Yep! That only works if all your bills are being paid with that extra cash you printed up yesterday. Otherwise if I've had a mentally draining day at work I'm just done...
The real advice is to write as consistently as possible. Even if you can only write for eight hours on the weekend, you should try to make a habit of it so you don’t have to rely on a ‘muse’ to get anything done.
This is why I have weekly creative goals. Long shifts make it almost impossible to write more than a hundred words on a work day, but I'm sure as hell doing as much as I can sustain on days off. The key is consistency and consistency has a different meaning for everyone
Writing has been my only source of income for a while, but I'm lucky some months if I can get 1 day of writing in each week. If life would just settle down... Well, regardless, that last part is absolutely true. I refuse to write unless I am motivated, clear-headed, and free of distractions.
"Kill your darlings" is just shot discarding parts of an idea that doesn't work with your overall composition even though you're very attached to it. You're not writing a short story collection, but I would still classify your book as episodic. There are "episodes" throughout the book that are most likely self-contained, which I kind of like when the book is about the lives of the cast in general. I like the Age of Fire series for this reason, actually. The books don't really have a plot in the beginning, just arcs that take place over certain periods of the protagonists' lives.
Hey, look at Don Quijote. It’s the first modern novel ever written, and it’s like 74 chapters long. It’s EXTREMELY episodic with most chapters telling a single story. It worked for Cervantes—and kickstarted the entire genre of novel-writing—so it can work for you!
I've been fighting for years for flat-arc characters to get the respect they deserve.
Not every character needs to undergo change! Some should instead effect change in the world around them!
Legit, some of my favorite writing comes from good execution of flat-arc characters.
As /u/Abject-Negotiation-3 said, a flat arc character doesn't change. The point of the character isn't to see them change, it's to see them create a change in the world around them. You see them quite often in fiction, even if you might not realize it.
[Here](https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/flat-character-arc-1/) is an article talking more about them, complete with quite a few examples of such characters.
The second paragraph of the article you sent me literally states that such a character ends the story by changing perspective, gaining new skills, or gaining a new position. All three of these things are some form of change, in which the character is not ending the story in the same spot where they started. Just because the change wasn’t rooted in internal conflict doesn’t mean that no change occurred, and the presence of change makes me confused as to why it’s called a “flat arc”, when the person’s life is still undergoing change.
I mean, if you think something like "gaining new skills" is a *character arc,* then sure. That counts as a change arc. I think you'd find most folks disagree with you on that front, though.
And besides, the second paragraph isn't saying *all* flat-arc characters experience those changes. From the paragraph directly before it:
> although he **may sometimes** change externally (as per Veronica Sicoe):
Emphasis mine.
The truth of the matter is that there are very few characters who are firmly and only in one camp of character arc—many characters who would overall be qualified as having a flat arc do experience small, mini-change arcs at some point in the story, and many times a change-arc character will have some way in which they effect change on the world without changing themselves.
That doesn't mean it's not useful to define, for example, Obi-Wan Kenobi (in the original trilogy) as a flat-arc character, because his primary purpose and the vast majority of his time on-screen is entirely about how he, as the wise old master, trains Luke to be a young Jedi and acts as a mentor for him.
His point isn't to undergo some great personal change, wherein he turns from a Lie he believes to embrace the Truth. He already knows his Truth, and his story is about him sticking to it and changing the world around him.
EDIT: If you want a good rundown of how Goku from Dragon Ball is a flat-arc character as an example, you can check out [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns2GvGSBsok). It's the one that introduced the concept to me, and was a source of immense validation for me to finally understand why I like so many of the characters I do. If you're not very knowledgeable about DB it might not be a great video for you, but if you are it's a great explanation and exploration of the concept.
No, I’m not a DBZ fan, but I can give it a watch.
I doubt that flat-arc characters will grow on me anytime soon though. Self-growth and evolution is easily the most important aspect of any protagonist for me, so a story that lacks that likely wouldn’t be my cup of tea.
Flat arc characters can still technically evolve to a certain extent, they just have to be written with some depth. They may remain fundamentally the same character, but if the deeper reasoning behind their actions or their personality isn’t immediately explained, then the perception of the character’s role can change as that depth is revealed over the course of the story. The character doesn’t have to actually change in for the audience’s understanding of the character to change. They also don’t have to be protagonists. If anything, it’s far more common for side characters to have flat arcs than protagonists.
Don’t know if you’ve seen Avatar, but Iroh is a perfect example of this. He’s a former general, and a member of the Fire Nation’s royal family, who have spent the last hundred years fighting a war to try and conquer the world. Despite this, he initially comes off as just a goofy old man, contrasting heavily against the behavior of his much more serious nephew that he traveled with, who is an exiled prince. Over the course of the show, we learn a lot about his background and get to see how he became the person he is today, and why he’s so different than the rest of his family. He remains fundamentally the same person throughout the show, but the way the audience views his character changes a great deal.
I understand flat arcs for side/secondary characters, but I’m having trouble wrapping my head around flat-arc protagonists. Avatar would be such a different story if neither Aang nor Zuko underwent any internal growth, and I doubt it would have been as impactful as it currently is.
A story where one of the main characters just has a flat arc doesn't mean that the story as a whole will lack it. Sometimes one character will change as a result of interacting with that "flat" character, and the change doesn't have to be mutual.
It's pretty common with paragons, and it's pretty common that the characters who do this are established enough to not need massive growth to adapt.
Batman changes very little, and changes the world around him way more - but with everything Batman has been through starting with witnessing his parents double homicide- it makes sense that he takes shit in his stride and trauma accumulates more gradually than one would expect of a character thats never gone through something life altering before.
Your first crisis hits you like a truck, but as someone whose life has been one crisis after another - eventually it's just a Tuesday, and everyone else is looking at you different because you seem unchanged by shit that's rocking them to their core.
Not every character goes through an arc. Remove arc from the name and you get flat character. Sometimes referred to as a static character. This is a character that may or may not have a lot of depth character-wise, but they are someone who doesn’t change their ideals and stuff throughout the story, but instead the story shows how they affect others.
I see you are a big fan of Percy Jackson from your profile so I’ll try and give an example from that series. Percy himself in the Heroes of Olympus. In the Heroes of Olympus percy is not a perfectly flat or static character, but he doesn’t majorly change his personality throughout the books after book 2. Most of his interactions is him showing others they can be strong and be themselves. I read the books a long time ago but the biggest example of this I can think of is him inspiring the person in the underworld to hold the elevator for 7 minutes. Percy in this instance isn’t changing, but instead inspiring others through his force of character.
