Tipping Points (and also: VOTE)
By Therese Walsh | November 6, 2018 |
It’s Election Day in the U.S., which you surely know unless you’re living under a sound-proof stone that hasn’t been picked up and thrown at someone. Hard to believe that a few short years ago many of us rarely expressed controversial opinions, choosing to be ‘polite’ rather than overtly ‘political,’ yet here we are.
So let’s talk broadly about tipping points for a minute, and tune in to story.
Consider your protagonist’s world view at the start of your tale:
- What won’t she do?
- What won’t she say?
- Whom would she never betray?
- What or whom does she trust implicitly?
- What or whom would she give up to achieve her greatest desire?
- For whom or what would she make significant sacrifices, even lay down her life?
Now think through what it would take, in each instance, for her to change her mind; to be pushed and shoved out of her comfort zone; to be rattled by a proverbial stone against her skull, or even to pick one up herself.
Don’t tell me she would never allow herself to be tipped, because I do not believe it, and if you do, then you need to dig harder, my friend. Identify the wildcard in her life, and if it doesn’t exist, then build it.
Need help brainstorming? Consider the effect of the following:
Lies
Liars
Injustice
Insecurity
Corrupt forces
Threats to her future
Threats to those she loves
Threats to things she loves
Disempowerment
Abandonment
Victimization
Brainwashing
Addiction
Poverty
Cruelty
Hatred
Illness
Abuse
Chaos
Pain
Fear
Don’t make her flip of nature too easy, either, or it will read false.
Consider:
- How can these things come from someone or something she trusts or trusted?
- How will she realize she has been fooled or manipulated, or unwittingly acted against her own best interests?
- How will she receive this message, and how hard will she rebel against believing it?
- For how many minutes, days, or years will she plug her ears, shut her eyes, turn her back?
- What can’t she ignore?
- What has she already compromised or sacrificed?
- Whom has she already lost?
- How has she lied to herself?
- How many voices will she dismiss as crazy before something finally filters past, nudges her conscience, makes her wonder?
- What will she do with that blast of enlightenment once she sees the truth?
- How can that redirected energy fuel her arc?
- What will she lose by accepting the truth?
- What will she gain?
- How will reaching a tipping point change her, for forever?
- Will this tipping point be only the first in a series?
- What comes next?
- How will these things propel her toward The End?
- Will she reach a happy ending, and be satisfied?
- If she fails, what does that mean for her future? How does that, too, become a tipping point, support a new goal, push her on and on?
Because if I’ve learned nothing over the last few years, it’s that nothing is sacred. Nothing is solid. Nothing is forever. Nothing can be taken for granted. And that doing nothing and expecting change is not only tantamount to madness but becomes impossible once that tipping point is reached.
Just as we writers must press on and pursue–must write on, and persevere–so must our protagonists if they are to convey a tale that is rich and bold and true. You need look no further than the front page of today’s newspaper to see why that will be required to gain and keep the attention of your readership.
Have a way of finding your protagonist’s tipping point that you’d like to share? Share away.
But only after you VOTE.
Therese Walsh (she/her) co-founded Writer Unboxed in 2006 and is the site’s editorial director. She was the editor of WU’s only book, Author in Progress, and runs the Writer Unboxed UnConference.
Her second novel, The Moon Sisters, received starred reviews and was named one of the best books of the year by Library Journal and Book Riot.
Learn more about Therese on her website, and sign up for her newsletter to be among the first to hear about any new projects.
Sorry, can’t vote in Canada.
But we can watch and learn.
What a rich and potent stew you’ve dished up for us today, T – the perfect melding and amalgamation of today’s politics and our storytelling craftwork. Hearty sustenance for sending us off to the polls.
Thanks for this, and for being there for me these past few years, my friend.
Thank you for the early read, V, for your help in spreading the word, and for all you do for WU and for me. Now, when are you voting? :-D
Been waiting for you-know-who to finish a conference call, so I don’t have to stand in line alone. Leaving in 3, 2,…
Excellent article. Giving me questions to ponder is always so helpful for me to identify what exactly is going on inside the story, clarity of my character’s mind. I so agree that no one is immune from having a flip of nature, but the questions help figure out the why to the action–so thank you!
