I'm late to the party, but I thought I might comment since I used to think a lot about this subject as well. First of all, tropes are absolutely unavoidable. Fiction writing has evolved to a point where no matter what cool way to twist your story you'll come up with, there's a 90% chance 10 writers already did it better. I don't think I read a story from the current century that was devoid of tropes. Second, I think it's actually better when a story is predictable than the other way around because that means said story follows a structure. Chekov's gun is predictable, but it's better than pulling a shotgun out of nowhere. My music teacher used to tell me that in order to break the rules effectively, you must first learn why they work. And by following a structure, you show that you have some knowledge about narrative constructs. It's better than making a story completely random. Once you'll understand what in certain structures makes your story satisfying, you can work on twisting it to be less predictable while still keeping the elements that made it satisfying in the first place. And lastly, "predictability" rarely ruins good stories. It's a problem if your story is only dependent on tension (which is why genres such as mystery novels and thrillers rely heavily on good plotwists) but there are a lot of stories that offer different ways to keep the reader entertained. Character writing will be dependent on your characterization. Motif-based writing will rely on your ability to discuss a point by using metaphors and symbolism. Wish-fulfillment fantasy will rely on your ability to describe the setting well. And these are just examples I thought of while eating pasta and typing this comment. To discuss issues via the use of allegory? To externalize one's psychological state in a form of a fantastical setting? To create theoretical scenarios exploring the nature of humanity under a different set of rules than those present in our own reality? Not to mention the obvious escapism factor.
Yeah, I could have worded it better. There's definitely a place for the simple stories that don't have much emotional depth or complexity. Hell, those are the kind I used to read and write when I was young. But it's exciting to find sci-fi and fantasy that breaks out of those boundaries.
I see what you did there Is Wolfe's quote re. genre science fiction available? Because it starts off long-form doesn't it - Frankenstein, War of the Worlds, Tomorrow's Eve - but comes to be defined by magazine shorts.
The Ducktales reboot cartoon shows a very good grasp of this, because they aim to create surprises a small child would recognize in retrospect, and they do it in a cartoon that has very little time for unnecessary details. To an adult, the "surprises" are usually obvious, because there are a limited number of ways the things they show could turn out to be relevant. (This character's magical necklace protects against burns, and wouldn't you know it, the villain just tried to burn her to death.) Even so, the structure can still work from an adult viewer's perspective. Instead of wondering how the characters will get out of this, you watch as every domino is painstakingly assembled before the inevitable collapse. It's a slight derail, but this is also a good way of thinking about twists the characters themselves wouldn't inevitably see coming. If they knew which details were the important ones, it would be obvious, but from an in-universe perspective, some things are beneath notice until it's too late.
I've read many books that had "predictable" plots, but I didn't mind or really even notice because I was enthralled by the characters. I've read some books with really interesting plots, but I couldn't enjoy them because I didn't like the protagonist (simply a personal preference, I have nothing against the authors), whose personality shared the qualities of a bowl of cold, congealed oatmeal. The point I'm trying to get at here is that a well-rounded protagonist can completely turn around a "predictable" plot. Honestly, you're probably going to start with a predictable plot. I'd say the majority of us do! But some people focus so much on making a unique plot that they neglect the characters, leaving them not much more than cardboard cutouts. Then you have an interesting plot full of clever twists, but you're left with predictable characters boring the reader (yes, this was learned from experience. And yes, it was bad.). So start with your predictable plot, then focus on your protagonist. Give them the details that make them human (or whatever species they are. Make them believable, I should say), and build them until they begin to build themselves. Tweak their personality until you know them as well as you know yourself, until you don't decide what they do, you just "know" what they would do. You'll start to see your "predictable" plot through their eyes and you'll watch it grow with them until it barely resembles what you started with. In a nutshell, bash your predictable plot over the head with a sledgehammer of unique perspective until you can't recognize the predictability anymore. I hope this helps. Best of luck!
I am writing a middle-grade novel as part of a writing course, and I asked about predictably not so long ago in one of our group sessions. The consensus in our group was that predictability isn't necessarily a bad thing, especially for children's fiction, as kids like the feeling that they worked it out. It's more important to give them a good adventure and present it in a fun way. I guess its a bigger deal if it's a crime story and you work it out on page 5
I like to use historical settings as a background for my books. So there is a certain amount of predictability which is unavoidable. It's how my characters behave and interact which make it interesting. (At least I hope so.) I also like putting my characters into situations that may appear to be out of character. Force them to confront things they certainly weren't planning on facing.
Be careful as this can backfire spectacularly. I don't want to shamefully plug my own thread in here but I went to great lengths to make my novel ending as unpredictable yet fitting as I could, and the result was that all the beta readers said it sucked and was too dark. https://www.writingforums.org/threads/wrote-myself-into-a-terrible-corner-what-now.172089 I'm still conflicted about it and dropped writing it indefinitely.
I may be stating the obvious here but, you can tell if your plot is predictable when you tell someone all about the beginning of your story and then ask them what they think happens next and eventually. If they guess right, you have a predictable plot. Having said that, it all depends on how you play it. Any plot can be predictable or unpredictable depending on the clues you give. To make a story unpredictable, you need to mislead the reader into thinking events will play out in a different way than they actually do. You also need to leave enough details to foreshadow the actual events but do so in a way that doesn't look like foreshadowing (those details need to have other reasons for being there). When a plot twist comes, you want the reader to think, 'yes, of course, why didn't I see that coming,' rather than, 'where the hell did that come from?' Generally, foreshadow the wrong things blatantly, and foreshadow the right things subtaly.
That's a great point. It's wonderful to see something happen that you didn't see coming, and it surprised you, but then you realize that it had to happen that way. The Coen brothers were masters at that, even in the little details. Consider the part in Fargo where the car dealer arrives late to a scene and discovers his father-in-law shot to death. After a long overhead shot of him sitting in the car, parked near the body, you start wondering what's going to happen next. And then you see the trunk popping open. Didn't expect that. But it was the inevitable "next thing" to happen.
