The collected musings of Ryan Elder

Oh I see. I thought that by the MC framing the villain for murder, and manipulating other cops into getting revenge on her, that it would not be a cliche. I have never seen it done before where the MC plants evidence to manipulate the others. Usually it's just the others doing it on their own accord without being manipulated as part of a bigger plan, isn't it?

I was told by another person that he thinks it's better if the MC gets revenge alone, cause it is more of a conflict, when no one agrees with the MC's rape, and he is alone in his revenge. Is this true? If so, is having the other cop live and help him out, take away from that?

 

As I've said, I havent read your characters, so this is all guesswork. I am not against killing characters, if they need killing, and if that death serves more of a purpose than to simply get that character out of the way. I can see where having the MC work alone would be less work for you. It does simplify the senario. However, I would argue you need to have some redeeming qualities for your MC, OTHER than the sympathy in the fact he was raped. (A partner or character with which to work/interact with could offer this.) Think about how far your MC will travel down the rule breaking/lying/scheming/do anything, including crossing the law (things he believes in) in order to get revenge. Without some glimpes of humanity/hope of finding his way back from this road in the end... really, you are just creating another villain, and showing the backstory of how his traumas created the calloused revenge mongrel he will become. Which... I don't know... maybe there is something to that.

 

Ultimately, it really looks like you need to spend some quality time with your characters, and make some of these decisions. When you really know who your charcters are, and how they will react to things, the rest will take care of itself.

 

Oh okay, so you are saying that the other cop would provide a road for the MC to find his way back on, you are saying? I thought that maybe the MC's gf can do that, but maybe he can too. I think I will have to figure out the method of capture for the villain for first. It depends on what is more important. The method of capture, or how the MC's humanity quest is determined.

In order to get to know my characters, different occurrences can cause my characters to react differently, and change. So I feel my characters are determined by which occurrences I pick. But I guess I have to decide if I want the MC to learn a lesson get back on his road, or become a revenge obsessed villain in the end.

 

Hello Ryan. Im brand new to these forums so if you currently have a WTF face about it, I completely understand. That being said...

I read your post. I have a few suggestions but I'd like to know a bit more about your story? Is it just the act of rape or is there a deeper meaning to it? How does this situation occur - how does it happen? Is it simply the act of rape that turns your MC's world on its head, or is this perhaps an act of revenge or an obsession the rapist has for the MC? Being frank, the act alone doesnt seem to carry enough weight to it. Even in a fictional telling, there's no way your MC is going to be able to explain this heinous act away unless the rape has a deeper meaning. That deeper meaning will give your MC a goal to strive for and possibly give him an opportunity to win his girlfriend back. It will also get rid of the cliche' itself.

I strongly suggest you create the backgrounds first - flesh your characters out. Learn about them. That will tell you exactly how the MC, rapist and girlfriend will respond in that moment.

 

Okay thanks. But what happens if you flesh out the characters but then it turns out that the build into pay off that you do not think is good? Shouldn't you decide on the pay off first, to avoid that?

 

Honestly I flesh out my characters first. Everyone has their own method when creating stories, however by knowing my characters intimately it rewards me by not having to spend so much time thinking of how they'll behave or act in a particular situation. I also beat out my story after I create my characters. Again, I can always lean on that information through-out the entire development process. Whatever way you feel comfortable developing your story is certainly up to you though.

 

Okay thanks. However, the character can act certain ways depending on what happens. Like if his quest for revenge leads to someone being killed accidentally that he did not intend, he will learn from it and learn that violence begets violence. Or if that unfortunate unintention does not happen, than he can still pursue his revenge. So things like that, make me unsure sometimes. I feel I have to decide on the pay off and the theme first, before deciding on the characters cause I feel the pay off, is what is most important. Or maybe I could flesh out the characters and then try to make them work into the pay off I have in mind.

As far as whether or not the character is driven by the act of rape or the deeper meaning to it, basically the character wants to stop her from doing it again and again, and feels she has to be stopped one way or the other.

 

Yeah, stories are tricky that way. I typically learn of my characters and trust the process from there. What I try to do is stay true to that character and will act out or imagine how they will respond to a situation, exactly how they would. Not to say that sometimes their action or behavior doesnt change from the original vision. Im sure you know how characters can sometimes want to do something completely unexpected (I love those moments).

