled badly, raised stakes start to seem like drama queen crisis hour. If everything is pitched at "11" all the time it's hard to take it seriously. But for me, I think it's helpful advice. When I was writing stories, they tended to be character-driven and to revolve around very small but personally significant moments in characters' lives. It's all too easy, I think, for stories like that to seem trivial, as if nothing is happening at all. A reminder to push the envelope, to push the story, to push the characters, to raise the pulse, is not unwelcome advice.