Recent observations on the art of writing fiction:

1. My main characters in failed/incomplete/unsatisfactory stories are surprisingly reactive, that is, driven by events around them rather than by their own impulses. I think this may be related to the fundamental attribution error: we see ourselves as reacting naturally to the environment, but others as driven by innate impulses. Unfortunately this doesn't work for storytelling at all! It means my viewpoint character ends up as a ping-pong ball in a world of strong, driven other characters. (If you don't see this error in my published fiction, it's because I don't publish unsuccessful stories.)

2. Closely related to the above is another recent observation: My main character has to be sympathetic, in the sense of having motivations that I can respect enough to write them properly. Even if they're mistaken, I have to be able to respect the reasons for their mistakes. Otherwise my viewpoint automatically shifts to the characters around them, and once again the non-protagonist ends up stronger than the protagonist.

3. Just as it's necessary to learn to make things worse for your characters, rather than following the natural impulse to make things better, it's also necessary to learn to deepen mysteries rather than following the natural impulse to explain them right away.

4. Early problems in a story have to echo the final resolution.

5. This isn't really about my own work, but I've been reading some fanfiction lately and it just bugs the living daylights out of me. I hereby dub this the First Law of Fanfiction: Every change which strengthens the protagonists requires a corresponding worsening of their challenges. Or in plainer language, You can't make Frodo a Jedi without giving Sauron the Death Star. There are stories out there with correctly spelled words, and even good prose, which are failing out of ignoring this one simple principle. If I could put this up on a banner on all the authors' pages of Fanfiction.Net, I would do so.