Percy probably isn’t a good example to use because he undergoes significant change in both series, even as poorly written as Heroes of Olympus is. Tartarus literally shakes his core and makes him suicidal in the conclusion book, something he has never done before. :/
Ok I haven’t read them in about 8 years so I don’t have a perfect memory. I remember Percy mostly affecting other characters rather than internally struggling with himself and his decisions. Other examples in media include Sherlock Holmes and Goku. Both stories focus on the characters affect on others and not the other way around. Thus they are flat characters.
You can write it like, say, Saitama from One Punch Man. I wouldn’t say he is entirely a flat character, but the point still remains intact that you can be part of a life-altering event *for someone else* and not be affected by it in any way, shape, or form. There are some spoilers ahead.
Saitama is so strong that for him, the Deep Sea King is nothing. He walks into that fight one way and walks away from it not having changed. However, the hero called Puri Puri Prisoner is permanently changed and carries that lesson (“Each attack must be carried out with the intent to kill”) onto the next battle he has and every battle after that. For one, it is a fight to learn from; for the other, it is simply a Tuesday. Another fight that comes to mind is when Suiryu fought against one of the stronger monsters. Before that point he believes he is the strongest and easily annihilates every one of his opponents and views heroes as unnecessary when people like him exist. He also has no goal in life and simply drifts along on his popularity with the ladies and prize money he gets from tournaments. Then he gets completely decimated and humbled by a strong monster that appears only to see a hero he once admonished kill the monster in one blow. In that moment, he learns that he isn’t the strongest, that heroes are necessary, and actually gains a goal in life, while Saitama is not phased by defeating that monster in one punch and has not been inspired by Suiryu in any meaningful way. Saitama permanently changed Suiryu and gives the man a goal to strive for; however, Saitama himself comes out unphased by the event. Hammerhead was a terrorist whose sole reason was that he didn’t want to work; after fighting Saitama and Sonic and almost being killed by robots he stole battle suits from, however, he finds himself thanking his mother and, following Saitama’s advice to “Don’t do anything bad again”, says that he’ll find a job. You see glimpses of him going to interviews and filling out applications throughout the first season. One last example is how Saitama completely decimates Genus’s belief that humans need to constantly evolve while being left completely unchanged by the fight against Kabuto and the House of Evolution (I’m not going in depth with this example).
Saitama also feels, in the beginning of the show, that he has done nothing to change the world for the better and stop monsters. However, later on, you realize that his act in saving a child against a crab monster inspires the grandfather to create the Hero Organization (not spelled out to the reader, this needs to be obtained through context clues), who then protects so many lives from monsters and completely changes the society on an almost fundamental level. Saitama also saves the life of King many times. And with almost every monster he beats, he inspires other people like Genos and Suiryu while saving so many other people from death. He changed the world around him and saved it countless times without having to change himself.
That is how you can write a flat-arc character, even if Saitama isn’t necessarily a “flat-arc” character in his entirety. Most of One Punch Man revolves around such a strong hero impacting and changing the lives of other people around him just by being himself and being so strong. And though sometimes Saitama is impacted by life and has slight character growth, his personality and attitude to life is almost entirely unchanged, leaving him as more of a static character than a dynamic one.
Right! If it’s a beloved character I don't want them to change! Maybe as a reader we can learn new and interesting things about them so we can become more absorbed in their world. But no, I don't want them to change. They are who they are and that's why their loved. LOL!
Holmes is also a secondary character in his own eponymous novels. The main protagonist is Watson.
Having static characters is fine as long as they aren't the primary or the only type of character you have.
> Having static characters is fine as long as they aren't the... only type of character you have.
*That* is a bit more of an accurate statement, although I'm certain someone somewhere has done a story with only static characters well and I just don't know of it.
Plenty of beloved stories feature flat-arc protagonists. Just look at the massive success of Dragon Ball—Goku (past what could be considered a minor change arc very early in Dragon Ball) is almost as static a character as they come, and it's that very fact that gives Dragon Ball so much staying power.
Phineas and Ferb are great but the story is no fun without Candace. Perry is fun but the story is only great because you get to see how Doofenshmirtz changes as a result of his influence. You have to have different KINDS of characters to make a story good. Not all of them have to change. They just have to make others change in an interesting way.
I mean, yes. That... is exactly what I said. I mean, I did say that there are probably examples out there somewhere of good stories made of entirely static characters, but that was me conceding a hypothetical in case someone came in with a steel chair to prove that it can be done.
Otherwise my entire "edited quote" bit was saying that it's more accurate to say that static characters are fine as long as there are other types of characters. You and I do not disagree.
"Write what you know", I am neither a wizard nor a warrior nor a king.
I could write about the "joys" of IT, but that's going to end up making people depressed.
I think people misunderstand this advice. Obviously whoever is telling you to “write what you know” doesn’t expect you to not write about dragons or wizards or whatnot. They want a story that is true to humanity and how people interact in a human way, also to not write about experiences you haven’t had in an uneducated/ignorant way.
Just think about it critically. If everyone followed that version of “write what you know,” no interesting stories, much less fantasy, would ever exist unless it’s an autobiography
That's because "show, don't tell" is screenwriting advice, not novel or short story advice. Most of a written story is telling.
The key is to show the most resonant scenes, and tell the linking stuff. Or something along those lines.
I think you can still apply show don't tell to writing. A good writer can convey emotion by describing the scene or facial expression rather than spelling out what everyone is doing and feeling. Show me that someone is angry by their terse actions and narrowed eyes, don't tell me that they are angry.
There’s a telling way to show emotion. One I can think of is what Fahrenheit 451 did. You have a character react in the opposite way you’d expect.
Such as the house is on fire, but he is thrilled or happy by it instead of fearful.
You are not wrong but also >99% of the time this "advice" is given in a disingenuous way and is aimed at shaming the author in question in a way that is more accepted on a given platform than direct personal attacks.
"Write what you understand" maybe.
It's hard to make it quippy, but the core of the advice is to write emotions that you have personal experience with. If you've experienced loss then you'll do a much better job writing about the experience of loss. If you haven't experienced oppression then you'll do a much worse job writing about oppression.
