Unstuck

PLOTTING 102: Making Characters Fail

This chapter is going to be a wonderful lesson on how to not let your protagonist off the hook. You'll find that once you start writing, you'll start falling in love with your protagonist (sneaky little fuckers seduce you) and then you'll be more and more lenient on the trials they go through.
This is bad for story. Characters in stories need to struggle a lot and those struggles need to increase with time. What is our main motto when we think of a protagonist going through the journey? BREAK THEM DOWN.
So let's focus on ten ways that we can keep twisting the knife in. THESE TIPS ARE NOT MINE. I read about them in one of the smartest writing books, Wired For Story by Lisa Cron. I know I recommend a lot of authors but she really is a wonderful writer and she uses this book to teach you how psychology and writing structure combine to create stories that hook us.


Without further ado, here is what you should keep in mind when thinking of tension.


TIP #1 : INFORMATION IS CURRENCY
Never let any of the characters, including your protagonist, give away information without being forced too. People don't want to share their demons, their secrets, their plans. They don't want to open up. Let characters keep those motivations to themselves and let the reader wonder. Characters won't admit to things unless they absolutely have to. Meaning, they will only do it if they have something to gain or to keep something bad from happening. In many books (I'm guilty of this too) characters will confess. This is good in real life but not in fiction. You need to build tension in fiction and secrets do just that, which brings us to...

TIP #2 : GIVE YOUR CHARACTERS SECRETS
Give your protagonist a secret, something that will torture them. Let the reader be aware of this secret, in on it. Then use the plot to force the secret out of the protagonist. Lisa Cron says, let the characters have secrets but not keep them. Secrets create tensions between the characters and suspense. Secrets are also good for internal conflict. Maybe the secret is the event that lead the character to have a KNOT in the first place. Whatever it is, make sure your character has at least one thing they don't want anyone to know.

TIP #3 : CHARACTERS SHOULD TRY AND FAIL
This tip helps you escalate and come up with a proper Act 2. Make sure that every single attempt the protagonist makes to make things better ends up actually fucking them up further. If the protagonist solves the problem early then we have no story and no rising tension. You want to make sure that every step of the plot, the problem is becoming bigger and bigger.
Having protagonists try and fail also creates irony. Here they are thinking that they are finally going to be rid of this thing that is ruining their life only to notice later on that now they have a bigger problem at hand because of the very thing they did.
Another variation of this might be that the character does succeed in getting what he wants only to afterwards realize that it sucks and he never wanted it in the first place and now have to deal with the consequences of having it. Irony, again.

TIP #4 : EVERYTHING THAT CAN GO WRONG, DOES
In the same vein of thought, you should make a list of every possible bad thing that could happen in this scenario and then let them all happen. If you don't do this you might find out missed opportunities for drama and conflict. You won't have use your tools to their full potential. Remember you want to dramatize your concept as much as possible.
You want the readers to think how will this protagonist ever get out of this? Lisa Cron recommends starting out small, letting the protagonist (and the readers) believe that all the protagonist needs to do is ask for help, for something. From then on keep upping the stakes, keep fucking shit up, make things worse than anyone could ever imagine.

TIP #5 : CHARACTERS TOUGHEN UP WITH THE CONFLICT
What this translates to is this idea that in the beginning the protagonist will only be asked to do little yet he will approach it with resistance and whining. He's weak. He doesn't want to do this. By the end of the story, the journey has made him stronger to the point that that same protagonist will end up risking everything without a word. Basically he will whine most in the steps that are easiest.
Lisa Cron calls this, let your characters start out risking a dollar and end up betting the farm. The situations will make the character more confident in himself and more determined to finish the mission. The hesitation he had in the beginning should slowly fade away as he becomes more invested.