And yes, I’ll definitely be voting today at lunchtime!
Thanks, Lara — for your comment, and for voting!
I find it interesting that all the potential “tipping point” causes you give are negative things, that all the “tipping” seems to be in a negative direction, that the “comfort zone” the character is moving out of is a good place.
It’s a mistake to think all “comfort zones” are good. Trusting people is far from comfortable: it’s risky, and you will at times suffer for it. It’s much easier, safer, and more comfortable to distrust — unfortunately.
So why not imagine a positive tipping? A character whose “comfort zone” is, for example, selfishness, distrust, hatred, and/or cruelty, who is pushed out of it by
Truth
Compassion
Tolerance
Joy
Beauty
Innocence
Kindness
So, ask yourself, who would your character never trust? Who would she never be loyal to? Who would she never sacrifice for?
Now think, what would it take in each instance for her to change her mind?
P.S. I was the 13th to vote at my polling place this morning.
Great comment. But I disagree. A protagonist who is selfish and distrusting and cruel would likely not compel me beyond a first chapter, and I think would be a tough sell. I do think your example works well for a typical antagonist, if that antagonist travels a road of change (e.g. Darth Vader). But most protagonists will likely be people whose comfort zones are free of conflict; that’s what, to my mind, makes them comfort zones. And most tipping points will come from negative (or at least stressful) events, because conflict is what drives story.
But there will always be exceptions. Happy to hear some, if you’d like to further the argument.
A protagonist shouldn’t be perfect. And too much of a virtue can be a vice.
My MC is caring and trusting. Law-abiding. Nice. Lovable, I think.
But her virtues will eventually lead her to break the antagonist, who tried to kill her and is facing the death penalty for attempted murders the MC witnessed, out of jail. It costs the MC her home, her family, everything she loves. But when she sees how wounded the antagonist is, she can’t let the execution happen.
I think that’s a tipping point for the MC. It’s one for the antagonist too. The antagonist doesn’t join the light side — deep wounds taken in childhood often never heal — but she does change, becoming at the same time less cruel and more dangerous.
It makes for an interesting relationship between the two of them for the rest of the story, and creates really powerful conflict between the MC and the people she loves most.
Cosigning that a protag shouldn’t be perfect. If s/he were, then there would be little need for a journey, metaphorical or otherwise.
So your protag is in her comfort zone (whether at the start of the story or before it, if the crime(s) happened as a part of the backstory), and is then subjected to:
threats to those she loves
threats to her future
insecurity
cruelty
chaos
abuse
fear
Which leaves her changed, but ultimately walks her back to center. Sounds like a powerful journey.
The antagonist’s attempted murders happen early in book 2 (she gets away with murder in the first book).
The MC spent book 1 (going out to beta readers for Christmas) finding her home and family. Then she gives up all she’d gained and her future as well for the sake of the antagonist.
This wasn’t what I originally planned. But the character of the two communities that are in conflict pretty much forced the circumstances leading to the antagonist’s execution, and at that point in the MC’s growth, she can’t allow that.
Later, when it’s her own small children that a hate group are trying to kill, we’ll see if that still holds true. [The MC is genetically-engineered to be capable of flight, and the hate group fears that conventional humans won’t be able to compete with her children and will eventually go extinct. Their fears are not unfounded — that’s often how evolution works.]
PCGE–I think your comment is both astute and accurate. But, then, I would: my WIP features such a protagonist.
At the same time, I understand Therese doubting that a character whose sweet spot involves being selfish, distrusting, cruel, etc., would hold her past the opening chapters. But, then, that’s the challenge facing the author who is drawn to develop characters that defy conventional notions of what attracts and what doesn’t. The most common example, widely overused, is that of Scrooge. He is moved by several of the qualities you list to see a different way to live. Minus any redemptive elements (as far as I can tell after viewing just the first season), the characters in House of Cards have attracted millions of viewers.