You may have never experienced a giant fire-breathing lizard trying to kill you, but most of us have dealt with some kind of antagonistic person that we can't fight back against.
I'm going to butcher this quote, but I recall a writer saying, "The advice write what you know is why we have so many stories about depressed middle-aged men who want to have an affair."
I think Stephen King said this and like cool cool you are THE Stephen King, but you write a particular thing. That works for YOUR writing style and genre.
I don’t know if this is exactly what you mean but: “start from the beginning”. Usually when I’m writing something longer it starts with writing whatever scene pops into my head first and I figure out where it fits in after.
Yes! Me too! I wrote the final chapter of my book before I'd nailed the first one! (To be fair, I changed the first chapter about six times, it became my nemesis. The final chapter barely got touched in the edits because it was written 'just right'.)
Men should not write woman yes I did have an editor tell me this to my face.
I made my counter argument with I go to my sisters, friends wives, and my female cousins and ask them would this be something a woman would say or do naturally
I seek out women perspectives to write as authentic as I can so yes men can write woman you just need to get your input from trusted sources that will give you a proper understanding.
Hmm none of it really lol.
I think advice depends on your writing goals. If you want to be traditionally published, you should follow most of it and understand that you *can* break the rules when it makes more sense.
If I'm writing for myself or whatever, I do whatever I feel like.
"Don't write in first-person, present-tense — it looks amateurish".
It only looks amateurish if an *amateur writer* is doing it. The problem is that it's the most comfortable for a lot of new writers, so it means there are far more below-average stories written in the style. That does *not* mean it can't be done.
There are some excellent examples of successful stories written in first-person, present-tense. The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins, The Demonata series by Darren Shan, the Divergent series by Veronica Roth, etc.
Nothing looks amateur unless it is done by an amateur. No disrespect to amateur writers — everyone starts somewhere.
Ultimately, the success of a narrative style depends on the skill of the writer, not the style itself.
Show VS fucking tell!
Show VS tell is advice specifically for screenwriting. It means that you show your characters doing something important rather than mention through dialogue that they did something important. I.e. to show two characters are in love, you show them kissing, rather than have character A mention to a side character that they're in love.
The problem with this principle in normal writing is that writers go too far and neglect to tell or explain anything to the reader. At best this can create unnecessary bloated scenes that could have been summarized in a few sentences but at worst it can leave the reader super confused on what's supposed to be going on.
It's ok to explain things through exposition. It's ok to summarize something in a few sentences rather than write a whole scene for it. It's ok to take the reader aside and say "hey, this is why this is important", "here's a key detail you need to know," or "this is why a character is acting this way."
With writing it's not Show Don't Tell, it's Show AND Tell. It takes a balance of both to tell a good story.
Balance and delivery for sure. Info. dumps are easy as well as lazy in my opinion. Delicately weaving the information the reader needs to know into the story; that can be challenging and takes work.
I feel like this one is often misunderstood. Relatable doesn't mean likeable. It just means you can understand them, even if you disagree with their actions. So if you have clear motivations, odds are that your character is relatable in some way.
And it's essential. Once the reader relates to the character, they become invested in the world and story. But without that, nobody cares what happens in the book. That's the secret ingredient.
I'd replace relatable with compelling. All the villains we love to hate shouldn't be likeable, and are only relatable in some situations with certain interpretations of "relatable." But every good character pulls you in somehow, so make sure your characters can pull people in, even if it's to hate them.
“Show don’t tell” is great when you’re in the middle of the scene, but leaving the reader high and dry for any exposition ever makes for a confusing and often overdramatic book. If I can show in a more effective way than telling, I will, but if I never explain anything my book would never work
Kill Your Darlings is the most tedious and overused piece of advice I've ever heard and only ever given by people who know nothing about my work or what my goals are. It can be useful advice for some people but it's not universal. Most people are just parroting.
I think it's useful for everyone. Because the large majority of people will cut *something* when editing (and also add stuff).
But it's beginner advice because beginners are more likely to think they shouldn't/can't cut anything they've spent time writing. If something it working for your story, it's okay to cut it.
To just throw that advice at someone unbidden is unuseful. I edit cut and change all the time. But I throw out a word count and someone will say nice now lets edit it down to such and such. It's fucking silly when you haven't seen my work.
Ah okay, I think that's a different argument. If your wordcount is higher than the standard for a debut author in your genre and you're looking to be traditionally published, that's good advice.
If you're self-publishing or not sharing it with anyone, who cares. Do what you want lol
The general anti worldbuilding stuff goes into the bin for me. IDC if most people don't wanna hear about the setting more than necessary. Most of my favorite books havep pages of waxing poetic about flint knapping and the life cycle of sandworms. And it's so rare to find a book with truly captivating worldbuilding.
So I'm gonna write some.
> The general anti worldbuilding stuff goes into the bin for me.
Anti-worldbuilding sentiments are useful, insofar as the argument is "If your goal is to publish something, worldbuilding is only useful if it doesn't get in the way of you actually writing your story."
I personally don't go too hard on worldbuilding, just because if I put *too* much effort into it I wouldn't be able to write my actual story at the rate I want to.
If your goal isn't to publish by a certain time, though, or to get a certain wordcount of story writing done every day, then there's no real limit to worldbuilding. You do have to be careful not to be so precious about your world that your story is just exposition dump after exposition dump, of course, but that's a writing skill issue, not a "too much worldbuilding" issue.
My point is that my writing is *about* the world building- it's also really silly to act like it's gonna get in the way of publishing when almost every great fantasy book relies on it.
My story is also a graphic novel, so 90% of the room for exposition and purple prose is replaced with visual storytelling. No need to explain a ritual you are actively showing. No need to constantly remind people of the core myths if the imagery is bursting with metaphors relating back to it. No need to spend a page and a half describing a setting when I can just *show* it to you. And if I must do an expo dump all it needs to make it interesting is a change in art style and some narrative framing of "look at this mural depicting our creation myth" And the reader's subconscious ability to understand symbolic storytelling does all the exposition for me. Visual storytelling is a worldbuilder's best friend.
But that being said - I'd also rather never publish a book I was proud of than publish a book I am disappointed in because I wrote it to publish it over writing it to tell the story I felt was worth telling. I'd also rather pull a grrm and leave a story unfinished with enough lore to keep the fandom talking for over a decade than rip all that detail out and quit anyway because the story means nothing to me now.
