Have you ever read a book and been unhappy with one or more of the choices the author made? How could Bailey Flanigan marry that guy instead of the other one I was cheering for? How could Lucy Maud Montgomery kill off that character at the end of Anne of Green Gables? Actually, I read somewhere that Lucy Maud later regretted that too.
But spare a thought for the author. They have to make hundreds of choices when writing their masterpieces. Some may be relatively minor, like whether the main character prefers tea or coffee. (Unless of course your story involves derring-do at a tea plantation or a Starbucks franchise.) However, other choices are more significant. What happened in Su Ling’s background that makes her wary of strangers? What lesson will Captain Giles learn as he fights off the pirates in the Maldives? Will Carrie marry Harry in Glengarry? And did the butler do it?
It reminds me of those decision trees we used back in my Uni days. A decision tree is a flow chart that shows various options and their respective outcomes. For example, some people are under lockdown restrictions at the moment, so a decision tree might look something like this. ‘Are you in a lockdown area at the moment? Yes/No?’ If you say ‘yes’, the next branch of the tree might say, ‘Are you an essential worker?’ Yes/No?’ If you say ‘No’, that might lead to a branch that says, ‘Work from home’. If you say, ‘Yes’, the branch might say, ‘Go to work, but wear a mask,’ and so on. By following the branches, you eventually arrive at the best course of action.
The trouble with writing a novel, though, is that the decisions are not always cut and dried. If you’re writing a murder mystery, why is your victim killed and what method is used? If you’re writing a romance novel, which obstacles are going to keep your sweethearts apart until love wins in the end? If you’re writing sci-fi, what nifty not-yet-invented gadgets will pop up?
While you may have a myriad of choices, here are a few things to keep in mind.
Actions and Reactions
Each option has a consequence. Be sure to think through those consequences and determine if that’s the path you want your story to take. Otherwise, you can end up writing yourself into a corner or discovering something down the track that makes a particular subplot untenable. While you can’t foresee every possible problem, you can at least avoid some of them with a little forethought.
The Story Arc
Is that option the best for the story as a whole? Does it move the story forward? It might be exciting to have your heroine bungee jumping over Niagara Falls on her holidays, but not if she’s an aid worker trying to help refugees in Ethiopia.
Originality
Is there enough originality in the plot? Sometimes, we can tend towards the easy option (e.g., the one that doesn’t involve another month of research), but that doesn’t always make for the most riveting novel. Try to come up with something new, or at least something that puts a new spin on an old idea.
The Reader
Think of the story from the perspective of the reader, including genre expectations. Your romance readers won’t be thrilled if the couple doesn’t get together at the end, and your mystery enthusiasts won’t like it if your sleuth doesn’t solve the crime. Your readers may not always be happy with the choices you make, but they should be able to see why certain outcomes were important for the story.
Christian Content
If you’re a Christian author, you also have some unique decisions to make while plotting. Are you writing for a predominantly Christian audience or a mainstream audience? The answer to that question, will affect how you deal with faith-based issues in your novel. For example, if you’re writing for the Christian market, your characters can go to church, pray, mention Bible verses or passages and discuss Christian themes, though even Christian readers won’t always like it if it gets too ‘preachy’.
If you’re writing for the mainstream market, you don’t have to avoid faith-based topics, though you might need to be more subtle in sharing some aspects of a Christian worldview. For example, you can get across the essence of a Biblical concept, such as forgiveness, without citing a scripture. You can show the answer to a character’s prayers or show him or her grappling with questions of faith without making it sound like a sermon.
And of course, you can pray about your story and ask God to guide you through the various branches of your fictional decision tree.
If you’re a writer, what challenges have you faced at different decision points in your plot? Is there anything you’d do differently? If you’re a reader, what kind of plot issues bug you in fiction? I’d love to hear your examples.
Photo Credits
Featured photo of tree by Alicja on Pixabay. Photo of flow chart by Gerd Altmann on Pixabay.
I had in interesting discussion with my beloved this morning after a random thought informed a potential plot point in my sequel. I mused at how an unexpected eruption from the dim recesses of my brain answered a question I hadn’t actively considered for months; he pointed out that complex problems often need mulling over, even relegating to the subconscious recesses of our minds for creative reworking.
When I read your post, I thought, yes, despite distractions and neglect, the neuron trees have been busy branching and budding in the wild woods of my imagination and managed to produce fruit in due season. Thank you, Jesus.
And thank you, Nola, for the practical imagery of your post. I love the idea of consciously utilising decision trees. Mine may resemble scruffy bushes at first, but that makes it easier to identify which branches to prune.
Thanks for that, Mazzy, and good on you for having those firing neurons. It’s amazing how that can happen, and yes, there are lots of issues that need mulling over. Although my last novel wouldn’t have taken 7 years and 8 months to write and revise if I’d been more organised, it wasn’t the sort of thing I could knock out quickly either. It definitely needed that mulling time. It took Anthony Doerr 10 years to write ‘All the Light We Cannot See’, which won the Pulitzer Prize. Looking forward to cheering on your soon-to-be-released tome and find out what happens in the sequel. Thanks for commenting.
Thanks Nola. Yes, I’m making so many decisions all the time. The whole plot would go in a different direction if one of the girls fell in love with the guy her friend likes. The possibilities are endless.
And re the expectations of the readers, I write Christian literature, but it’s not typical and is getting less typical all the time, I suspect. I hope to reach Christians but also some other unchurched readers who will find the story interesting enough to forgive the Christian thread.
Hi Jeanette – Yes those branches can certainly have lots of twists and turns. Your books sound interesting. The Christian/mainstream thing is probably better described as a continuum rather than either/or. A lot of unchurched people would still be interested in spiritual issues I think, but it depends how it’s done. In historical fiction, in particular, it’s easy to introduce God, church, prayer etc, because it was more common in the past. But modern readers can still be interested in faith issues. Good luck working out which romantic branch your latest WIP will take. Thanks for commenting.