Meg Harding's Blog - Posts Tagged "fiction"
The Element of Surprise
One of the most powerful tools any writer has at their fingertips is the element of surprise. This element can make or break a story. Readers don’t want to close a book and think, “Ah, yes. I called every last bit of it.” They want that plot twist to smack them in the face. They want to be so engaged in trying to figure out the surprise that they can’t put the book down. You don’t want all your reviews to read ‘predictable’. If you’re going to take the time to add in a major plot twist — be it a secret, a reveal, or a betrayal, then do it right.
Give the reader options, and make all the options just as believable. If you’re trying to find the murderer, or you’re trying to work out who betrayed who: Don’t single out one character and provide irrefutable hints way before the big moment. Lead your reader on a merry chase. Give them a million hints for three or four different characters, and then make it a random character that no one had suspected. Convince them one of your selected suspects is innocent and then rip that belief away. Don’t make one character any more believable than another till you’re ready to do the reveal.
Be subtle with your clues. Nine times out of ten when the clues pointing to someone are blatantly obvious, then they’re not the ones that did it. So you might be thinking this is providing a surprise or a twist, but it’s not. It is going to disappoint your readers, though. They want something intriguing and complex. They don’t want to feel like they just spent hours reading this whole book, when you actually wrapped it up in the first quarter or half, and they could have stopped then. Avoid making your readers feel like they wasted their time.
Leave the reader hanging. Have a character that you “killed”, but they’re not actually dead? Don’t say they’re not dead in the next sentence, or the next paragraph, or even the next page. Draw that out. Make that a huge surprise when they come back. Shock people. There’s a lot of things that a writer can play with in scenarios like this. Don’t miss that opportunity. Have some fun with it. Let your reader have time to work up some feelings about it. Don’t present every bit of information you’ve got right away, drag the process out. Make the reader have to read the whole book to get the full picture.
No one is going to read a mystery novel if they can solve the mystery in the first fifty pages. You’re not going to get a return reader if your fantasy novel’s plot twist is bland and not actually a twist. If the hero/heroine of your romance novel has a secret and their partner finds it out right away, your readers are going to be disappointed. Play with your plot. Make your book a maze, and let your readers hit some dead ends.
Give the reader options, and make all the options just as believable. If you’re trying to find the murderer, or you’re trying to work out who betrayed who: Don’t single out one character and provide irrefutable hints way before the big moment. Lead your reader on a merry chase. Give them a million hints for three or four different characters, and then make it a random character that no one had suspected. Convince them one of your selected suspects is innocent and then rip that belief away. Don’t make one character any more believable than another till you’re ready to do the reveal.
Be subtle with your clues. Nine times out of ten when the clues pointing to someone are blatantly obvious, then they’re not the ones that did it. So you might be thinking this is providing a surprise or a twist, but it’s not. It is going to disappoint your readers, though. They want something intriguing and complex. They don’t want to feel like they just spent hours reading this whole book, when you actually wrapped it up in the first quarter or half, and they could have stopped then. Avoid making your readers feel like they wasted their time.
Leave the reader hanging. Have a character that you “killed”, but they’re not actually dead? Don’t say they’re not dead in the next sentence, or the next paragraph, or even the next page. Draw that out. Make that a huge surprise when they come back. Shock people. There’s a lot of things that a writer can play with in scenarios like this. Don’t miss that opportunity. Have some fun with it. Let your reader have time to work up some feelings about it. Don’t present every bit of information you’ve got right away, drag the process out. Make the reader have to read the whole book to get the full picture.
No one is going to read a mystery novel if they can solve the mystery in the first fifty pages. You’re not going to get a return reader if your fantasy novel’s plot twist is bland and not actually a twist. If the hero/heroine of your romance novel has a secret and their partner finds it out right away, your readers are going to be disappointed. Play with your plot. Make your book a maze, and let your readers hit some dead ends.
Character Development: You Need It
Big or small, good or bad, there has to be some kind of character development if you want a reader to like your book. There are few things more frustrating than reading a novel and reaching the end to find that the character hasn’t changed in any way. It’s not realistic. It’s not engaging. Very often it makes readers dislike the character in question.
Recently I read a novel where the ‘protagonist’, and I use this term loosely, started off lazy and unlikeable and ended lazy and unlikeable. He went through a harrowing, life changing experience, and he came out of it exactly the same personality wise. I wanted to come through the pages and pummel him. What is the point of a character who doesn’t develop in some way? No amount of plot is going to cover up a lack of development.
Character development doesn’t have to be positive, and it doesn’t have to be dramatic. What counts is that something, in some way, is changing. You have a positive character and they go through an awful ordeal, and in the end they come out bitter? That’s fine. That’s realistic. They reacted to the situation, they were effected by it. Readers want to see that the characters have been impacted by their trials. A good example of this would be to examine a villain. How did they become a villain? Something happened to them and they changed, it may have been negative, but they aren’t the same and that’s what matters.
The same goes for positive character development. Your character should come out of the story with a new mindset, whether it’s an appreciation for something new or an understanding of something old, Want a good example of this? Look at Tolkien’s writing. It’s chock full of character development, some of it minuscule and some of it glaring.
People want to be able to connect with the characters, and if you remove the reality of personal growth through experience, that’s a hard thing to do. There’s a reason heroes and villains get so much attention. They are people who are constantly undergoing development in various ways. If your character isn’t learning something from their experience, then why are they the main character? What’s the point of the plot? Readers need to see the aftereffects. They need to see the emotion. Both require that your character come out different than they started. Character development is essential to the success of any story, don’t toss it aside.
Recently I read a novel where the ‘protagonist’, and I use this term loosely, started off lazy and unlikeable and ended lazy and unlikeable. He went through a harrowing, life changing experience, and he came out of it exactly the same personality wise. I wanted to come through the pages and pummel him. What is the point of a character who doesn’t develop in some way? No amount of plot is going to cover up a lack of development.
Character development doesn’t have to be positive, and it doesn’t have to be dramatic. What counts is that something, in some way, is changing. You have a positive character and they go through an awful ordeal, and in the end they come out bitter? That’s fine. That’s realistic. They reacted to the situation, they were effected by it. Readers want to see that the characters have been impacted by their trials. A good example of this would be to examine a villain. How did they become a villain? Something happened to them and they changed, it may have been negative, but they aren’t the same and that’s what matters.
The same goes for positive character development. Your character should come out of the story with a new mindset, whether it’s an appreciation for something new or an understanding of something old, Want a good example of this? Look at Tolkien’s writing. It’s chock full of character development, some of it minuscule and some of it glaring.
People want to be able to connect with the characters, and if you remove the reality of personal growth through experience, that’s a hard thing to do. There’s a reason heroes and villains get so much attention. They are people who are constantly undergoing development in various ways. If your character isn’t learning something from their experience, then why are they the main character? What’s the point of the plot? Readers need to see the aftereffects. They need to see the emotion. Both require that your character come out different than they started. Character development is essential to the success of any story, don’t toss it aside.
