secrets and plotting

Written on Friday, December 26, 2008 by haleigh

Friday, December 26th, 2008

So as I'm plotting my next novel (how fun is that to say? I finally finished one!), I'm reading, reading, reading. And this week, I came across a book that has really made me think.

I liked it - I liked it a lot - until I got to the last chapter. All the way through the book, it was clear the heroine had a secret. A big one. Something that created huge amounts of guilt in the heroine. And that guilt permeated every inch of her life - how she formed relationships, why she never put down roots but instead moved from town to town, why she no longer spoke to her father, why she'd dedicated her life now to helping others.

In most cases, this works - it's the classic search for redemption. I used this myself - Cole's entire life is built on guilt over his father's death. It affects every decision he makes, how he treats the people around him.

The problem, though, is the secret. I'm realizing that it has to be the kind of secret that would make your average reader feel that same level of guilt. Or at least understand why the character feels that guilt. Cole didn't actually kill his father (obviously), but he was in charge of the security, and he made one poor decision, and his father died. Happens all the time in security, and maybe some people wouldn't feel guilty, but in theory, readers could understand why Cole did.

The point (I promise there is one), is that in this book I read, once the heroine's "big secret" was revealed, I didn't get it. I still don't. The big secret was that she had taken the SAT's for her not-so-bright but uber-rich cousin. In return, the cousin paid the heroine's tuition.

Okay, maybe I'm more of a dishonest person that I previously thought, but I still don't get it. Sure it was a dumb thing to do. It might even have been criminal of the cousin. And I understand feeling guilty enough that when the college offered her a distinguished alumni award she didn't accept it. I don't understand feeling so guilty you walk away from a man who loves you because you think you don't deserve him because of this terrible thing you did. I don't understand that when someone unknowingly calls you a "fake," you panic so badly about someone finding you out that you go on the run for weeks.

So I guess that's my "what I've learned this week" message. If you're going to build an entire character around one trait, like guilt, the readers have to feel it too. Or at least understand it. I mean no offense to this particular author, but as a reader, it really bothered me that this character how I "got" for the first 20 chapters, I suddenly didn't understand anymore. And it really makes me hope that in my case, readers feel, or at least empathize, with Cole's guilt (and if you're reading it, and you don't, let me know!!)

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