The Write Way | ✔︎

04 | PLOT & CHARACTERS

     So you have your idea. Great! Now what?

     Now we get into matters concerning plot. What is a plot? A plot is essentially the storyline a book or a film follows, and it can be as complex or as simple as you want. Crazy, huh?

     In the Intro to Fiction class I mentioned in the previous part, my professor used Lord of the Rings as an example. Now, I've never seen the films nor read any of the books but I know that the general idea is they embark on a journey to get a very important ring somewhere equally as important. I'm pretty sure I just butchered it or that it's not even it at all; I just know there's a ring and a journey they must embark on—I apologize to any LOTR fans—but you get the idea. If you put it like that, if you look at LOTR in its most basic form, then you see that plot doesn't nearly matter as much as the characters. The reason people love LOTR, I'm assuming, is because of Frodo and Gandalf and Aragorn and all those other characters that made the book what it was. At least that's what my professor said; don't take my word for it (lol).

     You could apply this same logic to any other story and you'll start to see a common thread: the best stories have fleshed-out, complex, and relatable characters. That's what separates a good story from a bad one: bad stories rely on tropes and cardboard cut-outs and outrageous plot twists and cliffhangers to get anywhere. Good stories know how to utilize tropes, have well-thought-out twists that are a direct result of its characters' actions and motivations, as well as practice restraint in terms of everything else.

     Intimidated? That's fine; nobody can write a realistic character on the first try. Even I still struggle with that, and I think I'll continue to for the rest of my life. You know why? Because characters, for the most part, are human. I mean this in a sense that they're complex beings that do not necessarily adhere to a set of criteria to meet in order to be considered "good," so it could be anyone's guess as to why certain character traits are more loved than others.

     I would say it's not the individual traits that make a character but the combination of different ones that make them interesting. Mary-Sues are hated for their perfection because they don't seem human and humans are contradictory and sometimes obtuse creatures.

     My advice for you is to first get to know your characters, then decide on a plot. It's good to have a basic idea of what kind of story you want to tell, but it wouldn't make much sense for a pianist to know how to operate a rocketship, unless they also had a background in being an astronaut or an engineer, right?

     What I personally do is start off with the aforementioned basic idea, come up with characters that fit that idea (setting, genre, etc), and then figure out in what ways they can interact and follow the story from there. It's simple enough, but this process can take anywhere from days to months, sometimes even years. I once worked on a story for about three years, and that's not even a long time compared to other writers! I've also written a whole story then decided it wasn't the kind of story I was trying to tell!

     Be prepared for a lot of trial and error. Don't get too attached to your characters and your work, as it's good to have some form of distance and detachment from it. Remember that while your writing may reflect some vulnerable part of you that you are brave enough to share with the world, the work itself still isn't you. When a someone inevitably reads your work, it'll be good to keep in mind that the author is dead—meaning, the work has to be able to stand on its own without help from your credentials. That just means that your life has no bearing on the work of fiction when being read or criticized, even if it's inspired by true events.

     An example of this would be me writing a story about a toxic relationship, despite being in a healthy, long-term, happy relationship. Make sense?

     Characters not only make the story, they drive the plot. Decide for yourself whether you want a plot that fits a character, or a character that fits the plot. But don't hurry when you're trying to figure things out. Take your time. If you'd rather just dive right in unsure of what to do, however, then that's fine too. E.L. Doctorow said, "Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way."

     Just make sure you're disciplined enough to keep your eyes on the road and your foot on the gas pedal, lest you want to get stuck in the middle of nowhere.