The darkest hour

When the hero has lost everything. When the villain has temporarily triumphed, with nothing left to stop him. When the apocalypse has arrived. Most stories have that moment. That darkest hour.

Does yours?

The importance of losing everything

Think of any action television show – as the season comes to a close, the hero is often close to losing everything. The end of the second season of Buffy is a great example – she’s been kicked out of home, kicked out of school, and the love of her life, Angel, is evil and has begun to unleash hell on earth.

When the climax of your story draws nearer, it’s time for your hero to fail. He needs to lose, at least for part of the story. He needs to know the depths of his darkest hour.

Why?

1. The hero’s darkest hour allows time for reflection, for both the hero, and the reader

If you watch the audio commentary for How to Train Your Dragon, the creators admit that they had skipped that darkest hour, where Hiccup mourns Toothless after he's captured and taken away. Instead, they had Hiccup immediately jumping up, ready to get back into fight. The creators realised this was a mistake – that moment of reflection was needed. They let Hiccup experience the impact of his loss, let him feel hopeless. It’s a time all of us go through in life, and it’s an important progression in the story.

When the hero endures the worst of the worst, readers learn from his strength. They follow him to his darkest hour, and celebrate his glory when he finds his way back. If you’re looking for a reader who will truly love rereading your book, give them inspiration by slamming your hero to rock bottom and let him climb back up again.

2. The harder you fall, the higher you climb

You only need to watch J.K. Rowling’s speech on failure to understand that. When you strip a character down to the barest essentials, you’re left with his true nature. When your hero has nothing left, it’s this moment that defines him. It gives readers an insight into his spirit, his strength, and his endurance. Kill his family, turn his friends against him, let his arch nemesis triumph, and see what he does. Give him the greatest obstacles of all to overcome, and show your readers why he is the hero.

Rising from the ashes

Getting your hero out of his darkest hour is not easy. Usually he’s caught in a moment of self-doubt, and it’s not believable for him to just flick a mental switch and come at the problem again with newfound determination.

Sometimes a secondary character needs to come in and slap some sense into him. Choose that secondary character wisely. Who would be the most surprising character to help your hero in a time of need? Could it be someone who’s been a pain for the protagonist in the past? Could it be someone who used to be a threat, but has decided to work together with the protagonist against a common enemy? Could it be someone the hero had previously written off as useless?

Sometimes, however, the hero is alone in this moment of need. He must find an inner strength, but it takes a motivating factor to get him to move. Perhaps he solves a riddle or figures out a weak point that will help take down the villain. Perhaps he realises what more he might lose if he lets the villain win. Perhaps he needs that moment when he can choose to give up and die, but instead hauls himself to his feet.

Let’s go back to the scenario in Buffy. She’s lost almost everything. Angel is about to kill her, and asks (more or less) what she has left. He tries to impale her with his sword, and at the last second, she slams her hands together to stop the blade, and answers, “Me.” Who wouldn’t root for a character like that?

What are some of your favourite stories with a darkest hour? Did you find yourself rooting for the protagonist more because they struggled up from rock bottom?

How would your story differ if the villain took control, and the protagonist experienced that darkest hour?

Plot and Character

So I've read statements saying that character *is* plot. The people who make these statements often go on to say that the characters "tell them" what to do in the story.

And then I've read some statements who claim that this is complete and utter drivel. They add that you have to think about plot structure, and how your story needs to follow certain guidelines, not go on some subconscious whim that writers claim are characters "speaking" to them.

Okay, so that's a valid point, but I'm still going to argue the case that character is plot. I fall under the category of the first lot of writers, rather than the second.

Why?

Because, well, character IS plot. We no longer read stories where stuff happens to the character and they just react instead of act (did we ever?). Stuff will happen to the character at first, sure, but what the character then chooses to do is based purely on who the character is. Say a plague hits your fictional town. Depending on your protagonist, your book could go any way. For example, the story could start off with the protagonist's reaction to the plague, where he or she could -

1. Run for the hills and try to hide
2. Set out on an adventure to discover what caused the plague
3. Do scientific research to discover what caused the plague.
4. Tend to the sick

So right there, your plot is decided for you by who your character is.

Now. I am definitely, definitely an advocate of knowing plot structure. You can't just meander around the pages with nothing happening for the majority of the book while your character chooses their own adventure. A writer needs to know the bones of the plot. But the meaty part, the ups and downs of the story, are up to the characters.

How I figure out the beginnings of my stories, step-by-step, looks like this:

1. Create main characters and antagonists - this means giving them histories, desires, motivations, etc.
2. Figure out the story goal and ending (1 and 2 are interchangable, but I usually do them in this order).
3. Start the story off with an inciting incident, and while I'm doing that...
4. Work out the first doorway (see James Scott Bell's proper explanation for this phrase in Plot and Structure). I need to know what's going to force my protagonist into the story and give them no way to turn back.
5. Lead my character to the first doorway, so they can begin the story goal.

Now, from here on in is the tricky part, and this is where character really becomes the plot. What happens next is a choice depending on who the character is. Your character(s) will decide how to overcome this no-turning-back thing (usually it's with resistance at first), and take certain steps to try and get where they want to be (usually the status quo - back to how they were at the beginning of the story, although they never get there).

Do they try to eliminate the threat on their own? Do they enlist help? Does the antagonist have a certain style while trying to keep the protagonist from reaching his/her goal? Because, yes, the antagonist is also the plot. And all these plot choices rely on character.

Of course, while planning all this, I know that I need to lead my characters through doorway two and reach the climax, so I know the basic direction, but how the story gets there is up to the characters.

And that's what we authors mean when we say our characters "tell us" what to do.