As far as payoffs and themes, I usually have those beat/sub beat out already before I even begin the creation process. This kind of preparation keeps me sane (whatever that means to a writer) when I create as I dont have to remember much during creation because those all important beats and emotional payoffs are right there in front of me on the billboard. I make sure to hit all of them. Again though, that doesnt mean that this doesnt change from time-to-time. It does.

Not sure if I was clear before, but when I spoke of revenge I was speaking on the motivation/goal of your rapist/antagonist. Would love to know more. But, if you would prefer me to be patient and wait until you release your work and buy the damned thing to find out, I'm in.

 

Oh I misunderstood you before. Well the villain, is being pursued by the police and that is how the MC gets involved before she meets him and rapes, him, while he does not know that she is the perp.

Basically she has been going around doing it for a few months without being caught and she is doing it because she has been rejected by boys and men all her life, in a situation of involuntary celibacy as it's been called in my research.

I think I have the theme and pay off, worked out for the MC and the villain, but need to work it out for the MC and his relationship with his gf. There are times when I find the plot pay off that I want, getting in the way with the character theme pay off.

For example, I wanted the villain to learn from her mistakes and regret what she has done and try to do something to stop the MC from getting revenge on her. Like trying to negotiate turning herself in, and what it would entail confessing too, instead of the MC framing her for harsher crimes or possibly killing her to exact justice.

But if she turns herself in, than that might come off as anticlimatic. I was also told by others that they had trouble believing that the villain would try to negotiate a truce with the MC since that puts the villain in more danger. They also had trouble empathizing with a rapist who wanted to 'do the right thing', and felt that she has already done too much wrong, to warrant that.

So I could go for the climax where the MC traps her and gets his revenge, or I could have it so she tries to negotiate a truce and have it be her down fall, but I find the story becoming overcomplicated, plot wise, if I try to go for both. But if I don't have the villain learn anything, I feel that I have a villain who is incapable of learning. But I was told by some that is okay, and lots of the great fictional villains, are incapable of learning as well.

 

This is true. The only character that doesnt have to grow is the villain. If she doesnt learn anything by the end, you're okay. There's a rule I go by with every script I create. "Keep the story simple and the characters complicated." If you feel the plot is becoming too complicated for its own good, you're probably right. Try not to over think it. I believe that steals away the "magic" in your story. Just like over-editing. Too much of anything can be bad.

 

Yep okay. A lot of my favorite stories are ones where the villain ends up redeeming him/herself or learning to overcome their flaws, so perhaps I am just use to that.

 

Is the rapist the person your MC was already investigating, or someone different? If it's the same person, and he tells another cop, that cop would be obligated to tell their superior. If he continues to investigate when he is now a victim of that perp, then it's a conflict of interest. (CSI and the like violate this all the time.)

 

For my story it's about a cop who wants to bring down a gang of criminals, even breaking the law and do it on his own himself, to try to do it successfully.

However, when writing it, I kept facing too problems. If he is acting on his own, how is he suppose to be bring in any evidence, without it becoming fruit of the poisonous tree? Since he is acting on his own, without search or wire tap warrants, he cannot bring any evidence, that would be admissible in court.

Another problem I had is that I wanted the MC to bring the villains down all at once, without having to one, than the other, than the other, etc. Cause then it would look too suspicious and get too complicated, to the police, cause there is only so much he can get away with, and the villains would be less able to be taken by surprise at that point. It just creates more complications.

Basically I did some research and sat down with a real police officer, and came up with an ending that I think would work, at least well enough, but I am not sure if the reader will understand it.

Basically in order for evidence to be accepted without being fruit of the poisonous tree, there is one thing that the MC could do. He can tail and spy on the villains until he sees one of the villains go to a certain place. After the villain leaves, the MC then breaks into that place and finds incriminating evidence on all the villains.

Basically the main leader of the gang of villains has collateral on each of the members by video-recording each one of their blood ins. A blood in, is when a gang recruits a new member, that member has to spill the blood of another person, to prove they are reliable, but also to prove that they are not undercover cops.

He then takes all of the videorecordings on all of them, with him. He then arranges for the villains to all be in the same place at the same time, through baiting and manipulating them with his own little sting operation. He then goes to where they are and breaks into the building, but without making much noise, so they won't notice.

He then leaves the video recordings in plain view, where he broke in. He gets an ally of his to make an anonymous call to the police. The caller then tips the police by reporting a break in that just happened, and that there are video recordings in plain view at the entrance of the place, that was broken into. The caller tells the police that on these recordings are the blood ins of all the gang members, that were recorded for having collateral on each one of them.

