Hi! First off, I’ll say that I’m new here, so if I’m doing something wrong or posting this in the wrong place, please let me know and I’m sorry. Ok, so to keep things less confusing, we’re going to have person A - ( who is the main character and a girl) Person B - ( who is the main character’s best friend and is a girl) And person C- ( who is person b’s brother and is with person A at the time) I’m in the middle of writing a story where person B gets kidnapped and goes missing and stuff. So as you would expect, Person A and person C are very worried and distraught and all that jazz. So I’m planning on making it seem like person B was found dead, because her kidnappers made a fake body or something to make it look like person B, but they’re actually alive and just in another spot. So I was wondering how I could make that seem sadder? Because Person A and C actually think person B is dead. ( I should probably mention person A’s father is dead and shes been terrified this whole time that her best friend will end up like him , which is dead) Sorry if this doesn’t make any sense..
Like, sadder for the audience? Or sadder for the characters? If you mean sadder for the audience, I'd suggest making it quick. Don't write out the scene to be overly detailed and long, that kills all kinds of emotions, including sadness. If the scene is really long and detailed, your audience will quickly become desensitized to the idea of this character being dead. Keep it short, bitter, and to the point. If you mean for the characters, draw that shit out. Make them think they have a chance. Keep giving them hope that they'll find B alive and well up until the very last second. When they find the body, they should be filled with the hope of success so that it can be ripped out in an instant. There's an example of this I can show you, where there's a character is trouble who is trying to avoid death. Spoiler: Danganronpa 2 and 3 She makes it through all of these traps, gets horribly injured, and has her spirit beaten down over and over. But, she holds onto hope and finds the exit. At this point, all of her friends are watching, waiting for her to escape and find them (She's basically the super-friend of the group. Or the Heart if you want to get symbolic). She walks through the exit, everyone's filled with hope, only to find one last, completely unavoidable trap waiting to kill her. If you want the characters to suffer, you have to give them hope, only to show them that there was never any hope to begin with. That second one also works for your audience, but you run the risk of over-hyping the survival. It's kind of the same thing as before. If you write it all out, like you should when selling the idea that these characters have hope, you might accidentally write too much hope and your audience could catch onto the twist. It's like when a horror story has everyone survive until the last third of the story, so you know that a lot of people are going to die really quickly.
Is the reader aware that Person B is still alive? Because if the reader believes B is dead and then it turns out she isn't, you better have foreshadowed that really well, otherwise the reader may feel cheated, like you're trying to draw tears out of them for fun. I think that would be your bigger problem than making it seem sad. If you've written it well enough and the reader connects with B, there's no reason why the reader shouldn't find that sad, so I'm not sure what your concern is. And if you haven't given the reader time to get to know the character, you won't really be able to make them sad over her death. Your reader may be sad for Person A to see her heart break so, but it wouldn't be because B is dead, if that makes sense.
Thank you, that was really helpful I’m not really sure whether or not I wanted it to be sadder for the characters or the audience.. both I guess? I’m not really sure.. either way, this was really helpful and thank you The reader also thinks that Person B is dead. Ohhhh yeah, I see what you mean ( I haven’t thought about that lol). Thanks for replying!
Death scenes work when readers either care about the person who died, the person left behind, or both. So, the first step in writing a death scene is do what you've been doing and creating great characters. The second step is to create a realistic reaction. The faster the characters move onto the next thing, the faster your readers will too. That's why so many death scenes are considered "pointless." Someone dies, they all cry for five seconds and then move on. And the feeling of that person's loss should be one felt throughout the course of the entire story.
"Now Helen, why did we think you were dead? I am surprised you survived that." Like it kinda has already been said, we have to be invested in the characters, otherwise it doesn't work. So it could be sad for the MC, but for the reader it could just feel kinda off. That is all I know. Good Luck.
For me, your question about sadness for the loss of a character has to be with the reader/audience (I'll just use "reader" in this case) and you should approach it with that view. What makes the loss of a character sad for the reader would be if the read had invested anything into them before they died. A good way to create investment is to give that character things for the reader to related to such as their potential. Example: "Person B was just given a great opportunity that could change their life. A new job or they just started a new relationship. Another way that could make them relatable is to create empathy. Person B could endure a series of hardships that make them more sympathetic, such as the loss of a good job or the end of a relationship. Adding this detail also makes them more of a real person to the reader. When they discover that character is dead, it will have more impact because you've mad e the reader invest more into that character's story.
