Twist of the Screws
The life I live is really one of many peaks and valleys. I have friends whose lives go along pretty much status quo. Something a little sad may happen, a personal challenge. Something a little exciting may happen. But if theirs was a graph, the line would be fairly straight.
Not me. My graph would be insane. HUGE peaks. Really deep valleys. Part of that is I have a chronic illness so I have had a number of hospital stays and ER visits. Part of that is the joys and aches of raising four kids. Part of it is I have a career that is full of peaks and valleys and anxieties.
Now, when writing a novel, you are pretty much going to write about the second type of person. Much as the first type of person might be more of the "norm" (and really, what IS normal), it does not make for dramatic tale-telling.
Which brings me to plot twists. Sometimes they can get pretty ridiculous. Or you go to a movie and see a plot hole so huge you could drive the proverbial truck through it. But the thing is, you have to put your main character through the screws, the pits of despair, because seeing how he or she reacts to those calamities is a test of their mettle. I always say that you really don't KNOW, for sure, if your relationship is going to work if you only face calm seas. Have four kids at once with the stomach flu, and the washing machine pick that time to bust, and then your brother call you to bail him out of jail in the worst part of town, and THEN, maybe, you see what your other half is made of.
Which brings me to the next point. Today they have an arrest in the Jon Benet-Ramsey case. Does anyone, for a minute, doubt that if they did that in a novel, no one would believe it? Truth is always stranger than fiction. Thus, frankly, I have had some very intense and insane things happen to my characters. But when I write to the EXTREME, I never doubt for one second that it could happen. Write it realistically and you can suspend disbelief. Because in the end, you want those dramatic extremes. When you think things can't get any worse for your character . . . have something worse happen. THEN you see what that character is made of. Then you know if they are really as courageous and smart and determined as you think they are.
What sort of paces do you put your character through?
Not me. My graph would be insane. HUGE peaks. Really deep valleys. Part of that is I have a chronic illness so I have had a number of hospital stays and ER visits. Part of that is the joys and aches of raising four kids. Part of it is I have a career that is full of peaks and valleys and anxieties.
Now, when writing a novel, you are pretty much going to write about the second type of person. Much as the first type of person might be more of the "norm" (and really, what IS normal), it does not make for dramatic tale-telling.
Which brings me to plot twists. Sometimes they can get pretty ridiculous. Or you go to a movie and see a plot hole so huge you could drive the proverbial truck through it. But the thing is, you have to put your main character through the screws, the pits of despair, because seeing how he or she reacts to those calamities is a test of their mettle. I always say that you really don't KNOW, for sure, if your relationship is going to work if you only face calm seas. Have four kids at once with the stomach flu, and the washing machine pick that time to bust, and then your brother call you to bail him out of jail in the worst part of town, and THEN, maybe, you see what your other half is made of.
Which brings me to the next point. Today they have an arrest in the Jon Benet-Ramsey case. Does anyone, for a minute, doubt that if they did that in a novel, no one would believe it? Truth is always stranger than fiction. Thus, frankly, I have had some very intense and insane things happen to my characters. But when I write to the EXTREME, I never doubt for one second that it could happen. Write it realistically and you can suspend disbelief. Because in the end, you want those dramatic extremes. When you think things can't get any worse for your character . . . have something worse happen. THEN you see what that character is made of. Then you know if they are really as courageous and smart and determined as you think they are.
What sort of paces do you put your character through?
posted by Erica Orloff at 10:51 AM
45 Comments:
To me, a plot should grow organically from the characters' actions and reactions. Some authors start with a predetermined plot, and then move their characters around like pieces on a chess board to fulfill the needs of that plot. I think character-driven stories are always superior, even in plot-heavy genres like mysteries and thrillers.
Agreed, Jude. I already know my characters are going to be strong . . . or find their strength. I have them all dreamed up FIRST and then find my "what if" as the barest premise of a plot to start. "What if a criminalist uncovered DNA that proved who killed her mother?" I know who my criminalist is, all about her, and the plot goes from there. But I have HER (the heroine) all picked out. I wouldn't do the opposite. Have a "what if someone tried to prevent the killing of the President" (or whatever) without having ANY idea of who that someone is.
I belong to the break 'em and build 'em back up characterization group.
Jude, I think you're over-generalizing. Plot-driven doesn't mean that characterization loses out.