The police then go to the scene, find the break in, and sees the recordings in plain view. They call their superiors, who then call the prosecutor and a judge to get a warrant to obtain them, based on the callers specifics.

The caller then calls back and tells the police that the gang members who are on that video are also close by in the same building. The gang members shortly later begin to leave, only to discover that the place has been broken into, with the blood in recordings right there, and the police right there waiting for a warrant as well. So this is what the MC was hoping for, to get evidence on them that will not be fruit of the poisonous tree, but also to get all the villains discovered by the police all at once.

However, do I need to explain to the reader why the MC decides to catch the villains this specific way, with the legal technicalities, of the evidence needing to be reported by someone, other than a cop, or someone related to a cop that is on the case, which is why it has to be anonymous...or that it has to be in plain view, etc.

Or do most readers understand the how the fruit of the poisonous tree thing works, and they will understand why the MC chooses this specific plan?

 

Great idea to go and speak to an actual police officer. I've never done that kind of research myself (but my stories tend to be pretty silly).

I didn't even know the phrase 'fruit of the poisonous tree' - had to google it. Apparently it's a US term so maybe me being British is the problem there. Also, I don't read a lot of crime writing so it could be reasonable to assume that someone who did would be aware of this rule. To me though, you would definitely need to sneak an explanation in somehow.

More than anything I'm curious to know why the cop acting on his own? Is there some personal connection whereby he feels the criminals' downfall has to be entirely his work?

 

First of all why doesn't he just go and get a warrant once he knows their secret place? That be the easiest way around the bush.

 

^^ Seconding what Iain said.

 

It's 172 separate threads now.

 

Yes. I tried to make this point in an earlier thread on the same subject. I think it's a big mistake to approach the story in the manner the OP is doing, essentially writing by committee by running everything through a writing site or others. It's more likely than not to lead to a bad story, which is quite the opposite of what is intended.

 

The cop is acting on his own out of personal revenge, because of all the damage the gang has done earlier in the story.

There wasn't enough evidence to bring one of the gang members to trial earlier, so he got off free, but because he is not guilty, the police cannot get search warrants or wire tap orders to investigate further. So the MC acts on his own as a result,

He can't get a warrant just because he knows their secret place. He is following and spying on them without authorization and I was told by a cop, that a cop could not get a warrant under those circumstances. The only way he can get one is if someone other than a cop, leads the police to previous evidence, hence the anonymous tipper. If the tipper calls and says I know where these murder suspects are, that is also not enough, and the police cannot arrest someone based on anonymous tips, if the tipper just says this is where the murder suspects are.

The tipper needs to provide proof first, then lead the police to the suspects.

 

My story is a thriller, set in modern day America, and in it, the leader of a gang, recruits members by giving them blood ins. A blood in, is a term for when a new recruit has to spill the blood of another person to join the gang.

The leader of the gang video recorded all of the blood ins over the years, in order to have insurance on his members in case any of them turn on him. He arranged for the recordings on any of them to go to the police should that happen, and he cannot find where the member is, if so.

I wrote it so that in the ending, the police discover all the blood in videos and use that as evidence to prosecute each member. But I was told by a couple of readers that this is a plot hole, because the police are not allowed to use videos of murders as evidence, because technically the videos can be 'hearsay', since there is no way to prove that the victims in the videos are the actual victims, and they could have been actors in make up and the whole video could have been forged. Therefore it's hearsay and would be admissible as evidence.

However, the villain doesn't any logical reasons to keep any other evidence of his gang's crimes around. But if the blood in videos would not be admissible, he doesn't have a reason to have videos as leverage now either.

So is there anything I can do about this plot hole, or does it count as one?

 

Tagging @Wreybies , since he's the legal expert.

 

Oh okay, thanks for tagging him. Or maybe video evidence is the wrong thing for a gang leader to use as leverage against his members. Maybe a different type of physical evidence can be used, that will not tantamount to hearsay. But is there anything better than video for that?

 

My layman guess? A good lawyer could have them dismissed as fiction. After all, Hollywood regularly distributes videos of murders. And, technically, they could be amateur films. The fact that there actually are dead bodies is coincidence.
Perhaps the gang leader keeps the weapon they used, complete with fingerprint and DNA evidence, all under the guise of ritual preservation.