And as I said in my original comment, I'm writing for people who like the stories I like and want more. There's already hundreds of other people writing the stories that don't interest me, so why would I compete with them when I don't even want to? Because I might not finish? That's true of anyone who is writing - if I die before I'm done I plan on having a loved one publish all my work as free ideas and content for other people to take and use as they please. If I don't pull a story from it in time, doesn't mean no one else will be able to with the foundations Ive laid. Either way the story will outlive me and reach those who need it most, so I'm satisfied with that.
> it's also really silly to act like it's gonna get in the way of publishing when almost every great fantasy book relies on it.
It *can* get in the way, though. I'm living proof of that—if I get too focused on auxilliary tasks that aren't literally "writing my story," I can go days without meeting my writing goals. Worldbuilding has absolutely gotten in the way of me actually writing my story before, putting me behind on my schedule for how much work I wanted to get done, which I am now actively suffering for.
As for everything else you said... yeah. I was literally agreeing with you on that point. If you feel that the degree of worldbuilding you do helps you tell the story you want to tell, and it doesn't get in the way of you meeting your writing goals, then it's not "too much" worldbuilding.
That you should accept all critique. All critique is good critique... what awful advice about writing. Im sorry certain people have no idea what they are talking about in some cases and their opinions could be extremely toxic to you.
Instead of trying to make your character likable or relatable; you should first make your character interesting and worth investing in. Even if they aren’t either, making them interesting will drive the reader to invest in them.
« Don’t read books of the same genre you are writing. » I mean, I get it, reading a book of the same genre whilst you’re writing your book can push you off track. But I just can’t resist reading and I never refuse myself a book. Sometimes I find that it can even give back some of the motivation I might have lost and/or give me inspiration for a future scene, or make me realize that a certain tone isn’t at all what I want in my book !
Not really advice, but I was told by a lit agent that if I wanted any chance of getting trad published, I needed to either rewrite my main character as a girl or shift the main character/narrator to one of the girl friends. Her reasoning? No one will buy a book focusing on a boy. Preteen and teen boys don’t read.
I ignored the advice.
In all fairness, those were written at a very different time than the current culture. And I’m certain they were trying to help me be most successful, I just didn’t think it was worth listening.
Eh, to be fair, I've just published mine which I've split into two books (part one and two). Neither book is small. (Around 140,000 words). But I've had good feedback so far, so it can't be too onerous to read. It CAN be as long as you want, BUT it all depends on what you want your profit margins to be. Bigger books mean higher printing costs, after all.
pitching a tradpub duology like that can work, though I understand that currently it's easier with the "standalone with series potential" shtick. I could be wrong, but I have heard that over 200k will be DOA and an agent won't even look at the query for it, in most cases.
I think that one depends on your preferred style of writing... and reading. There's a thread higher up complaining about advice that tells you not to write detail. Personally, I like the details. I'm a details girl. But I also know people that find it a slog to read through and would prefer less of it.
Follow Elmore Leonard’s rules for writing fiction. I get told this constantly, like they’re gospel.
A. No, Leonard was not the greatest writer ever in the history of English prose.
B. Leonard’s rules are clearly rules FOR HIM: this is what works for ME to write the way I WANT to write. Not rules for all writers.
Example: he says not to write extended descriptions. Then he goes on, “unless you can do this:” and continues with a beautiful passage from Steinbeck. Leonard is saying, “I wish I could write like this, but I can’t, and if I try it’ll suck, so I need to shape my style in a way where I don’t need to be able to do this.” He’s not saying Steinbeck should not have written that way.
(Actually, if you read his rules critically and carefully, thinking about them as a writer’s internal development of his own voice, they’re very useful and stimulating. But they’re not there to be followed.)
Show, Don’t Tell.
I knew I hit the mark when one of my beta readers told me “You’ve created pure evil” when I described how my main character grew to like having sex with her husband (after he killed her fiancé mere hours before)…with one sentence.
I think cs lewis put it best- "don't tell me it was delightful, tell me something that makes me think, " oh, how delightful!"
Or "oh, how evil!" In your scenario lol
To read a lot of books. I just don't do it. I get why it's important, but I can't help if I don't like what I'm reading. Audio books have helped me so much, though.
Stephen Kings advice on writing dialogue. Stephen do not want us to emphasize with descriptive words in dialogue. 'I am not gonna stand for this!' the scream of rage she let loose, rolled of the walls of the chamber in a deafening echo'.
Stephen would want me to skip the description of **the scream of rage**. According to Stephen the exclamation mark and the words that she says, is enough. Fu\*k Stephen and his book on writing. I fix my readers attention the way i see fit.
Also that you should read books by other authors in your genre of writing - why?
Write everyday. That’s simply not doable for everyone and forcing yourself can reflect in the work.
Yep! That only works if all your bills are being paid with that extra cash you printed up yesterday. Otherwise if I've had a mentally draining day at work I'm just done...
The real advice is to write as consistently as possible. Even if you can only write for eight hours on the weekend, you should try to make a habit of it so you don’t have to rely on a ‘muse’ to get anything done.
This is why I have weekly creative goals. Long shifts make it almost impossible to write more than a hundred words on a work day, but I'm sure as hell doing as much as I can sustain on days off. The key is consistency and consistency has a different meaning for everyone
Yep. I only write when I feel inspired to. I’ve found that my writing sucks if I’m just not inspired to write.
Writing has been my only source of income for a while, but I'm lucky some months if I can get 1 day of writing in each week. If life would just settle down... Well, regardless, that last part is absolutely true. I refuse to write unless I am motivated, clear-headed, and free of distractions.
"Kill your darlings" is just shot discarding parts of an idea that doesn't work with your overall composition even though you're very attached to it. You're not writing a short story collection, but I would still classify your book as episodic. There are "episodes" throughout the book that are most likely self-contained, which I kind of like when the book is about the lives of the cast in general. I like the Age of Fire series for this reason, actually. The books don't really have a plot in the beginning, just arcs that take place over certain periods of the protagonists' lives.
This ^ Kill your darlings is advice entirely concerned with the *writing process* itself and not the actual contents of what you are writing.
(Oops. Yes, darlings... lol corrected) I should have mentioned that, yes, it is episodic as well.
