Writing, promotion, tips, and opinion. Pour a cuppa your favorite poison and join in.

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Secrets and Lies

The ending is the place where all must be revealed.

Of course, any secrets the main character is keeping might be revealed earlier. The lies that were told to the main character could come out before the climax. But it's more likely that if there's a secret or a lie that is driving the plot, that won't come out until the last possible moment.

The worst possible moment.

If the story is based on a secret, then a major player in the story must not know the secret. The other characters must keep it from him/her. Actively. But we'll all be disappointed if that character never learns the secret. It must come out sometime.

Same with a big lie. It must be kept from someone. That someone might be the reader. But we'll all be disappointed if we never learn the truth.

What secrets and/or lies are your characters keeping?

4 comments:

Charity Bradford said...

I've got two new characters keeping secrets from Talia and Landry. Both are protecting them with lies. It makes it really hard to tell which one is the bad guy and which one is just afraid to tell what his real mission is.

I like secrets!

Jess said...

Hmm, good question. Can't think of one off the top of my head for my WIP. They're very good secret keepers, these characters of mine~ they won't even tell me, the writer :)

Charity Bradford said...

Hah! Jess, don't you love/hate when they do that? This is why getting that rough draft finished is SO hard. Good luck prying the secrets from your characters!

Huntress said...

I had an antagonist turn into one of the good guys half way through the book. Shocked me. Another example of the characters keeping secrets from their creators.