My mc jumps through a lot of hoops. I rarely let my mc rest.
milady:
I think they go hand in hand, but I think that the best of books are ones where the character is unforgetable. You remember Jane Eyre or Heathcliff . . . or Hannibal Lechter. I mean, a serial killer is a serial killer . . . they will always think of more twisted ways to kill a man. But much as I read a few of John Sandford's (serial killer books) I cannot tell you a single one of his killers (other than one was an actuary). I can only recall one trait of the cop (into the Civil War), but I can tell you many memorable things about Clarice and Hannibal--and that was before the movies, too. It had an awesome plot--but the nuances of those characters were awesome.
la:
I remember you posting that once before. You like them hoppin'!
E
In my WIP, I take off half of my MC's leg... does that count? Of course, later on I let him fall in love, but not before I make him choose his life or another's.
Through interviews with a maniac who dines on his victims, an FBI trainee gains insights to the whereabouts of a serial killer.
There's a good plot. The only reason it worked, though, is because Clarice Starling and Hannical Lecter connected on an emotional level.
Let's say you take Clarice out and replace her with Sherlock Holmes. Holmes would have solved the case, somehow, but not by connecting with Lecter. The plot would have been different because the character was different.
Characters' actions and reactions should determine the direction a story takes. Otherwise, you're left with something similar to a pupput show.
Milady: I agree that my statement is a generalization. I know authors who would argue me to the ground on it. It's just my opinion, and the way I choose to work.
Gee, Erica. You and I seem to be on the same wavelength today. :)
(Sorry about the typo in my last comment. PUPPET)
Ewoh: I'd like to read about your one-legged protag. It would be interesting to see how he gets out of jams with the obvious physical limitations.
ewoh:
You cruel, cruel author!
E
Jude:
Good point about Clarice/Lecter. I am a Law & Order junkie. I like the plots, but after a while, I know they go something like this: crime-likely suspect called in an interviewed-seems like they have it nailed until an entirely new set of circumstances or evidence sends cops in new direction-new suspect caught-trial-seems case is lost until DA finds NEW argument or evidence-justice served.
But I watch the re-runs at night because I haev come to care about the interaction between the cops and between partners. It works.
E
In my defense... my MC starts off as a bad guy with few redeeming qualities. He does however become a good-guy by the end of the story.
The other MC doesn't fare well either: she gets blinded. But they end up falling in love so I think they come out of it well.
See, I come from the other end of the spectrum.
It's only in recent years that I've learnt to truly appreciate characterization. I grew up reading plot-heavy thrillers. Even now, I still choose books by plot, but characterization does matter much much more to me now.
It's reflected in the way I start books. Sometimes it happens like Erica does it (character, then what if question) and sometimes it's the other way around.
milady:
I think any technique to arrive at your story is okay. I guess for me, the characters come first and then I am certain they're not "cardboard" or only cliches. It's funny, I would say most of my fan mail is people writing that they loved a specific character. They will say they loved a book--but they will almost always reduce it to a character that meant something to them.
E
ewoh:
I love those characters most of all. Americans, especially, seem to love the anti-hero.
E
ewoh:
I love those characters most of all. Americans, especially, seem to love the anti-hero.
E
I work both ways. In Second Chance at Forever, I wanted to write about the kind of (straight) man who would be a stripper and why, and a woman who'd been robbed of everything and left pregnant and alone.
But I've also had plot ideas first--what if a woman was confronted with a dragon, and wasn't surprised because she'd known all her life it would happen? Hopefully, what I do is find the character who would be in that situation, or figure out what kind of character I have to see how she/he would react in that situation. Then both the plot and character grow from there.
No idea how well I'm doing with it, but I can say in the little bit of fan mail I've gotten so far, most of it focuses on character. So, phew! :)
Erica,
The ideas that you present on this blog are worth their weight in Gold. Extremely valuable and the personal touch that you administer to it is very welcome.
best
Seán
Erica & all,
I tend to write plotlessly, storylessly. So all empahsis is on character. You might ask, how can a story be plotless? Well, there is a tradition for this in literature, and believe it or not in life itself. But it is digging beneath the surface as far as characterization is concerned, laying bare the internal structures of their being.which itself lays bare the relationships they have through the thoughts they have, the language that they use.and the actions they take. Characterization is not just about what happens to them, but what they inspire as the source of their very own acts. The depth of characterisation then becomes important. You can have a plotless novel, but you cannot have a characterless novel.
