Ok so I'm wanting to write a novel. And seeing as my favorite genre is Fantasy/Urban Fantasy that's the sort of novel I want to write. And I've come up with several characters for this novel, and I even have the opening sequence worked out in my head. What I'm having trouble coming up with us what I like to call "the hook" of the story. That element that draws the reader in and makes them want to keep turning the pages till the end. So far all I can come up with is the same old cliche idea of "bad guy wants to take over/destroy the world, good guy is the only one that can stop him." *YAWN*
Any writers out there that can give me some advice?
![[-]](https://gayspeak.com/images/duende_v3_local/collapse.png)
•
Posts: 835
Threads: 24
Joined: Apr 2013
Reputation:
0
Mood: None
idea 1: Bad guy wants to take over the world, good guy is one of the TWO 'chosen' ones to stop the bad guy, but they will need two of the chosen ones to beat him but the problem is that the OTHER chosen one ( could be an anti-hero) is sorta badass/shady.
Idea2: Bad guy wants to take over the world, good guy...works for him. Yes. The good guy is a sleeper agent, and the good guy is actually living a fictional life when he's in control ( fake parents/friends/memories) but the good guy slowly realizes people around him are fake/agents. The good guy can have some sort of 'disease' which may be the fake reason why the good guy can't remember days or even weeks .
idea 3: Bad guy is actually some sort of ancient time god, and the good guy is actually part of this alien race(sort of like doctor who), and the good guy have to travel across time and space and train himself to stop the evil forces.
•
Generally speaking (as you only give general info) I'd say involve unsuspecting (though they can be extremely cynical and suspicious, but still should be in for some surprises) characters get tangled up with the plot indirectly.
For example, a cynical, bitter mercenary is sick of the thugs who act as the duke's legbreakers, perhaps having been recently beaten & robbed by them while drunk and/or ripped off when he scouted for them in work they considered too dangerous for themselves (and he wasn't expected to survive anyway), and sympathizes slightly when seeing a stranger (or maybe even an acquaintance) brutalized over something trivial (perhaps in possession of a gem the duke considers unlucky or legal only for the nobility which has created a black market for them), and comes to his aid not only over sympathy but even more for revenge, and sucker punches the guards for payback, but they're tougher than he thought (maybe he was a little drunk then), though they manage to overcome, though injured and hunted. 'Course complications ensue and the pair are then forced into hiding together. And the stranger mentions a mentor (or maybe even someone blackmailed) who did him a kindness (got him off the streets or whatever) who can help get them out of the immediate area, but find too late that he's been taken prisoner (possibly with the 2 characters) or killed (and the 2 then decide to solve it, though the first character would need a motivation, maybe he'd helped both of them once upon a time, or just wants to find some clue that will decipher a map to a treasure...) And this plugs into the bigger picture.
•
Shakespeare already wrote that.
In fact Shakespeare wrote every possible story combination that exists.
There are details and different ways to divide up literature: Click Here
However it all boils down to the protagonist Vs _____________ (fill in the blank) and there is a conflict and resolution.
That link will give you about 30 different things you can try to include as subplots. Having subplots in a story, such as a mystery tied to a secondary character that may (so the reader believes until all is revealed in the last chapter) have some huge bearing on the main story.
Your story can have maybe three subplots and remain followable by most readers. So have a mystery, a discovery/slow revealing of some subplot material and a metamorphosis of one of the main characters.
These three are to be strung along through the whole story, with resolution to all three being tied up in the last chapters.
You can take a break from the main story by throwing in other side 'ventures' - unexpected detours down dark alleys of the psyche, or if you want just hot passionate sexy scenes which gets the ready hooked on reading more hoping there will be a money shot.
A lot of Modern Movies do that - have the hot passionate kiss, the revealing of a little flesh to entice the watcher to stick around to see if that love interest developed into soft porn. Of course bad directors/producers are now giving the audience soft porn forgetting that that kiss that revealing of a little flesh was only a gimmick to get the males to sit through 2.3 hours of a 'Comedy Romance'....
•
How about good guy not that all good, like if he is a assassin or mercenary, bad guy seems to be a good guy. So good guy, doses terrible things but wants to save someone or protect them or doesn't want to die. He could also be hired to save the world
•
You could try to take typical fantasy conventions and give them some unexpected twist? Pretty unspecific I know, but that'd be cool.
•
The main idea I have is a modern day setting where "Magick" (note the spelling to differentiate between actual abilities and "cheap parlor tricks") is real and accessible, but only to a select few. Those who can access it normally have to learn how to, but the hero of the story is one of the rare few for who the ability comes naturally. I also have a "mentor" type character (ala Obi-wan Kenobi) who is there to guide our hero on his journey. And I was thinking of having some sort of bad guy who wants to dominate the world and is somehow connected with our hero. Maybe an old friend of the family or something. Had thought about making the bad guy a family member of the hero but that sounds to cliche.
