Literary fiction has a bad reputation for being low on the “entertain-o-meter,” a completely imaginary device that I pretend to use to measure how engaging a novel is. So, it came as kind of a surprise that Alice Walker’s The Color Purple was very fun to read while still having everything that people love about literary fiction. All the while, the book confronts the difficulties encountered by women, people of color, and LGBTQ people in a way that’s nuanced, insightful, intersectional, and almost visionary.

It’s no secret that literary fiction has a bad reputation for being low on the “entertain-o-meter,” a completely imaginary device that measures how engaging a novel is. So, it came as kind of a surprise that Alice Walker’s The Color Purple was very fun to read while still having everything that people love about literary fiction. All the while, the book confronts the difficulties encountered by women, people of color, and LGBTQ people in a way that’s nuanced, insightful, intersectional, and almost visionary.

But, I think what made the book so engaging and fun to read—again, despite the infuriating world that constantly attacks the cast—is Walker’s ability to manage pacing by always ensuring there’s some kind of conflict keeping readers interested. Walker does two things, in particular, that set conflicts in The Color Purple apart from other novels.

First, many of the conflicts aren’t resolved immediately; they’re short, intense incidents whose echoes are felt through the rest of the book, providing an undercurrent of tension that keeps the reader on their toes. Celie’s sexual assault in the beginning of the book is a prime example, as is the leaving of her sister Nettie. Instead of wrapping up the conflict or turning the fight against it into a major part of the book, Alice Walker makes it clear that the characters lost the overt conflict, which causes it to shift from an external conflict to an internal one. The characters are now battling the aftereffects of what they’ve suffered, which provides a sort of long-term struggle that sets you up to cheer when the characters overcome their scars.

Second, Walker introduces a new narrator halfway through the novel and uses her to layer sources of conflict and tension. This new narrator is Celie’s sister, Nettie. She’s introduced smoothly, as Nettie never really left the book, because Celie never forgot about her. We start to learn about Nettie’s life through the letters that Mr. _____ had kept from Celie around the same time that Celie starts to experience degrees of relief and happiness in her life. I won’t spoil anything, but some of these moments would have been any other novel’s “happy ending,” or the point where the reader got bored and put it down. Walker prevents that by balancing Nettie and Celie’s narrative. Because Nettie’s letters exist in bulk, they can be explored in any order, at any time. So, when Nettie’s story loses conflict—by necessity—Celie winds up with new challenges. And when Celie’s life turns happy, Nettie faces new issues. As a result, there’s never a point where the reader doesn’t have a reason to turn the page and find out what’s going to happen next.

So, what can writers learn from this? Well, every story needs tension to keep the readers going, and the easiest way to create tension is to create conflict. The problem is that many writers lean too heavily on external conflict, they arrange it in a linear fashion, and they fail to properly interlace their sources of conflict. Walker’s The Color Purple is practically a masterclass in why you shouldn’t do this. See, novels excel at displaying internal conflict. By making your character lose something important to them, that loss and their inability to get over it becomes a powerful source of tension throughout the book while reflecting the human experience in a way that seems incredibly realistic. Likewise, you can balance “slow” points in a novel by introducing conflicts in other areas, or for other characters. This is particularly effective for writers whose works feature multiple narrators or complex worlds. Pay attention to their individual pacing and, when one character or source of tension lags, use another to spice things up.

I’ll leave you with one more piece of writing advice: read The Color Purple. Seriously. It’s an amazing, important work, and I’m just on the verge of saying that everyone is obligated to read it. Happy writing!

Featured image courtesy of Bessi!