Forum: Story Discussion and Feedback

When asked how she developed her stores, Lois Bujold [Vorkosigan Saga, Chalion series] said that she would ask herself 'what was the worst thing that could happen to the MC at this time?', and then go from there. And no, she never stress tested her characters. The problem may seem almost insuperable, But it was always within the character's abilities to solve.

Isn't that what makes good drama? I believe that the stresses on a character have to remain within his/her ability to handle them in order to make a story believable. For myself, if that condition isn't obtained, that's a turnoff and downgrades the story in my mind.

Unless you're that rare author than can overload the character and still stay within his/her ability to handle it. When done properly, it makes for great fiction. Like Hemingway in The Old Man and The Sea. There was initial success then abject failure that Santiago couldn't prevent. But you somehow get the feeling that he wins anyhow. There aren't too many like Papa around anymore. And if there are, they aren't contributing to SOL.

ETA for grammar

Ka Hmnd does stress test some of his characters, and it my mind the results seem to take on a flavor of 'dios machina',

Odd.

I've never noticed that in his stories. Usually, his characters tend more to face challenges that match up perfectly (for the MC) against the MC's strengths.

What I'm thinking of is more like.... years ago, Stan Lee pulled it off in Iron Man, where the villain du jour decided the best approach was to destroy Tony Stark, since that was a easier battle than fighting Iron Man. So the villain destroyed Stark Industries, sent henchmen to battle a distracted Iron Man to a draw, and ruined Tony's personal life, and then left Tony's alcoholism to finish the job.
Yeah, you're left wondering "How can he come back from that?" but if you're being honest, you've gotta ask "Why would he even try?" There's been times I've tried that style of storytelling. Those stories always ended abruptly with the suicide of the MC. It's the most believable result.

If it's a battle situation, I can see it working - a MC with no reason to live other than vengeance would be pretty damn dangerous.

But in any other situation, if you take basically everything from someone and leave them in agony (or crippling depression), it really strains suspension of disbelief to have him choose to continue suffering.

The author just needs a believable way to end the suffering without him killing himself to tell the story.

Not quite.

There also needs to be motivation. Why would he put the effort in, and keep suffering until it paid off to the extent that at least he's not suffering, even tho he still has nothing to live for?

I dunno. Maybe it's just that I've known so many people who've committed or at least (repeatedly) attempted suicide that it's far more plausible. I understand it... most people fear death, to some extent. When the fear of death is less than the fear of continued existence, there's not much to hold one back.

Everything you are saying is focused on the idea that there has to be pain and suffering in a bad situation.

No, actually I specified that in the subset where that's the case is what I was discussing. Like I said, if there's a obvious target for vengeance, hatred and desire for revenge is more than adequate reason to continue on. If someone loses a lot, but isn't terribly hurt by the loss, it's reasonable to pick oneself up, dust oneself off, and set about rebuilding.

But just piling on, until there's nothing left to carry on for, where every moment is a moment of agony and there's no 'home' to return to and no 'villain' to strike back against? That's the situation I'm talking about. And I've seen more than a few stories like that.

In Country Boy, many lashed out at me when Linda "Went bad" and cheated on the main character. But I told most to go back and read the story again, she was never a nice character. They only saw her as such through the eyes of the narrator.

I only read the first story, so...

When I read it, my read on it was she was very much like a character I'd created - she'd been given the reputation undeservedly, but made the best of her situation and still had standards. It was a bit of a let-down to hear otherwise.

As to your MC... well, a medical would be one way... a OTH discharge would've worked too, and hospitalizing the guy he'd been cheated on with would've accomplished that. (Sure, probably would've got him a few months with nothing to do, and busted down to private, but...)

And quite literally, just recently I had the guy literally get hit by a truck, breaking his neck, arm, leg, and put in a coma for 6 weeks. I had many write "WTF!", screaming why I am torturing him.

Well, it is set in 1987, the guy is scheduled to leave the military in 1989. And a lot of us remember that in 1990 the Gulf War happened, where a guy only a year out would likely have been called back in.

I needed him out of the military, and not in any danger of getting recalled so he would not get pulled into the 1990-1991 conflict. So there was a reason for busting him into a month and a half long coma. Not just because I like torturing my characters.

You can get someone a medical discharge from the Marines, even in advance of a war, without going anywhere near that extreme. My brother-in-law got medical discharged for a knee injury that doesn't affect his civilian life on 9/11.

He was actually on I-95 on his way in to Quantico for the final examination before the board made their decision when the plane hit the Pentagon and the entire area shut down. He ended up sitting in stopped traffic for hours, eventually managed to get in touch by cell and got sent home until things settled down. When he did eventually get in for his examination, they still discharged him.

They needed Marines; they didn't need Marines who couldn't reliably run while carrying a combat load.