Your story must have a hero, a villain, and conflict between them

Here is the deal. If you have no hero and no villain with conflict between them, you have no story. 

Your hero and your villain must be actual people. They can’t be ideas or concepts or systems or moods. 

We readers are stupid that way. While we like think of ourselves as sophisticated and intelligent, we’re really consuming stories for the show factor. 

Think Rome. Think Colosseum. Think crowd thirsty for blood, for spectacle, for experiencing two primal and most powerful emotions: sexual desi...