Tip #28: Is your conflict engaging?

There are many ways to hook a reader who opens your book--a great cover, a catchy title, luscious descriptions, an endearing character portrait, a captivating hook, and so on.
Yet all too soon, much of how well the story grabs a reader will depend upon whether your conflict is engaging...
two main strategies that we can use to introduce conflicts... Think of them as notes on a scale: A) mystery, B) conflict... we might go with a line like this: A, A, A, B. A, A, A, B. In this example we might create a sense of mystery for five pages to lead to the revelation of a major conflict—which in turn leads to more mysteries and an even greater conflict in chapter two.
But of course you can create any variation

David Farland's Daily Kick in the Pants - Opening Strategies, 10th May 2010