In short, when a writer manages to create interest and sympathy for truly negative characters, the stage is set for very good things.
Thanks, Barry; that’s a solid example. A Man Called Ove is another tale of a grouchy old guy, with a compelling backstory to explain his demeanor (involving insecurity, pain, and chaos).
One of my struggles with my book is that my alpha readers found my ruthless, amoral, and cruel antagonist more interesting than the MC. Sure, she’s sociopathic, but she had to become that, to survive, and the reader figures that out when they meet her (without even a line of backstory). Not being bound by morality or ethics, she can do anything, so she’s constantly surprising the readers.
[ I had to go back and work harder on writing my kind and gentle MC so she could be as interesting — I’m not interested in writing an anti-hero MC.]
And the antagonist does have a redeeming feature, beyond being a survivor: someone loves her. He won’t admit it, even to himself, because they both consider love a weakness. She eventually come to love him, too, but again, never admits it.
Thank you, thank you, Therese! Why is it that whenever we start out to write a new novel, it’s like we’ve never written one before? Maybe I shouldn’t be using the royal “we,” but that’s my experience! I feel like I’ve been standing before a dark and tangled wood and you just lit a lantern and carried it down a previously unseen path. Printing this out.
Great voter turnout in Doylestown today! I arrive at 7:05 am and was #61 in line.
I don’t know why, but I agree that it’s true: We seem to have to re-learn everything, with every book. It’s maddening, no? I’m glad this post found you today, K!
Great post, Therese, Thank you!
Thank you, Beth!
Therese, thanks for throwing protagonists into the emotional blender. With some of those suggestions, the setting is on “puree” rather than “tip,” but it is good to mix it up now and then.
As for voting, I did that by mail a while back. but I’ll vote again this morning on your admonition. (Just kidding, Mr. Sessions!)
So long, and thanks for all the fish (you set free here).
Sometimes they need a good pureeing, no? Thanks for voting, Tom, and for your comment!
I’ve completely flipped a characters’s worldview in 3 of my novels. Whether tipping their worldview, or just replacing a brick in its foundation, the change always seems to be centered around believing a lie versus knowing the truth.
Hi H.L., and thanks for your comment. Sounds like you write with Lisa Cron’s ‘Story Genius’ plan in mind (whether you mean to or not), which involves a protag’s ‘misbelief.’ If you haven’t checked out Lisa’s book, I highly recommend it.
That was fucking badass.
Seriously. I’ve saved this article in three different places, so FEEL THE LOVE.
And you’re damn straight I voted.
I voted like our lives depend on it.
Which they do.
Made my day. (Or at least the part of my day that doesn’t involve the outcome of today’s election…)
Thanks!
Inspiring article, T. Thank you for all you do, and for standing up when push came to shove, for people who’ve intentionally been shoved into the category of “less than”, by those TS Eliot described as “The Hollow Men”. https://allpoetry.com/The-Hollow-Men
It takes a writer…
Thank you, too, B! I’m glad to stand with you.
Thanks, Therese. Your tipping points come at the perfect time for my novel, since I’ve been thinking for the last couple days about people my main character trusts and why she should or shouldn’t. Your list of questions will speed my process.
I voted early this afternoon.
Thanks for your vote, Judy! And I’m glad the post will help you along.
I’m going to print this one out and keep it. Very concise and clear ideas/questions to help drive change in characters. Thanks.
I’m glad the post is a keeper for you, Annette. Thanks for your comment!
Can’t vote here in NZ either, but I am certainly awaiting the outcome of your elections with interest.
What can I say? Y’all have enough nukes to lay the whole world waste 12 times over. No point pretending your government means nothing to me.
At least now we have some checks and balances, but this is for certain an unstable time in American politics. I’m sorry for the stress felt by our allies, truly; we feel it here, too.
Great list! Will save and share with writing students. Thanks.
Thank you, Carol!
Thank you for this brilliant and inspiring charge, Therese! (I am late to commenting, but I read and loved it on the day it aired.) <3