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My Real-life Novel is Too Boring?



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Thu Jun 12, 2014 10:10 pm
dancingwatermelon says...



Hi, all! So, I'm writing a novel, "The House of Sand", based on real life. A friend of mine read it and said that I need some major event to move the plot along. I'm not really sure just how big of an event is needed, though. (Not everyone can defy the Capitol and overthrow the government, right?) *cough HungerGames&Divergent cough* I don't really want to make up an event, especially since that would make the novel dependent upon explosions or tragedies or whatever rather than just the individual's actual life.

^Did that make sense? What sort of event would you want to read about in a person's life? Where do I take the novel from here?
  





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Thu Jun 12, 2014 10:15 pm
lostthought says...



Maybe someone died. MC got in a car accident
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Thu Jun 12, 2014 10:24 pm
dancingwatermelon says...



In chapter 3, her grandfather died and she meets his family. Does that count?
  





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Thu Jun 12, 2014 10:33 pm
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niteowl says...



First question: By real life, do you mean "realistic fiction" (John Green is a hot example right now, though I haven't read his stuff yet), a biography or historical fiction of a real person, or an autobiography based on your own life? I'm guessing the first one. In that case, think of the problems you and your family members have or could have. Here's some general examples

-Death/illness (see John Green again), either the MC's or someone else's
-Financial issues (suddenly losing money, suddenly gaining money, people owing other people money, etc.)
-Legal issues (arrests, lawsuits, false accusations, committing a crime)
-Families (always a good source of drama)
-Personal growth/change (what qualities do you want the character to develop? What events could trigger that? For example, if the character needs to be nicer to poor people at the end, having him or someone he loves experience poverty would be an eye-opener).
-School (getting in it, dropping out, getting accepted/rejected by the "dream" school, not having access to it (depending on time/place))

You'll probably have to do some research on the issue of choice (say, a specific disease or legal issue), but all of those could help move the plot along and be interesting to read if done well.

EDIT: That could be very interesting. For that example, I'd research things like the grief process and what people meeting "long-lost relatives" experience
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Thu Jun 12, 2014 10:38 pm
dancingwatermelon says...



Well, chapter One covered some issues at home-- her father is abusive, one of her sisters is usually a jerk. Chapter Two was a pleasant scene with her sisters. Chapter Three was her grandfather's death and meeting his family.

While I have events, I'm wondering if I'm just stating them rather than applying them to the character? (If THAT made any sense...) Like, Person A is bullied by Person B. (Stating it.) Person A is bullied by Person B, so Person A decides to stand up for others who are bullied. (Applying it to character.)
  





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Thu Jun 12, 2014 11:07 pm
niteowl says...



Without seeing the writing, it's possible. A character is going to be affected by lots of different things, both big and small. How they are affected probably depends on the character. Person A in the above example might also run away, cry, and never tell anyone or react by bullying Person C.

You've outlined the first couple chapters...do you know how you want her story to end? If she's going to end up a powerful CEO, for example, how will she need to grow? How does this death and "new family members" change her?
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Thu Jun 12, 2014 11:11 pm
birk says...



Realistic fiction is a good genre with lots of potential.

Though, despite dealing with everyday things and issues, I'd still want such a novel to be interesting. You say you could use some more 'events' to spice up your novel, which is good. I would still sort of view the entire novel itself as a major event in the life of your character. Otherwise it wouldn't be worth writing about, right?

As long as you have an overall interesting story to write about; that you care a lot about, then go for it.

To add to what Nite said; there are many ideas you can put into your novel. Mold and format the ideas you come up with into plot points within your novel and write them into the structure of your choice. For example the three act structure.

As for your question regarding these events, I'd say it would depend on what it is and your character. Whether this happens directly or indirectly to your character, you still have to deal with it somehow.

In your bullying example, I guess I would need to know the importance of this character it's happening to. If it's a primary character in your story, I would definately go into more detail rather than just stating that this character was or used to be bullied.
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Sun Jun 15, 2014 6:23 am
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Rosendorn says...



For me, I'm looking at that and wondering where the repercussions are.

Abusive parents leave massive scars and affect all your future relationships. It's hard to deal with. It's not just a one off event, but it impacts your characters deeply.