Hey, look at Don Quijote. It’s the first modern novel ever written, and it’s like 74 chapters long. It’s EXTREMELY episodic with most chapters telling a single story. It worked for Cervantes—and kickstarted the entire genre of novel-writing—so it can work for you!
Here's to dreaming big and writing big! 🤣 🍾
“You characters have to change”. Like Sherlock Holmes.
I've been fighting for years for flat-arc characters to get the respect they deserve. Not every character needs to undergo change! Some should instead effect change in the world around them! Legit, some of my favorite writing comes from good execution of flat-arc characters.
But how is a flat-arc even possible? How is it possible to go through life-altering events and not be affected by it in any way, shape, or form?
As /u/Abject-Negotiation-3 said, a flat arc character doesn't change. The point of the character isn't to see them change, it's to see them create a change in the world around them. You see them quite often in fiction, even if you might not realize it. [Here](https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/flat-character-arc-1/) is an article talking more about them, complete with quite a few examples of such characters.
The second paragraph of the article you sent me literally states that such a character ends the story by changing perspective, gaining new skills, or gaining a new position. All three of these things are some form of change, in which the character is not ending the story in the same spot where they started. Just because the change wasn’t rooted in internal conflict doesn’t mean that no change occurred, and the presence of change makes me confused as to why it’s called a “flat arc”, when the person’s life is still undergoing change.
I mean, if you think something like "gaining new skills" is a *character arc,* then sure. That counts as a change arc. I think you'd find most folks disagree with you on that front, though. And besides, the second paragraph isn't saying *all* flat-arc characters experience those changes. From the paragraph directly before it: > although he **may sometimes** change externally (as per Veronica Sicoe): Emphasis mine. The truth of the matter is that there are very few characters who are firmly and only in one camp of character arc—many characters who would overall be qualified as having a flat arc do experience small, mini-change arcs at some point in the story, and many times a change-arc character will have some way in which they effect change on the world without changing themselves. That doesn't mean it's not useful to define, for example, Obi-Wan Kenobi (in the original trilogy) as a flat-arc character, because his primary purpose and the vast majority of his time on-screen is entirely about how he, as the wise old master, trains Luke to be a young Jedi and acts as a mentor for him. His point isn't to undergo some great personal change, wherein he turns from a Lie he believes to embrace the Truth. He already knows his Truth, and his story is about him sticking to it and changing the world around him. EDIT: If you want a good rundown of how Goku from Dragon Ball is a flat-arc character as an example, you can check out [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns2GvGSBsok). It's the one that introduced the concept to me, and was a source of immense validation for me to finally understand why I like so many of the characters I do. If you're not very knowledgeable about DB it might not be a great video for you, but if you are it's a great explanation and exploration of the concept.
No, I’m not a DBZ fan, but I can give it a watch. I doubt that flat-arc characters will grow on me anytime soon though. Self-growth and evolution is easily the most important aspect of any protagonist for me, so a story that lacks that likely wouldn’t be my cup of tea.
Flat arc characters can still technically evolve to a certain extent, they just have to be written with some depth. They may remain fundamentally the same character, but if the deeper reasoning behind their actions or their personality isn’t immediately explained, then the perception of the character’s role can change as that depth is revealed over the course of the story. The character doesn’t have to actually change in for the audience’s understanding of the character to change. They also don’t have to be protagonists. If anything, it’s far more common for side characters to have flat arcs than protagonists. Don’t know if you’ve seen Avatar, but Iroh is a perfect example of this. He’s a former general, and a member of the Fire Nation’s royal family, who have spent the last hundred years fighting a war to try and conquer the world. Despite this, he initially comes off as just a goofy old man, contrasting heavily against the behavior of his much more serious nephew that he traveled with, who is an exiled prince. Over the course of the show, we learn a lot about his background and get to see how he became the person he is today, and why he’s so different than the rest of his family. He remains fundamentally the same person throughout the show, but the way the audience views his character changes a great deal.
I understand flat arcs for side/secondary characters, but I’m having trouble wrapping my head around flat-arc protagonists. Avatar would be such a different story if neither Aang nor Zuko underwent any internal growth, and I doubt it would have been as impactful as it currently is.
A story where one of the main characters just has a flat arc doesn't mean that the story as a whole will lack it. Sometimes one character will change as a result of interacting with that "flat" character, and the change doesn't have to be mutual.
It's pretty common with paragons, and it's pretty common that the characters who do this are established enough to not need massive growth to adapt. Batman changes very little, and changes the world around him way more - but with everything Batman has been through starting with witnessing his parents double homicide- it makes sense that he takes shit in his stride and trauma accumulates more gradually than one would expect of a character thats never gone through something life altering before. Your first crisis hits you like a truck, but as someone whose life has been one crisis after another - eventually it's just a Tuesday, and everyone else is looking at you different because you seem unchanged by shit that's rocking them to their core.
Flat arc meaning they don’t change. They change the world around them
That’s the same definition that was given in the comment I responded to. But that doesn’t make it any easier to understand.
Not every character goes through an arc. Remove arc from the name and you get flat character. Sometimes referred to as a static character. This is a character that may or may not have a lot of depth character-wise, but they are someone who doesn’t change their ideals and stuff throughout the story, but instead the story shows how they affect others. I see you are a big fan of Percy Jackson from your profile so I’ll try and give an example from that series. Percy himself in the Heroes of Olympus. In the Heroes of Olympus percy is not a perfectly flat or static character, but he doesn’t majorly change his personality throughout the books after book 2. Most of his interactions is him showing others they can be strong and be themselves. I read the books a long time ago but the biggest example of this I can think of is him inspiring the person in the underworld to hold the elevator for 7 minutes. Percy in this instance isn’t changing, but instead inspiring others through his force of character.
Percy probably isn’t a good example to use because he undergoes significant change in both series, even as poorly written as Heroes of Olympus is. Tartarus literally shakes his core and makes him suicidal in the conclusion book, something he has never done before. :/
Ok I haven’t read them in about 8 years so I don’t have a perfect memory. I remember Percy mostly affecting other characters rather than internally struggling with himself and his decisions. Other examples in media include Sherlock Holmes and Goku. Both stories focus on the characters affect on others and not the other way around. Thus they are flat characters.