Seán
Sean:
Thanks for your kind words about the blog.
I agree with you--more this week than I would have last week. Why? I started a book--not for any line, genre or publisher. Literary fiction . . . and it doesn't really have a plot--it does, but it's feather light. What it does have are two characters and a whole lot about quantum physics, math, and chess. I love working on it because it's rather like you describe.
Natalie:
I love fan mail like that--I am always secretly delighted, too, when the characters seem so real to people that they write me and ask, "Well, what happens next?" To me, the novel is self-contained. To them, the novel is "real" in a way. The Roofer . . . I had at least ten emails asking me "well, what happens to Tom?" But to me it's self-evident. But to them . . . they wanted to somehow have me assure them he gets better, gets an HEA. When characters are real to people, that's the best compliment they can give an author.
E
Ooh Erica! You've got your very own discussion forum here. Whip people up much more and you'll be seeking out time for actual writing.
Ewoh, I have cheated on them, punched them and thrown them off a cliff in a car...I have never dismembered them, nor have I ever concocted recipe's to use them in. Hmm...maybe I'm not there yet.
I'm in the 'character' line. they come to life in my head long before they have an actual plotted story. I also agree with Sean, the external events can be sketchy, provided there is enough internal development of your character to make people want to read on and get to know them.
We know he lost a leg, and might even think that he deserved to. But if you develop him in a way that makes readers like him in the end, we may forget about the leg, and simply remember how he overcame his misfortune. That would be a job well done.
Lainey:
That was lovely . . . true enough. And the reason it is true, is because that is what life is like. I have been friends with people who were blind, and a friend who was deaf, and eventually, if you know them and cared for them, you forgot they had a disability of any sort because they just "were."
E
Erica & Lainey
Yes, I agree entirely with you about the internal development of a character, mainly because it is the way we should understand social relations themselves and know how individuals stand in relation to one another, ie by the ideas they have of one another and the world around them. The "popular" scientific, or sociological way to explain social relations is conceived in the same way as we do physical processes. In order to make such an investigation respectably scientific, they try to eliminate the ideas of the individuals involved, their motivations, their cultural aims etc. and place the "external relations" at the mercy of an empirical investigation applying scientific generalisations. It thus becomes a purely external inquiry. It is fortunate for us that good writers and readers are intuitively aware that is would be a fruitless way of understanding human thought, action and relations and render any literature impossible. But we often find weak characterisation through too much of an emphasis on the external relations as if that is a way of advancing the story. The purpose of a novel, it seems to me is primarily to understand the people in it, their roles and purposes, the ideas they have about one another and the relations they establish through those ideas, and that is more a philosophical task than a scientific one. The deeper we can go to reveal those ideas and purposes and develop the relations between the characters in terms of those ideas the better the work of fiction we will produce. I would agree with one philosopher who said that, “the social relations between people and the ideas which their actions embody, are really the same thing considered from different points of view.”
Sorry if this was a little abstract!
Seán
Sean:
Yesterday in the car, my daughter (16 and interested in quantum physics, though a musician by aspiration/profession) asked me why so many very successful people were beaten down as children, abused, etc. What makes one child rise above that to become this amazing individual and another ends up dead or in jail? THAT to me is the stuff of novels and why I do what I do. I love exploring that (less in the abstract and more in the evolvement of character). There but for the grace of God go I, as it were.
E
Yes indeed Erica. I agree fully. I wasn't advocating an abstract analysis, quite the reverse. I was saying that if we leave out of our development of character the ideas which determine their actions and with which they "see" the world in which they live, they would simply be empty.
By the way your daughter sounds justlike my 17 year old son. Physics and maths are his thing in a big way.
Seán
Good stuff here, everybody.
Sean: I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment of the social "sciences."
About physics...
I really don't know much. I seem to remember something about "for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction."
Hmm. Maybe that's all I need to know as a novelist. :)
Jude:
I never thought about how that idea is so pertinent in a novel.
E
Sean:
Absolutely. I know in THE ROOFER, the main character values loyalty above all else. You can murder and and lie--as long as it is for the greater end of loyalty to your family/breathren/mob. It colors everything she does and every choice she and her brother make. Then she has sayings from her father, "If you aren't cheating, you're not trying hard enough," "A day without larceny is like a day without sunshine." "Loyalty" is, in some ways, an abstract, a quality, but take it as your RELIGION and like any religion carried to its most fanatical end, you have a distorted reality which still make sense to you and which you can still justify.
