First, a big thanks to everyone who posted words of encouragement after my bad writing day on Monday. They helped!
Also, welcome to Shelli Stevens and T.J. Killian, who kindly posted their first comments in the past week. It's always nice to have a little new blood around the old blog!
This post is going to have to be brief because the kids are screaming at me to go swimming and I always get some of my best writing done out by the pool. (That's because I don't have wireless Internet and so I can't fork around on blogs and reading email/chatting, so there's nothing else to do.)
But, as it turned out, the reason the scene wasn't working on Monday was because I was trying to make my heroine behave in a way that's completely antithetical to her nature. Once I realized that, it was easy to see how to fix it. The only problem now is I'm going to have to write a love scene much earlier in the book than I originally anticipated and they always take forever! I enjoy writing them, actually, but they're difficult to get right.
So, today's post question is: What do you do when your characters refuse to behave as your plot demands? Do you beat them into submission or change the plot? Or a little of both?
And now, the pool!
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7 comments:
I try to let them be them within the confines of the general plot, but then I don't write the most detailed outlines/synopses either. I like being an organized pantser. :-) Of course, I've been known to change GMC and plot. Several times. But, uh, YOU know that.
Darcy
I usually let the characters have their heads and let them tell me the story.
In this last book I refused. I have to look at the long view since I'm writing the first book of a six book series and I can't be ruled by one hobag's vagina.
I always get stuck if I take a wrong turn in my story. If my characters want to do something out of context, I let them, with the knowledge I may make them go back and start over. LOL.
If my characters don't want to do what I want them to do, it's usually a motivation issue. They must act true to themselves. So either I have to go back and re-motivate them properly, or I have to rethink the scene so they can act how they "really would".
I used to be really bad at this (case in point: my first two stories) but after some brutal honesty from a crit partner, I realized the error of my ways and (hopefully) now write stories where well-motivated characters act like themselves.
Of course, when I have to change a character's personality (or 3, as recently happened) in the second draft, sometimes things get wonky...
I'm going to take the high ground on this and say - it depends.
If your characters are motivated linealy - ie. they are progressing in a very simple plot toward, say, romance, then the plot needs to gain more weight.
If your plot has weight but the characters aren't up to speed, then the characterization needs to gain depth.
Will have to comment on this on my blog otherwise I'll get way too wordy.
T.J.
I think about it before I decide whether to beat them or spoil them. This is probably a good trait in a God-like being, no?
I let them have their way -- but I'm a plotter, big time, so when my characters throw me for a loop, I get out the old outline and see what can stay and what can go. If too much has to go and I'm totally off kilter, I have to go back to the beginning and replot the whole thing. It usually looks much better than the original! Then, once I have a "map" to where I'm going, I start writing again.
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