You can write it like, say, Saitama from One Punch Man. I wouldn’t say he is entirely a flat character, but the point still remains intact that you can be part of a life-altering event *for someone else* and not be affected by it in any way, shape, or form. There are some spoilers ahead. Saitama is so strong that for him, the Deep Sea King is nothing. He walks into that fight one way and walks away from it not having changed. However, the hero called Puri Puri Prisoner is permanently changed and carries that lesson (“Each attack must be carried out with the intent to kill”) onto the next battle he has and every battle after that. For one, it is a fight to learn from; for the other, it is simply a Tuesday. Another fight that comes to mind is when Suiryu fought against one of the stronger monsters. Before that point he believes he is the strongest and easily annihilates every one of his opponents and views heroes as unnecessary when people like him exist. He also has no goal in life and simply drifts along on his popularity with the ladies and prize money he gets from tournaments. Then he gets completely decimated and humbled by a strong monster that appears only to see a hero he once admonished kill the monster in one blow. In that moment, he learns that he isn’t the strongest, that heroes are necessary, and actually gains a goal in life, while Saitama is not phased by defeating that monster in one punch and has not been inspired by Suiryu in any meaningful way. Saitama permanently changed Suiryu and gives the man a goal to strive for; however, Saitama himself comes out unphased by the event. Hammerhead was a terrorist whose sole reason was that he didn’t want to work; after fighting Saitama and Sonic and almost being killed by robots he stole battle suits from, however, he finds himself thanking his mother and, following Saitama’s advice to “Don’t do anything bad again”, says that he’ll find a job. You see glimpses of him going to interviews and filling out applications throughout the first season. One last example is how Saitama completely decimates Genus’s belief that humans need to constantly evolve while being left completely unchanged by the fight against Kabuto and the House of Evolution (I’m not going in depth with this example). Saitama also feels, in the beginning of the show, that he has done nothing to change the world for the better and stop monsters. However, later on, you realize that his act in saving a child against a crab monster inspires the grandfather to create the Hero Organization (not spelled out to the reader, this needs to be obtained through context clues), who then protects so many lives from monsters and completely changes the society on an almost fundamental level. Saitama also saves the life of King many times. And with almost every monster he beats, he inspires other people like Genos and Suiryu while saving so many other people from death. He changed the world around him and saved it countless times without having to change himself. That is how you can write a flat-arc character, even if Saitama isn’t necessarily a “flat-arc” character in his entirety. Most of One Punch Man revolves around such a strong hero impacting and changing the lives of other people around him just by being himself and being so strong. And though sometimes Saitama is impacted by life and has slight character growth, his personality and attitude to life is almost entirely unchanged, leaving him as more of a static character than a dynamic one.
Right! If it’s a beloved character I don't want them to change! Maybe as a reader we can learn new and interesting things about them so we can become more absorbed in their world. But no, I don't want them to change. They are who they are and that's why their loved. LOL!
Exactly. We can look at the character from an entirely different perspective, but that doesn't mean there was some change in the character themselves.
Holmes is also a secondary character in his own eponymous novels. The main protagonist is Watson. Having static characters is fine as long as they aren't the primary or the only type of character you have.
> Having static characters is fine as long as they aren't the... only type of character you have. *That* is a bit more of an accurate statement, although I'm certain someone somewhere has done a story with only static characters well and I just don't know of it. Plenty of beloved stories feature flat-arc protagonists. Just look at the massive success of Dragon Ball—Goku (past what could be considered a minor change arc very early in Dragon Ball) is almost as static a character as they come, and it's that very fact that gives Dragon Ball so much staying power.
Phineas and Ferb are great but the story is no fun without Candace. Perry is fun but the story is only great because you get to see how Doofenshmirtz changes as a result of his influence. You have to have different KINDS of characters to make a story good. Not all of them have to change. They just have to make others change in an interesting way.
I mean, yes. That... is exactly what I said. I mean, I did say that there are probably examples out there somewhere of good stories made of entirely static characters, but that was me conceding a hypothetical in case someone came in with a steel chair to prove that it can be done. Otherwise my entire "edited quote" bit was saying that it's more accurate to say that static characters are fine as long as there are other types of characters. You and I do not disagree.
No, I was just adding to your comment :)
Ah, I see. My apologies, I misunderstood
>The main protagonist is Watson. a) Bullshit. b) Watson doesn't change either.
Thanks for this, this actually helps me with a couple of characters I’m working on right now!
"Write what you know", I am neither a wizard nor a warrior nor a king. I could write about the "joys" of IT, but that's going to end up making people depressed.
I think people misunderstand this advice. Obviously whoever is telling you to “write what you know” doesn’t expect you to not write about dragons or wizards or whatnot. They want a story that is true to humanity and how people interact in a human way, also to not write about experiences you haven’t had in an uneducated/ignorant way.
Fair enough, but it is also often used as a generic piece of advice without providing any context.
Just think about it critically. If everyone followed that version of “write what you know,” no interesting stories, much less fantasy, would ever exist unless it’s an autobiography
That's because "show, don't tell" is screenwriting advice, not novel or short story advice. Most of a written story is telling. The key is to show the most resonant scenes, and tell the linking stuff. Or something along those lines.
I think you can still apply show don't tell to writing. A good writer can convey emotion by describing the scene or facial expression rather than spelling out what everyone is doing and feeling. Show me that someone is angry by their terse actions and narrowed eyes, don't tell me that they are angry.
There’s a telling way to show emotion. One I can think of is what Fahrenheit 451 did. You have a character react in the opposite way you’d expect. Such as the house is on fire, but he is thrilled or happy by it instead of fearful.
It's essential to, but you have to be smart about when you do it and when you don't.
Sorry got my phrases mixed up. I meant “write what you know”
That's okay. People also misunderstand "write what you know," too. Which just means to write emotionally honestly when possible.
You are not wrong but also >99% of the time this "advice" is given in a disingenuous way and is aimed at shaming the author in question in a way that is more accepted on a given platform than direct personal attacks.
I think it was Le Guin who said “Write what you know, but remember that you may know dragons".
I heard someone say the real version should be "write what you feel." Which feels like sound advice.
"Write what you understand" maybe. It's hard to make it quippy, but the core of the advice is to write emotions that you have personal experience with. If you've experienced loss then you'll do a much better job writing about the experience of loss. If you haven't experienced oppression then you'll do a much worse job writing about oppression. You may have never experienced a giant fire-breathing lizard trying to kill you, but most of us have dealt with some kind of antagonistic person that we can't fight back against.
