#storytips

    1) Sacrifice. Either by their own means or against their will. Either way, their death saves thousands of lives, OR... maybe their sacrifice does the opposite and ends up killing thousands, but they died thinking they left a positive impact.

     2) Stabbed in the back by the one guy everyone told them not to trust, but they decided to trust anyway because “there’s still good in him.”

     3) After surviving a very dangerous event in your book, they die afterwards from something minor or a wound that they’ve been concealing.

     4) They’re being mind controlled by the enemy, so they beg their allies to kill them before they do something bad. Or they already did that bad thing and have to be killed after creating an upset. This makes a bad event even worse.

     5) Give them an “Achilles heel” — a single weakness that ends up being their downfall.

     6) They die by their worst fear (ex. drowning if they’re afraid of deep water.) This could end up haunting and affecting the other characters deeply.

     7) Consider killing them in the middle of their character arc. An abrupt, sudden death that leaves their story unfinished. Was the bad guy just about to be redeemed? Did the shy hermit finally gain enough courage go on an adventure, only to die before reaching the end?

     8) Give them an ironic death. The champion is killed by accidentally tripping. The dragon rider is eaten by one of his dragons.

Pt. 2 — Coming Soon

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My last few blog posts were discussing what anxiety is from a clinical standpoint. Today, we’re going to bring all the pieces together and discuss how you can use this to form a character/story arc.

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If you have been exposed to any writing theory at all, then you are probably at least a little familiar with standard story structures. This is the form in which most stories go: First there’s an introduction followed by an inciting incident, then there’s the middle stuff as the character tries to manage the change in their world that was caused by the inciting incident. Everything comes to a head in the climax followed by the resolution. Now I’m going to describe this using what we’ve previously discussed in anxiety terms.  

Character is living life in a relatively normal way whether they be a young teen or an expert secret agent. Then a stressor occurs: teen is in a major car accident and loses her leg; secret agent is betrayed and watches helplessly as his entire team is killed. This stressor will cause a psychological and physiological response in the character (see post: Anxiety for Writer’s Summarized). Depending upon what type of story you are writing, you may want to linger here for a bit. If your character is a teen suffering from loss of limb, a good portion of the story might be spent on failing to accept herself, falling into a depression, and journeying out. (Keeping in mind that these mental health conditions are linked and anxiety often leads to depression. For more information on types of anxiety disorders, what they look like, and why they might manifest, see post: Writers Guide to Mental Health: Anxiety Disorders)

At some point in the story, a decision by your character, conscious or otherwise, needs to be made. Are they going to live in a continual state of anxiety? Or are they going to move forward and out of that state?

Your character may not come out of it. They may fall into a depression and that’s how the story ends. Keep in mind that is an option. A tragic option, but an option nonetheless.

If your character does seek help and healing, they will probably go through some sort of a process where they face their fears and become more courageous. This can be through self-initiative or with the formal help of a therapist. How this happens will be determined by a lot of factors including your story type, setting, and character’s personalities. For information on how anxiety is treated in a clinical setting, check out my post: Writers Guide for the Treatment of Anxiety Disorders.

Probably the best, well-known story to use as an example in bringing all this together is Batman. Bruce Wayne is afraid of bats. They cause an anxiety related response, so he exposes himself to these bats until he is braver. Then he channels the bat in order to defeat the underworld.

Of course, this is just a superficial representation of what is taking place in the broader story as a whole. Bruce Wayne experienced a trauma when his parents were murdered by members of the criminal underworld. For years, he struggled with the grief and fear of this event. Then he channeled his fears, became a criminal vigilante, and confronted them and defeated the criminal underworld.

My husband started watching this anime show on Netflix called “Attack on Titan” the other day. I was sitting there with my headphones in trying to get a work done on my WIP. Usually, I can tone whatever he’s watching out, but my gosh, this show was a creepy as hell! If you’ve ever seen it, you’ll know what I mean. 

I continued to try and ignore it, but the imagery was exceptional, and the giants eating people was like a bad car accident--you can’t help but watch. And worst of all--it’s completely in subtitles, so the earphones did nothing. 

Long story short--we are both now bingeing “Attack on Titan.” 

And as a writer, that’s when you know you’re on to something. When your story sucks viewers/readers in against their will--what you have created is good. 

A similar thing happened when my grandmother came to live with my parents when I was a kid. She had her own apartment downstairs and watched the Lifetime channel religiously. Now, my family used to mock this channel and the shows. They can be a bit melodramatic after all. But one by one, my family would disappear into the basement. Mom would start by going down there to ask Grandma a simple question, like if she’d like something for dinner. After awhile, my dad or my sister would go see what happened to Mom and never come back. So, someone else would go down and see. Soon, all of us would be sitting on her couch staring at that blasted TV with the volume high enough to rupture eardrums (Grandma was half deaf).