I commented to a friend of mine yesterday that it seemed one of my main characters had too many powerful allies (read: any at all) and that, at first, I wasn't sure what to do about it--and then I decided a quick murder could solve the problem. Seemed like a natural solution at the time. His immediate comment was, "Ah, the Archer world view! There is no problem that can't be solved by murdering the right person at the right time." I wonder if I overuse that sort of thing. In this case it's still perfect, but it made me take a look at some other writing of mine to see if... Ok, well, yeah. Seemingly central characters drop like flies in my work. So I wanted to ask. In your Plot Creation Toolbox, what's the one tool you pull out most often?
My tools are not generally plot devices. The tool I most often use is peoplewatching. Have you ever bungled a murder attempt, and had the intended victim become a serious liability for your character?
Oh no--not murder by a character. Murder by me. --- Edit: You'd be amazed how hard it is for a character to come back to haunt anything when the writer is the one who killed them. If I want him to come back, it's not really bungled. But, no, it's never actually happened. I haz de sure shot. Sure to make de body drop. It probably helps that I'm usually doing it to create serious liabilities for my characters.
You could disable the character until the time suits you... Or just change everything you've ever written. Try destroying his allies, maybe.