E
I never did either, Erica. The comments here inspired me. But it's true, isn't it? Every time you twist the screw, the wood must expand to accommodate it. After all, the wood was happy just being wood, but then enters the screw and interesting things start to happen. Tension, conflict, the goal of the screw to proceed and the goal of the wood to resist. The screw is motivated one way, the wood the other. These are the elements of Story and, for those of us trying to write commercial fiction, Story is very important indeed.
Sean: I thought your comments regarding characterization were very astute. My thing is, plot arises naturally from strong characters. You can have a couple of characters sitting around drinking tea and talking about their feelings, but sooner or later (sooner in the case of popular works), you have to send in a couple of guys with a guns (Chandler). There you have an action, and the reaction depends on the strength of the opposing force.
Sorry, Sean, I don't think you can have a plotless novel. Even if the story is completely about the internal change, sans external catalyst, THAT'S your plot. If there's no change, it's just a character study, not a novel.
But maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. :)
Well said, Natalie. I think you nailed it.
Hi Natalie,
I appreciate your comments. And I see what you mean. I think I need to expain what I mean by "plot", and what is normally understood by plot or story. If you mean by plot any scenario then plot itself would not have any distinct meaning. Just like if you said everything is art. Clearly that would not be acceptable. The "plotless" novel, or in some other vocabulary, the "psychological" novel has a different intention to that which seeks to tell a traditional story, and has a distinct means to do so. The intention of the conventional narrative is unroll itself in majestic leisure with the author continually telling the story from a detatched or omniscient point of view. Here the omniscient narrator (the author) knows everything about his characters. The removal of the author from the scene in the "psychological" novel, and the replacement of the "mind" and the working of it from a first person perspective, did one significant thing: it created the need to use the memory of the characters to place the reader in a relationship with their past. There is no "plot" in any traditonal sense, and even a "story" is changed from its normal perspective. The other thing it does, and I think this is vital, is to almost turn the reader into the author, for it is s/he who ultimately puts any story there is, together. I am thinking here of Joyce's Ulysses, as the pinnacle of such a novel.
Very best to you all. I am really enjoying your contribiutions here.
Seán
I read Ulysses a long time ago. Even with help from The Bloomsday Book, I found it extremely difficult. I know it's considered a literary masterpiece, but it's virtually unreadable for most people. Give me Huck Finn any old day. Why? Because, along with the classic allusions, introspection, political overtones and a deep understanding of humanity, it ENTERTAINS.
Entertainment is a writer's first job. If people don't enjoy reading what you've written, then it doesn't matter how brilliant you are. 99% of the population and I don't have a clue what James Joyce was doing in that novel.
Also, the omniscient narrator is pretty much extinct in all genres. Whether writing in first person or third, we stick with one POV at a time. There are exceptions, but that's the general rule.
I have nothing against writing for pure enjoyment. In fact, I'm all for it. For those of us interested in selling, though, entertaining the reader is top priority.
Jude:
It reminds me of studying Creative Writing at the university. I was in a class with my best friend, now an award-winning journalist with the Washington Post (I think . . . he might still be with the Boston Globe). We both gravitated toward each other--both wrote pretty well, usually choosing subjects like poverty, war, racism, betrayal . . . big themes told through one or two characters. There was a woman in the class--definitely bright (you had to be to go to this school, for the most part). Her stuff was so obtuse--sort of "look at how brilliant I am." At the end of one short story--and I'm no idiot--I had not ONE clue of what the hell she was saying/writing, or even who the character was. Turns out it was a cat "speaking" to a mirror about the ramifications of politics or something equally . . . strange. Whatever. What annoyed me was she said anyone who didn't "get" it was just obviously not on her level. NO, you failed to COMMUNICATE. Writing is a two-way relationship IF you choose to share your stuff and not just have a journal. In any case, from them on, I was on my guard for pseudo-intellectuals. It's no way to communicate with your fellow man. Now, Joyce . . . everyone for the most part agrees he's a genius . . . I don't mean him. But there are plenty of authors I meet who try to blow smoke up my ass. "No one has ever written anything like this before." Well, don't reinvent the wheel. You're writing a book, not curing cancer.
