How to Write a Good Story

Interlude: Joy on Plotting and Characters (II)

Do your character's choices make sense? Is what's happening in the story believable? In the previous chapter, we learned about the 'why' test, and how it can help us strengthen our plot and characters, make our story more convincing and captivating.

In this chapter, I'd like to look at key elements of a plot and character that are vital to a good story. Oh and a small PS, this chapter might be a little spoiler-y, depending on whether you've read some of the books mentioned. You have been warned.

CHARACTER:

1. Your character (the protagonist) needs a GOAL (external and internal) from the get go.

(I've covered this before, so go read that chapter if you haven't yet)

Example:

Kvothe from Patrick Rothfuss' books is introduced (as a child, and hints as the man in the inn) with a hunger for magic and knowledge, and this hunger is eventually defined in a search to know the name of the wind. This is his external goal.

Soon we learn that the Chandrian kill his family (they are very powerful, very magical, very mysterious) and his internal goal becomes to destroy them, to avenge his family. Pat doesn't need to say this, because by this time everyone's rooting for Kvothe already. This second internal goal drives the whole plot. We want Kvothe to get into the university, to learn the name of the wind, to master his art, but we want it so that he can beat the Chandrian in the end. 

If we hadn't been given the character's goals, internal and external, we wouldn't be rooting for anything; things would just be happening and there would be no motivation to care.

2. Something must be at stake, something drastic and bad for your character.

When we know what the character's goal is, and maybe also what he cares about, we can have something at stake, and it is best if you introduce what's at stake as soon as possible. Let's use Pat's book again as an example.

In the first chapter, we see Kvothe as a man waiting to die, but a man who had become legendary because of his marvels. We wonder what happened to him, and we hope he'll snap out of it before it's too late. We know that his very life is at stake, his love for a girl is at stake, his passion for magic and helping people is at stake, and we get all of this from the first few chapters.

Now when we read that something bad happens to him (like the death of his family), we're shouting 'noooo' at the book, and when things turn for the better, our palpitating hearts calm and a smile spreads onto our faces. Knowing what's at stake makes the story. It's not enough just to have a lot of action; we need to know what the character cares about, and then we must put those things into danger.

Kvothe wants to learn magic, wants to go to the university, wants to know the name of the wind. and above all, wants to defeat the Chandrian. What will it take for him to reach his goal? What does he lose, go through, fight, in order to get these things? 

PLOT

1. A plot must include a bang moment near the end.

By 'bang moment', I mean an event that the entire story builds up to. Something fall-off-your-chair worthy. The whole book gears up towards this moment. In a romance, it's usually the boy and girl FINALLY hooking up, or getting back together; in a fantasy or adventure novel, it's usually the protagonist and antagonist clashing. In a historical novel, it could be a battle scene, where two clans finally clash and the outcome of the whole book is decided.

From the first page of your book, you should be dropping hints and leaving clues that will lead the reader into this bang moment. In this way, the suspension builds, the tension multiplies, and us readers are on the adge of our seats, biting our nails. 

I find Joe Abercrombie is very good at the bang moment. The culminating event of his third book blew my mind. Mysteries that had been strung along for chapters, books even, were finally clarified, and the mother of all events occured. Don't worry about being too showy with this climactic event; the reader wants, expects, craves, for you to blow them away.

2. Something should be happening from the get go.

By this I mean that you should not start chapter one with your character waking up to a normal day, or as a firend once said, looking into a mirror before heading off to school. Never start with the normal tedium; throw us right into the action or drama (whatever it may be). Ask yourself, what's happening here? If the answer is it's a normal day, then please rewrite. Nobody opens a novel and claps with glee at a normal day.

Now, this doesn't mean we want to start with a scene where characters' heads are being chopped off or anything like that, but SOMETHING must be happening.

Here's an example:

In @MishaMFB's book, The War of three crowns, the firstchapter starts with the character's parents coming home with a child they've adopted without telling anyone. This is a good start. It's not heart-thumping adrenaline stuff, but it's also not a normal day. Something is happening that immediately throws us into the emotional tension the character feels.

3. What happens should make sense

If your character's main goal is to destroy the Chandrian, and suddenly in a town nearby rumours are heard of the Chandrian being there recently, the plot should follow the goal. What will your character do? If you make your character just go on with whatever was happening before, this will be quite unconvincing. After all, he wants more than anything to destroy the Chandrian. Even if it is dangerous, the character must go to the town. It is the only logical answer.

Similarly, what happens in your story should be logical (or logical enough) and the parameters are set by your character's goals, passions, hates, what's at stake, etc. 

But this is not the only element to consider in the plot that makes things 'make sense'. Say your character is, at one moment, picking a flower and talking to Ann, and then in the next instant they are sitting in a tree and laughing... what us reader's need to know is what happened inbetween. a character doesn't just flick from one position to a drastically different one in a moment. In this example, we'd say the character drops the flower, looks up at the tree, grabs a branch, and puls himself into the tree. Then the character sits on a branch he's chosen and turns to look back down at the other character. This sequence of events is logical, and the character's movements make sense.

This may seem small, but I've read countless books where what happens is illogical or skips over important bits that make the scene ridiculous.