TIP #6 : NO SUCH THING AS FREE LUNCH
This tip goes along with Tip #1 : don't let anything that helps the character come easily. This process isn't about handouts or helping the protagonist out. It's about fighting for every single piece of good thing that comes to him. Good things are hard to get. Bad things come easily. Literally, your protagonist could be sleeping and suddenly someone is there to kill him. Like Tip #4 says make all the bad things happen.
Remember, the protagonist is IGNORANT at the very start of the journey. He can't possibly imagine how bad things will get and how much this will take out of him. Very few protagonist go into journeys like, wow I cannot wait to see how I become a better person after this. Even though that is what is going to happen and we all know it. They always think they'll do this quickly and go back to being that same failure they were. Make them sweat.

TIP #7 : LET YOUR CHARACTERS LIE
This one is important. In real life, we are all taught that lying is wrong and that liars are always caught. We know that if we lie we are only stalling because when the truth does come out, we'll be in big, big trouble. So most of our protagonists end up telling truths too, they confess, they feel sorry, they admit. They talk about their feelings and thoughts openly. Healthy characters.
For fiction to have tension, the opposite needs to happen. Make your characters lie. Why would they tell the truth if they don't have to? These aren't healthy people here. They are flawed people that need correcting. Let them keep things hidden. Let them be silent about their feelings, their real thoughts. Let them lie about themselves, about others, about the situation. Or at the very least, let them not say everything they think.
This tip works particularly well when the readers know the lie. Then they'll wait for it to be exposed (or maybe not, let them get away with it). Depending on what you want to do with the story you can decide how you want the lie to affect the plot and to unfold. The ultimate thing is just to think of ways to make situations worse, not better. Don't release tension, up it.

TIP #8 : CLEAR, PRESENT, ESCALATING THREAT
This tip goes with what I've been saying about ANTAGONISTS all along. They work much, much, much better if they are concrete, clear, right there. Don't make doom something vague. That kind of stealth doesn't work in your favor here. In fact, the most effective, suspenseful stories tell you exactly how things are gonna go unless something happens to change them
Make it clear what is in danger (Are aliens out there eating people? Are people getting murdered? Is there a dirty bomb in Manhattan? What?) Even if you want to keep the real bad guy or the real situation a secret, put something on screen (on page?) that will make us think ok, this is bad. Someone just disappeared into the darkness and I don't know what is happening but people are missing.
Lisa Cron also mentions that the way to do this with emotions or concepts is to personify them. It's very hard to fight against abstract things like anxiety or self-doubt, though it can be done too through physicalizing it, externalizing it and having someone else there personify the loss, the threat.
We all have bad guys in our life. What do those look like? A bully, a bad mother, an abusive husband, a ruthless rival, a cheating landlord. Use those entities to make the internal fight of the protagonist to get better be more of an external fight. Have a goal at the end that's external symbolize internal healing. Maybe they always dreading public speaking but loved debate and the final thing is a debate competition.

A final note on this tip (I really should make a 'bad guy' chapter) is that it's in your interest to have what we call a TICKING TIME BOMB. I understand that it's not possible in all stories but it would make your life easier to see if you can force one in there. What a TICKING TIME BOMB means is that there is something, like a countdown, fighting against the protagonist.
There is more tension in the protagonist needing to do something before the bomb goes off, in three days, before that competition comes, before the deadline approaches. Deadlines create tensions, even in real life. They force action. The reader will always keep in mind that something bad is about to happen and if this character doesn't get his shit together, we are all screwed.
TICKING TIME BOMBS even work to give tension to filler scenes. Now that we know we only have three days before the apocalypse, every moment is precious. Even in scenes where the characters are resting, the reader is worrying for them.
Basically, the minute you establish a TIME BOMB, a deadline, the reader takes it upon himself to be the one responsible for guarding it. He is now the time-keeper, always thinking, ok but you only have this much time so really, just keep going.