As you can tell, I am hostile--a tiny bit--over the pseudos. No offense intended to anyone here. I just think if you choose to express yourself for an audience, remember you HAVE an audience and REACH us.
E
Very well said, Erica.
I agree,I would not want to defend pseudo intellectuals, but that would be a truism. A pseudo intellectual is by definition something no one wants to be or be associated with. At the same time I would not want to ignore genuinely important works because I was hesitant about the possible accusation of being a pseudo intellectual. And that is a form of lynch mob justice for those who do want to defend certain works.
Of course, another truism, an author who wants to reach an audience wants to write something that WILL reach them. But that does not necessarily mean a MASS audience. They want their audience. I don't think Joyce would ever have imagined for a moment that Ulysses would have been a best seller. He thought he had to write it and he was in the company of those of his day who wanted to see it published, and and thank God they did.
We hear people these days saying they cannot come to grips with Shakespeare. Yet we would not contemplate for one moment that he he should not have written anything. With Shakespeare as with Joyce it is very much up to the reader to do SOME work. If we are not prepared to bend to the language of early modern England then we would be the poorer for it. Or maybe those who do not want to bend would want it updated into modern English which would be absurd and foolish. It is ok to say you do not understand Ulysses but let's not make that some sort of piniciple and badge of pride and denigrate those who do as pseudo intellectuals.
To say as Jude does that writing is about entertainment is also a truism. Of course we want to be entertained. But one person's form of entertainment is not another's. I am perfectly entertained by Ulysses. It is perfection as far as I am concerned. I am Irish I would say that. But if we mean by entertainment, something democratically decided, then we have shifted the ground to somrthing more serious.
Seán
Sean:
True enough . . . just because Shakespeare or Joyce are difficult doesn't take them from entertainment. I suppose it's a matter of who is your audience, and I definitely spoke too hastily. When I critique a work as an editor, or if I speak to writers' groups, my first question is "Who are you writing this for?" If you are writing a family history for your children, you can entertain them with endearing stories that by nature dull the rest of us into glassy-eyed boredom. They are amusing to your children/family/audience. If you are writing a romance, then there are things romance readers expect. If you are writing a psychological thriller, there are things that audience expects. I don't feel effective critique can be done in a vaccum. That said, Joyce probably, because of his genius, felt a calling to write as he did for his select audience. Faulkner is another genius that the masses certainly find difficult. I have a hard time with Henry Miller--just don't enjoy his work. Literary fiction is perhaps the hardest to criticize in some fashion because the audience is smaller, more discerning perhaps, and has a different expectation than readers of commercial fiction.
E
Erica,
I think you have summed it up so eloquently.
I also have a hard time with Henry Miller (in the literary sense!) and always have had, but I have to say I do so because, I believe, he is not a good writer. I find him terribly clumsy. But I keep going back to Miller to see if there is something I ma missing. And I will continue to do so. I know I would certainly have to defend that opinion to those who disagree. And there will be many.
Seán
If you have some talent, something to say, and are willing to share it, why wouldn't you want to reach as many people as possible? I don't get it. Shakespeare's plays were popular in Elizabethan times, and continue to be produced today. Just because a work is considered literary doesn't mean it has to be so esoteric as to baffle most of the population.
I remember thinking, after studying Ulysses, that Joyce had played a big joke on the academics, that he had produced a magnificent literary puzzle and said, "Go ahead, ya punks, figure this one out." Well, even the literary elite are still working on it. Joyce is probably having a good laugh somewhere.
Jude,
I am not saying that as an author you would not want to reach as many people as possible. That would be crazy and you are right to emphasise that. Of course a writer would want the audience to be great. But in the case of some authors they simply know before hand that the work will only reach a certain "type" of reader with a certain type of mind or mentality. Of course he or she would want that type of reader to be greater in number, but the difference is in work that is solely dictated by readers or that dictated by what the author wants to write. And possible something in between.
In my case I write stuff with a particular audience in mind. I am not dictated by a strict format or for that matter a specific content or style but I am aware of areas of interest, and money will not be a major consideration.
I belong to the "something in between" camp.
I'll always be aware of the audience, yet struggle to develop and maintain a distinctive voice.
If you write solely for the audience, then you're probably a hack. If you write only what you want to write, you risk Mom being your only patron.
In the end, we can only write our version of the truth and hope for the best.
Jude:
And a final Amen to that. Succinct, my friend.
E
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