I'm not sure what you mean by stating vs applying? Whether or not the character stands up to the bully depends on the character, not on whether or not you're applying it to the character. When I read the word "applying" I understood it as "making the character feel repercussions from that event that will affect them the rest of the story"... which you really should be doing for good character development.

Realistic fiction is composed of two parts:

1- Events
2- How characters react to those events and the ripple affect

You're not just stringing together events, or traits, or situations. You're putting the characters through things that in turn impact them, which impact later events, and every other relationship. One event can last 50k, easily, if you handle the repercussions well.

To take Paper Towns (John Green): the book is fuelled by basically one event. The whole book. There are two other key events, but those are caused by the first event. This first event is tiny and barely given passing mention in the book when it's first brought up, but because it had such a strong impact on one of the characters that led to a few hundred pages of plot.

Don't focus on events. Focus on how those events leave a mark on your characters, primary and secondary characters included (the key event in Paper Towns happened to a secondary character).
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Sun Jul 13, 2014 12:59 am
wtppowers says...



You could try exaggerating the details of some of the events in the story that you already have.
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Sun Jul 13, 2014 2:01 am
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BluesClues says...



Do you ever read literary fiction? It's realistic fiction that focuses on character over plot.

Okay, and it's critically acclaimed and "serious" or whatever, but I don't really care about that part of the definition. Just check this out, from the Wikipedia page on lit fic:

Literary fiction, in general, focuses on the subjects of the narrative to create "introspective, in-depth character studies" of "interesting, complex and developed" characters.


Anyway, my point is that it is acceptable--as long as it's well-done and there's character growth and a point--to have a book that doesn't have a really easily-described plot because it focuses more on character interaction and reactions. Take, for example, Prodigal Summer, by Barbara Kingsolver.

(Well, really anything by Barbara Kingsolver, who is like a goddess of this genre, but we'll go with this one.)

It primarily follows three characters, as I recall--one is a woman who has been living in solitude and deals with a man suddenly coming into her life, one is a woman who is dealing with the recent death of her husband and trying to keep the farm running without him, and one is an old man who is trying to save the dying chestnut trees while also dealing with his annoying neighbor.

(His neighbor is actually awesome, but it takes most of the book for him to realize that.)

What is the plot? There is no plot--not in the usual sense. There is no straightforward, linear, cause-and-effect storyline. The whole book is characters dealing with things. Each one with a single major event that more or less leads to every choice they make, but it isn't about a resolution of these events or anything like that. This is the kind of book that is more about an idea, a theme, than about what happens. In this case, the theme or idea would be interconnection and man's interaction with nature.

(Or at least, those would be some basic themes from this book.)

So you don't necessarily need a bunch of big events to add to the story--I mean, you've got abuse and a death in there, which I think is quite enough for one character to be getting on with, don't you? However, it can be difficult to do well, especially since it's hard to know where to end the story if there's no traditional plot or climax.

(I'm looking at you, Anita Diamant. The Red Tent was so good at first, but then it just went on and on and on long after it should've ended.)

Plus, lit fic is not everyone's cup of tea. I love it, myself (though I love most genres, so I may be a bad example), but a lot of people think it's dull because there aren't a bunch of exciting events moving a plot forward.

Of course, I'd have to read what you're writing to form my own opinion about your book in particular, but without knowing your writing style this is my verdict. I suggest reading some literary fiction to see how it compares and what these authors do, how they write without having a bunch of explosions or car chases or...whatever.

A short suggested reading list:

Prodigal Summer, Barbara Kingsolver
The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
The Bean Trees, Barbara Kingsolver
seriously, just anything by Barbara Kingsolver
A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry (fantastic but depressing as heck)
The Power of One, Bryce Courtenay (do not watch the movie, we made our teacher turn it off after five minutes because it was already so different from the book)
The Red Tent, Anita Diamant (it really is quite good, it's just that she didn't know where to stop)

Wikipedia: Literary Fiction
  





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Sun Jul 13, 2014 2:44 am
dancingwatermelon says...



Thank you all SO much for your input!! Y'all are the best. <3
  








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