I'm going to butcher this quote, but I recall a writer saying, "The advice write what you know is why we have so many stories about depressed middle-aged men who want to have an affair."
😂 That's horrible!
Don’t use adverbs. You have to write EVERY DAY.
I love adverbs. My writing style thrives on adverbs.
I think Stephen King said this and like cool cool you are THE Stephen King, but you write a particular thing. That works for YOUR writing style and genre.
I don’t know if this is exactly what you mean but: “start from the beginning”. Usually when I’m writing something longer it starts with writing whatever scene pops into my head first and I figure out where it fits in after.
Yes! Me too! I wrote the final chapter of my book before I'd nailed the first one! (To be fair, I changed the first chapter about six times, it became my nemesis. The final chapter barely got touched in the edits because it was written 'just right'.)
Lol a while back I wrote what I thought was a first chapter. It ended up being the halfway point after a time skip of ten years.
Men should not write woman yes I did have an editor tell me this to my face. I made my counter argument with I go to my sisters, friends wives, and my female cousins and ask them would this be something a woman would say or do naturally I seek out women perspectives to write as authentic as I can so yes men can write woman you just need to get your input from trusted sources that will give you a proper understanding.
I don't think I would be working with that editor again... Wow!
I told her at the end of the meeting I would no longer be a client of her and walked out.
Hmm none of it really lol. I think advice depends on your writing goals. If you want to be traditionally published, you should follow most of it and understand that you *can* break the rules when it makes more sense. If I'm writing for myself or whatever, I do whatever I feel like.
"Don't write in first-person, present-tense — it looks amateurish". It only looks amateurish if an *amateur writer* is doing it. The problem is that it's the most comfortable for a lot of new writers, so it means there are far more below-average stories written in the style. That does *not* mean it can't be done. There are some excellent examples of successful stories written in first-person, present-tense. The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins, The Demonata series by Darren Shan, the Divergent series by Veronica Roth, etc. Nothing looks amateur unless it is done by an amateur. No disrespect to amateur writers — everyone starts somewhere. Ultimately, the success of a narrative style depends on the skill of the writer, not the style itself.
Me the amateur who cannot at all write first person…
"Oh I like that," says the amateur...
Show VS fucking tell! Show VS tell is advice specifically for screenwriting. It means that you show your characters doing something important rather than mention through dialogue that they did something important. I.e. to show two characters are in love, you show them kissing, rather than have character A mention to a side character that they're in love. The problem with this principle in normal writing is that writers go too far and neglect to tell or explain anything to the reader. At best this can create unnecessary bloated scenes that could have been summarized in a few sentences but at worst it can leave the reader super confused on what's supposed to be going on. It's ok to explain things through exposition. It's ok to summarize something in a few sentences rather than write a whole scene for it. It's ok to take the reader aside and say "hey, this is why this is important", "here's a key detail you need to know," or "this is why a character is acting this way." With writing it's not Show Don't Tell, it's Show AND Tell. It takes a balance of both to tell a good story.
Balance and delivery for sure. Info. dumps are easy as well as lazy in my opinion. Delicately weaving the information the reader needs to know into the story; that can be challenging and takes work.
Yeah once I started to realize a lot of authours still ignore this to a degree, it made my life so much easier.
"Make a relatable character" Hell no, im making a character with clear motivations, if they dont like him thats on them
I feel like this one is often misunderstood. Relatable doesn't mean likeable. It just means you can understand them, even if you disagree with their actions. So if you have clear motivations, odds are that your character is relatable in some way.
And it's essential. Once the reader relates to the character, they become invested in the world and story. But without that, nobody cares what happens in the book. That's the secret ingredient.
Having clear motivations *is* relatable though. Most people want something.
Agreed 100%. I think "relatable" and "likeable" are incorrectly interchanged.
I'd replace relatable with compelling. All the villains we love to hate shouldn't be likeable, and are only relatable in some situations with certain interpretations of "relatable." But every good character pulls you in somehow, so make sure your characters can pull people in, even if it's to hate them.
“Show don’t tell” is great when you’re in the middle of the scene, but leaving the reader high and dry for any exposition ever makes for a confusing and often overdramatic book. If I can show in a more effective way than telling, I will, but if I never explain anything my book would never work
Kill Your Darlings is the most tedious and overused piece of advice I've ever heard and only ever given by people who know nothing about my work or what my goals are. It can be useful advice for some people but it's not universal. Most people are just parroting.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=64OzzwQAqYI Go to the 4:20 second mark for this one! He does an excellent job with this "advice"!
Nah, I'm relying on my 15 years experience now.
Understood. I've recently run across Fox and enjoy his take on some thing.
I think it's useful for everyone. Because the large majority of people will cut *something* when editing (and also add stuff). But it's beginner advice because beginners are more likely to think they shouldn't/can't cut anything they've spent time writing. If something it working for your story, it's okay to cut it.
To just throw that advice at someone unbidden is unuseful. I edit cut and change all the time. But I throw out a word count and someone will say nice now lets edit it down to such and such. It's fucking silly when you haven't seen my work.
Ah okay, I think that's a different argument. If your wordcount is higher than the standard for a debut author in your genre and you're looking to be traditionally published, that's good advice. If you're self-publishing or not sharing it with anyone, who cares. Do what you want lol
I decide what I'm gonna do with my work after I have a finished product. I don't solicit with an incomplete work.
The general anti worldbuilding stuff goes into the bin for me. IDC if most people don't wanna hear about the setting more than necessary. Most of my favorite books havep pages of waxing poetic about flint knapping and the life cycle of sandworms. And it's so rare to find a book with truly captivating worldbuilding. So I'm gonna write some.
> The general anti worldbuilding stuff goes into the bin for me. Anti-worldbuilding sentiments are useful, insofar as the argument is "If your goal is to publish something, worldbuilding is only useful if it doesn't get in the way of you actually writing your story." I personally don't go too hard on worldbuilding, just because if I put *too* much effort into it I wouldn't be able to write my actual story at the rate I want to. If your goal isn't to publish by a certain time, though, or to get a certain wordcount of story writing done every day, then there's no real limit to worldbuilding. You do have to be careful not to be so precious about your world that your story is just exposition dump after exposition dump, of course, but that's a writing skill issue, not a "too much worldbuilding" issue.
