When your characters won’t cooperate

Sorry about missing two weeks of blogging. Life has been pretty hectic. I’ve had three ideas on what to do for today’s blog post, and decided to go with the third, which, ironically enough, is not speculative fiction exclusive.

What to do when your characters won’t cooperate

It happens sometimes. You have an idea. It’s brilliant. All you need is for your characters to do X. Except your characters don’t want to do X.

To explain, in the last few weeks, I became inspired to write a cozy mystery about a bride murdered on her wedding day. The idea was inspired by a game advertisement, that probably had nothing to do with the game itself. I have no idea what the game does with that, if anything, but I stopped to think. Okay, a bride murdered on her wedding day. Fine. Who killed her? A second later, I had an answer. Playing with it further, I asked myself who would be my detective? It’s a cozy, which more or less requires an amateur detective. I decided on the wedding planner.

Who immediately said something along the lines of ‘Not a chance in this lifetime.’ I didn’t even have a name or personality for her yet, but I knew she wanted nothing to do with this. So, I stopped and asked myself why.

While you can attempt to force your characters to jump through your hoops, it’s better to figure out why it doesn’t seem right. In my case, I figured out very quickly that my wedding planner didn’t want to get involved because as much as I love amateur detective stories, and I do, they make no sense! Especially in the case of murder.

Regardless of your opinions on police, they have a few advantages over your average civilian. Advantages such as training, back-up, access to labs, and jurisdiction over the case. Your average civilian is more likely to contaminate a crime scene, miss out on something because they don’t have the training to notice it or the labs to confirm something, and possibly be accused of obstruction or possibly the crime itself. And if they are lucky (or unlucky) enough to find the murderer before the police, they may find themselves dealing with someone who has already decided that murder was a solution to their problems in the past and may not hesitate to do it again.

In this case, my character didn’t want to get involved, because I thought that getting involved was a dumb thing to do. I needed to figure out either how to convince her to do it anyway or something else she could do that was less dumb. I don’t want to give away too much, especially since I haven’t written it yet and a lot can change, but I decided that yes, my sleuth has and had no desire to get involved. But she was first on the scene, a prime hub for gossip, and related to one of the officers on the case. So, when she becomes convinced the wrong person is being blamed… she can’t let it go.

Try to put yourself in your characters shoes. If your character seems reluctant to do something, that’s a sign. Not a sign that you are a bad writer, but a sign that your characters have depth, and maybe that there is something wrong.

Another thing to keep in mind, if your characters don’t want to do X, maybe it would actually be better for your story to do Y. Here are your options.

Keep writing. Push through the block: As you may have guessed, I’m not in favor of this option. But there will be times when this is right. Sometimes the words don’t run smooth. Interestingly enough, that won’t always be obvious to other readers. But before you decide to try this, at least try to figure out what it is that is bugging you. The end of my quest story, I didn’t actually like the resolution the first time. I wrote it because I needed it, but I didn’t like it. When I did my second edit, I considered changing it. I haven’t, because I don’t dislike it the way I did, and I don’t have a replacement. That said, I’m keeping a few thoughts on it, and will ask my first reader when she finishes the book.

Figure out what would make your characters do X: That’s what I had to do in this case. Why would my character do something I thought was stupid? Make it not stupid. It may mean changing to character or adapting X. For example, in the Hyde Chronicles, I had to spend a fair bit of time trying to develop Violet to figure out what kind of person would fit what I needed. What kind of person would be drawn to Hyde University, be accepted by the school, and not go running when things started to get dangerous.

Have your characters do Y: Sometimes your second idea is richer and deeper than the first. I mentioned this in a previous blog post long ago, but a huge sub-plot of the second book in the Moonlit Memories happened because it would ruin the plot if Liska got the information she needed too easily, but I didn’t have a reason for her source not to give it to her. If I had to write the book again without that, I don’t know that I could.

When things feel wrong, take a break, play with a few ideas. Trust yourself. Trust your characters. Trust your ideas. You can do it.

In other news, Camp NaNoWriMo starts up again in July. I’m going to be working on A Wedding to Die For. Updates as they come.

What have you done when your writing feels wrong?

Character Development: Playing with Archetypes

Playing with Archetypes

Certain character types abound in fiction. Partially because they are useful, partially because we see them everywhere. An archetype is not a cliché, but they can fall into one really easily. Let’s look at a few and see if we can’t use and redesign a few.

The enigmatic mentor: He knows all or almost everything. Not that he’ll tell us what he knows. Albus Dumbledore, Gandalf the Gray, Obi-Wan Kenobi. They tend to speak in riddles, guide the hero along on their quest, and frequently, though not always, die somewhere along the way. (NSFW language)

Okay, how can we change this up? Maybe the hero eventually realizes that the wise old mentor isn’t as wise as they thought. Maybe the mentor is continuously proven wrong? Maybe the mentor is actually crazy. Or perhaps instead of the mentor guiding the hero, the hero can be prodding and pulling the reluctant mentor to follow the quest. Maybe the hero thinks the mentor is wise and enigmatic, but they don’t actually speak the same language. Could still work if the mentor is physically demonstrating how to do something.

The Rebellious Princess:  She’s sure real life is outside the palace, chafes at the rules of the castle and is determined to get outside. Merida comes immediately to mind, though there are loads of others.

What can we do with this one? Well, normally, with a rebellious princess, we’re supposed to agree and sympathize with her. She’s right, and we’re supposed to agree. Well, what if she isn’t right? Or even if she is, what are the consequences? The princess who runs away to avoid an arranged marriage to a prince of another country could well cause massive conflict, possibly even war between the two countries. Or perhaps she doesn’t have a clue on how to function outside of the palace? She may have never so much as put on her own shoes before. That’s not someone who’s cut out for adventuring.

The Jilted Lover: Love is not always enough. Sometimes relationships fizzle. And sometimes, one feels, rightly or wrongly, that the other person is far more to blame. The jilted lover, usually female, is one who has been abandoned in love. Sometimes, she languishes in despair until either her death or something or someone (maybe the hero) pulls her out of it. Sometimes, she’s out for revenge, and you had better watch out!

There’s a reason that she goes to one of those extremes instead of something more middle of the road, because lack of conflict is boring. But that doesn’t mean you can’t set up things to look like they are going in this direction, only for the jilted lover to either get over it quickly or decide that they don’t care enough. First guy I dated started ghosting me when the relationship didn’t go the way he wanted, and I quickly realized that I didn’t care enough to pursue it. You could also play with the jilted lover as a man and see if that changes any of the dynamics.

The gruff loner: Generally a male trope, this guy has been hurt in the past (usually lost his wife, possibly one or more children) and isn’t interested in connecting to people again. He doesn’t want to talk, rarely smiles, and is usually dragged into the adventure against his will.

It’s been done, it will be done more in the future, but why do you want to do it? Instead of fridging (Both NSFW language and disturbing subject matter) his family, maybe have him have gone through a rough divorce? Maybe he’s gruff but actually very social? Maybe he seems like the gruff loner, but he’s actually prone to social anxiety? Once you get past his walls, he actually talkative and borderline clingy.

Any character you use that seems very familiar, maybe you should take a few minutes to see if you can play with the character to make them a little less predictable.

Happy Memorial Day!

What’s your favorite archetype to play with?