•
stranger221 Wrote:idea 1: Bad guy wants to take over the world, good guy is one of the TWO 'chosen' ones to stop the bad guy, but they will need two of the chosen ones to beat him but the problem is that the OTHER chosen one ( could be an anti-hero) is sorta badass/shady.
I actually considered something similar to this for a fantasy novel several years back. Only it was two brothers and one of them, possibly the oldest, gets corrupted by the "dark one." Don't know why I never finished that one but I may have to revisit it until something comes a long with this newest idea.
•
Ok that is your main plot... Great. The hook is what supports the main plot.
You have at least one clear Universal Law - Meaning a law for your universe.
Most people must work at attaining "Magick", and when he said the word I could hear the capital "M" clearly denoting the difference between the mundane magics of illusionists. Except a few who are more gifted, are blessed, are cursed, have the right genetics, are hybrids of an alien race, are born at an auspicious time when certain bodies align in the heavens... whatever. It is rare. Why?
Why not make to to where Magick is accessible to all to a minor degree (Think X-Men and all of the minor mutants, lots of useless 'skills' only few greats who are mentioned). But people have to work at it, study it going to Elemental School and Intermediate Magicks School.
The modern world with Magick for nearly all to one degree or another, with technologies gears for magickal energy, thus everyone who has some minor magick to them can survive quite nicely in the world, but those unfortunates born without magick are outcasts, and have to rely on trickery in order to survive.
And have this very rarest type of Magickal person who has the "natural gift" without need of schooling to be envied by an illusionist the far other end of the spectrum, people born with no Magick in a world were being magickal in someway is important to society.
Those who are born without Magick turn to Technology and Illusion to fit into society and 'scrape by' and this villain of yours is a technological genius who desires to destroy the world as it is and replace it with one of no magick.
Why are fully talented Magick users so rare? Why are people born without a single drop of Magick in their body? Let that be your mystery, that will be revealed slowly, or discovered and have that connection between these two ends of the spectrum be something that connects your villain and hero.
As for the 'Mentor' why have one? Unless it was this 'Mentor' who is the true connection (Revealed in the last chapters as having stolen the magick from the villain and dumped it in the hero in a quest to make a perfectly magickal person).
What are the laws of your Universe? Sit down and think about the fundamental laws - Sort of like the Law of Gravity, when you let something go it falls down... Now what are the basic laws of Magick?
What are the laws of its society, what are the basic structures that keep society moving? If Magick is needed in order to work in that society, how does that happen?
Assumptions. Red Herrings. The book opens with the first chapter focused not on the hero, but the villain. Spend a bit of time describing his miserable childhood as a magickless person in a society geared for magick, describe is 'triumph' of being able to manage to exist in society through the use of technology (Technomancy - cool word). Get the reader spending the first chapter thinking that the villain is really the hero.
Lead the reader to thinking 'Oh so people are naturally born without magick, sucks to be them - sorry.' Keep that illusion up until the end of the book where it is revealed that magick can be stolen from a person. The plot twist, the revealing.
Second Chapter, Focus on the early years of the hero, make him out to be a real bastad - using his abilities in school to torment and torture his fellow classmates, using his abilities to commit petty crimes. Get your reader to really hate his guts and believe that all people who are 'naturally' born with those abilities are dicks.
Chapter three Back to the villain as a young man who figures out a way to do something with technomancy to give him the potential to rule the world, but instead of dominate the world let his initial desire to be to help others in his situation. Chapter 4 the hero is seriously looking like he is going down the broad and easy path to hell. Chapter 5, the first meeting or crossing of the Villain and Hero where both of their desires and though plans for the future take 180 turns, the Villain now becomes vindictive and hateful, spiteful and turns his genius into a world dominating thing. The hero realizes that he and only he can save the world.
Maybe have them have a sort of non-contact encounter, where the second hand reactions of something the hero does causes the villain to become the villain.
Both characters work under the assumption that their lot in life is by accident, and because of that assumption they do things that maybe they wouldn't be doing had they known that this mentor fella purposefully and maliciously screwed them both over by stealing from one and over gifting the other. What is the final price to having twice the magic and a full use of it? What's its ultimate toll?
The hook of any good story is not so much the content of the story, but how we get from the start to the finish. You can write a great book about the life of rabbits - no one cares if the rabbits can or can't really talk, its the venture the rabbits have that hook the reader.
Each plot turn, each new discovery, each deepening of a mystery, the interactions of one character and how it affects another character, those are what keeps the reader up way pass their bedtime. It is not just 'a' (one) hook, it is many tiny ones which gets the reader wanting to know the who, how, why to the details.
Good books/stories ultimately ask a lot of questions during the start and middle of the story end ultimately answer them all by the end, leaving just one last answer to be answered before 'The End'.
•
I see what you're getting at Bow and I'll take all that into consideration, but after talkin with a friend I've had another idea come to mind and its really starting to take off so I think I'm going to shelve this one for a while and run with this new idea. Same genre but a different concept. Thank you all for your ideas. I am goin to keep them in mind for later.
•
|