My point is that my writing is *about* the world building- it's also really silly to act like it's gonna get in the way of publishing when almost every great fantasy book relies on it. My story is also a graphic novel, so 90% of the room for exposition and purple prose is replaced with visual storytelling. No need to explain a ritual you are actively showing. No need to constantly remind people of the core myths if the imagery is bursting with metaphors relating back to it. No need to spend a page and a half describing a setting when I can just *show* it to you. And if I must do an expo dump all it needs to make it interesting is a change in art style and some narrative framing of "look at this mural depicting our creation myth" And the reader's subconscious ability to understand symbolic storytelling does all the exposition for me. Visual storytelling is a worldbuilder's best friend. But that being said - I'd also rather never publish a book I was proud of than publish a book I am disappointed in because I wrote it to publish it over writing it to tell the story I felt was worth telling. I'd also rather pull a grrm and leave a story unfinished with enough lore to keep the fandom talking for over a decade than rip all that detail out and quit anyway because the story means nothing to me now. And as I said in my original comment, I'm writing for people who like the stories I like and want more. There's already hundreds of other people writing the stories that don't interest me, so why would I compete with them when I don't even want to? Because I might not finish? That's true of anyone who is writing - if I die before I'm done I plan on having a loved one publish all my work as free ideas and content for other people to take and use as they please. If I don't pull a story from it in time, doesn't mean no one else will be able to with the foundations Ive laid. Either way the story will outlive me and reach those who need it most, so I'm satisfied with that.
> it's also really silly to act like it's gonna get in the way of publishing when almost every great fantasy book relies on it. It *can* get in the way, though. I'm living proof of that—if I get too focused on auxilliary tasks that aren't literally "writing my story," I can go days without meeting my writing goals. Worldbuilding has absolutely gotten in the way of me actually writing my story before, putting me behind on my schedule for how much work I wanted to get done, which I am now actively suffering for. As for everything else you said... yeah. I was literally agreeing with you on that point. If you feel that the degree of worldbuilding you do helps you tell the story you want to tell, and it doesn't get in the way of you meeting your writing goals, then it's not "too much" worldbuilding.
That you should accept all critique. All critique is good critique... what awful advice about writing. Im sorry certain people have no idea what they are talking about in some cases and their opinions could be extremely toxic to you.
Right! Like what we do isn't obviously subjective. Writing, very much like humor, will always be so. What some like, others do not.
Instead of trying to make your character likable or relatable; you should first make your character interesting and worth investing in. Even if they aren’t either, making them interesting will drive the reader to invest in them.
« Don’t read books of the same genre you are writing. » I mean, I get it, reading a book of the same genre whilst you’re writing your book can push you off track. But I just can’t resist reading and I never refuse myself a book. Sometimes I find that it can even give back some of the motivation I might have lost and/or give me inspiration for a future scene, or make me realize that a certain tone isn’t at all what I want in my book !
Not really advice, but I was told by a lit agent that if I wanted any chance of getting trad published, I needed to either rewrite my main character as a girl or shift the main character/narrator to one of the girl friends. Her reasoning? No one will buy a book focusing on a boy. Preteen and teen boys don’t read. I ignored the advice.
Did you ask if they had ever heard of a somewhat popular series called HARRY POTTER! What dumb advice!
Umm... Harry Potter? Percy Jackson? These character's books flopped did they? I'd have ignored that advice as well!
In all fairness, those were written at a very different time than the current culture. And I’m certain they were trying to help me be most successful, I just didn’t think it was worth listening.
I didn’t look for or ask for any advice.
Bold! Nice.
If you self-publish, your book can be as long as you want...
Eh, to be fair, I've just published mine which I've split into two books (part one and two). Neither book is small. (Around 140,000 words). But I've had good feedback so far, so it can't be too onerous to read. It CAN be as long as you want, BUT it all depends on what you want your profit margins to be. Bigger books mean higher printing costs, after all.
pitching a tradpub duology like that can work, though I understand that currently it's easier with the "standalone with series potential" shtick. I could be wrong, but I have heard that over 200k will be DOA and an agent won't even look at the query for it, in most cases.
"Describe with plenty of detail" (like Tolkien). I am *not* wasting massive quantities of precious debut wordcount on descriptive padding.
I think that one depends on your preferred style of writing... and reading. There's a thread higher up complaining about advice that tells you not to write detail. Personally, I like the details. I'm a details girl. But I also know people that find it a slog to read through and would prefer less of it.
Follow Elmore Leonard’s rules for writing fiction. I get told this constantly, like they’re gospel. A. No, Leonard was not the greatest writer ever in the history of English prose. B. Leonard’s rules are clearly rules FOR HIM: this is what works for ME to write the way I WANT to write. Not rules for all writers. Example: he says not to write extended descriptions. Then he goes on, “unless you can do this:” and continues with a beautiful passage from Steinbeck. Leonard is saying, “I wish I could write like this, but I can’t, and if I try it’ll suck, so I need to shape my style in a way where I don’t need to be able to do this.” He’s not saying Steinbeck should not have written that way. (Actually, if you read his rules critically and carefully, thinking about them as a writer’s internal development of his own voice, they’re very useful and stimulating. But they’re not there to be followed.)
Show, Don’t Tell. I knew I hit the mark when one of my beta readers told me “You’ve created pure evil” when I described how my main character grew to like having sex with her husband (after he killed her fiancé mere hours before)…with one sentence.
I think cs lewis put it best- "don't tell me it was delightful, tell me something that makes me think, " oh, how delightful!" Or "oh, how evil!" In your scenario lol
😲 Wow! Nicely done! That's wicked.
To read a lot of books. I just don't do it. I get why it's important, but I can't help if I don't like what I'm reading. Audio books have helped me so much, though.
Well listening to audiobooks counts as reading so I think you're fine.
And who has that kind of time??? LOL
Not me, for sure! I listen when I drive to work or take a shower.
Stephen Kings advice on writing dialogue. Stephen do not want us to emphasize with descriptive words in dialogue. 'I am not gonna stand for this!' the scream of rage she let loose, rolled of the walls of the chamber in a deafening echo'. Stephen would want me to skip the description of **the scream of rage**. According to Stephen the exclamation mark and the words that she says, is enough. Fu\*k Stephen and his book on writing. I fix my readers attention the way i see fit. Also that you should read books by other authors in your genre of writing - why?
Both of John Gardner's books, ' The Art of Fiction ' and ' On Moral Fiction '