TIP #9 : GIVE BAD GUYS GOOD SIDES
With how things have gone lately, antiheroes and Deadpool and shit, we all know that we love troubled people. There is no excitement in super good people or super bad people. They are caricatures of humanity. If you show them in your stories, they'll be read as boring (if they're good) or ridiculous (if they're bad). No one is that one-dimensional. Everyone has motivations for doing stuff.
Lisa Cron says, the audience has to hope, until the very last moment, that the bad guy can be redeemed. This is that classic moment where the hero helps the bad guy not fall off a cliff and they take one more swipe at his face before falling to their death. It's a classic because it works that muscle in us that has hope that this antagonist can understand, can be given a chance.
There are very few characters I can think of where I'm like ok, die now and die painfully. That's a different kind of satisfaction. Most of the time we want redemption. Make it possible for a reader to have that hope.
What does that mean? Here is how you lose reader's sympathy for a character: you either make that character commit things so horrible that nothing will excuse them or you make characters do bad things without a motivation or a proper explanation as to why they are doing it. If you do those things, readers will think, ok, there is no salvation for him (and maybe that's what you want).
If you don't want that, give you ANTAGONIST a backstory too and make sure that, as readers, we understand it. I'd advise against villain monologues though, those are just outdated and read as funny at this point. Find more subtle ways for us to know why he's doing what he's doing.


TIP #10 : EXPOSE YOUR CHARACTERS
This tip is the best way to end this chapter because it summarizes all of the tips. This is what we want to be the result of every single attempt at torture we make. Every single external thing shouldn't be there just to be there (like don't throw a tornado in if the story isn't about natural disaster just because tornados are bad). Every external thing that goes wrong serves to force the character to face something that he does not want to recognize or reconcile with.
The external things are slowly peeling away at layers of the character to expose his vulnerable core (THE ESSENCE) that he has hidden from the world ages ago and protects with the outer layers and personas (THE IDENTITY aka THE MASK). Match the situations to the FLAW. Ask yourself, how are these things I'm throwing at my PROTAGONIST forcing him to change and recognize he needs to that in the first place?
Another way to do this is by removing instead of throwing. The first way is us throwing at the protagonist every obstacle imaginable. This second way is us removing from the protagonist every sanctuary he has. This is what I talked about in the last chapter too. Slowly and systematically, take away every ounce of protection this person has until he is left exposed to the harm.
This might be actually taking away physical protection like his home, his security, etc or taking away internal things that protected him, his masks, his fake sense of self, the people around him, the things he used to hide behind, etc. We need him to be raw.


Let's summarize...
When writing or editing, ask yourself these questions:

1. Is there any point in the story that people confess or admit to things willingly?
(And how can I make those instances forced?)

2. Does my protagonist have a secret they don't want anyone to know?(And how can I force it out of them using my plot?)

3. Does everything my protagonist do end up aggravating the problem?
(And how can I make bad things happen because of the character's actions?)

4. Has everything that could go wrong, gone wrong?
(And how can I make a list that guarantees I've used my most dramatic points?)

5. Does my character do things in the end that they'd never thought they could at the start?
(And how can I show them growing as a person through their reactions to the conflict?)

6. Is there a point in my story that my protagonist is given a hand-out?
(And how can I make sure that my protagonist fights tooth-and-nail for every gain?)

7. Is there a point where my protagonist tells the truth when it would benefit them to lie?
(And how can I expose them for what they are, a dirty, little liar?)

8. Is there a clear bad guy that will do clear damage in a clear time-frame?
(And how can I force the situation and stakes to be as high as they can?)

9. Have I made my bad guy all bad with no hopes of redemption?
(And how can I motivate his actions and show readers that side of him?)

10. Am I doing my best to expose and remove every layer of protection from the protagonist?
(And how can I use my external plot points to jab and make the protagonist face himself?)

I know this was a little more talky and general, as opposed to my other more concrete, write-this advice but I think it's helpful to keep in mind because it doesn't come to us naturally. We want things to get better so we help characters do that. What we need to do is disallow things to be good until every bad thing has happened.