I'm writing a supernatural thriller at the moment and I'm totally stuck. (new to writing by the way) So my character has been approached by people from “the other world” trying to entice his interest in joining them for some unknown reason. Then another gang (on the opposite side to the ones who have approached him before) try to kill him and this forces him to seek out the “good” team for information and protection. But I'm not sure if I like the “attack idea”. What would you suggest?
Hi there, I'll tell you what I would do in this position and why I think you may be having problems, but I'm not an experienced writer so hopefully others will chime in as well and offer better guidance. First, I think you need to decide whether this is a plot driven story or a character driven story. Both are fine but it's good to know. You can combined them of course but most people tend to lean more one way or the other. Thrillers do tend to be fast paced and a bit more plot-driven. What you have so far is a plot driven story. Events happen outside the characters control that force them to make a choice or to act. In some cases it removes the characters choice entirely. He has no choice but to seek out the people who can give him information to keep his arse alive. If you're not careful you can end up with a reactive character. Someone who never takes charge and is constantly controlled by events around them (external conflicts). To make it character driven he needs more room to make a choice and his choices cause other events to occur that wouldn't have before. So maybe the “bad” team approach him in a conversational way and try to convince him they are the good guys and the others are manipulative devils. This leads to internal conflict. Your character needs to make a choice. Who will be decide to trust? And when he makes his decision why did he choose that side? Maybe he goes with the original good guys and this incites the bad guys to try even harder to kill the other team. Or maybe he picks the wrong side because he doesn't trust his own judgement because his gut has been wrong in the past. The characters choices control the plot and make the events happen, not events happen that force the character into a choice. This tends to make it easier to write an active character. Again neither plot driven or character driven is right or wrong, but I do beieve a character needs to be, at some point active and the driving force. And although it's fine to just wing it, I find new writers often benefit from some kind of plan, even if it's very basic. Hope this helped.
Don't make it an attack, just another meeting with corroborating but conflicting claims. The MC is then forced to believe that something is going on he must engage with, but doesn't know who to trust. Much like the beginning of the Matrix, it isn't clear who the good guys are until Agent Smith does something evil.
@cosmic lights - good information and very helpful advice. I think that's what I'll do. I'm not too sure on the character driven plot so I'll look into it. @Farrow - thanks.
Extending upon what cosmic lights said, if you're writing a thriller you need to develop scenes with "narrative weight" (Something is at risk, it doesn't have to be physical) But the only way to do this is to show the readers that these things actually are at risk. You could have the protagonist start out as a driving force, but he could make a fatal mistake that costs something (A limb, a life, a natural disaster) and this causes him to question his judgment as he swaps into a reactive character. Or, you could do it the other way around. There are many ways to give scenes weight, do whatever you feel fits best, but in a thriller having tension is a necessity or it isn't very thrilling. On a side note, having character motivations for this type of thing mapped out can help out a lot. If motivations aren't aligning then that could also disorient the "thrill".
Problems are almost always in earlier stages of working/text/concept. Don't think about that part of story/working methods/whatever where you stuck. Go back. Seek what took you there. If you are writing a plot heavy story, it might be lack of character motivation with some characters. If you have a character who is some kind of idealised version of you, then the problem might be that idealisation process. If your characters are motivated, do they have needs and flaws to build that motivation? Are plot and characters built for your story? (If they are, you'll have big problems which are hard to find because you have blinded yourself.) Seek the beginning of that story. How have you built it and what that kind of story building often produces. Seek the beginning of your characters with outside eyes. The fact that you did not start by telling us about your plot and characters is a big hint towards you being able to find and solve your problems.
Or vice versa. You can make excellent character driven stories by takin out your characters room to make choices and putting them to still make them, even that there is absolutely not room for that kind of choices. You do that and you get several conflicts, story that is both character based and character driven and it might get really interesting twists. If somebody of your characters is not suitable for that environment/role/position/task he has, you might get it even more interesting. Examples: - Hitchiker's Guide to Galaxy (mc) - Da Vinci Code (mc) - Ender's Game (mc) - Pippi Longstockings (mc) - Sherlock Holmes (mc) - Homer Simpson in his job - Svejk (mc) - Forest Gump (mc) - Will Hunting (mc) - most rromantc comedies (love interest) - Westlakes Dortmunder books (ally - Kelp) If you start like that, your story will be constant fitting in of that character and that social or practical environment. Later it looks like that character was perfect. That is because of the power of all those conflicts and they resolutions made that story so interesting. And via that way you must make interesting and creative resolutions all the time, not only on the end of your story. If you think about Game of Thrones... It's all the time: We put someone somewhere he/she does not fit or have room to make choices and that makes this plot driven story so character driven. And characters take their positions in plot by making decisions they don't have room to make.
Some really good suggestions thanks guys. I'll try going back a little bit and maybe dig into my character a bit more.
