Character Assassination for Fun and Profit (Boskone)

[jpskewedthrone]

This is the first of the writerly discussions that I'm stealing from the Boskone program. Because, yes, I am a thief. I was actually on this panel at Boskone and I thought it was a great title for a panel and the description very interesting. Unfortunately, I don't think we got to half of what could be discussed on this panel due to . . . sidetracking, let's call it. So I figured I'd have my say here, on my LJ, where no one can hijack sideline the panel in favor of, oh, I don't know, stories about their children. Or interesting ways to die that make me not want to eat lunch after the panel.

I'll give the panel description according to Boskone, and then just talk about whatever that description inspires in me. I'm hoping that everyone else here has their own opinions and/or comments and will comment heavily.

The Description: The death of a major character often proves upsetting for involved readers. How does it feel to the writer? What genre works have killed off their own most memorably? Does it always help the story? Which writers have a special gift for this dark art?



First of all, I want to state that I have never killed off a character frivolously in any of my novels. One of the things brought up was killing off a character because a writer had grown bored with them, or hated them and never wanted to write about them again, or whatever. I don't do that. If a character dies in one of my novels, even a minor character that has only been there for a chapter, it's because that death was inevitable. Meaning it's was necessary for the plot, or for character development, or because that's what HAS to happen at that point to make the story believable.

But this still leaves tons of options open. For example, the writer can bring in a new character for the purpose of the plot, to perhaps make things more suspenseful or whatever, and then not know what to do with that character. And so "disposes" of them in some way.

I don't do this either. I think the writer needs to treat death seriously in a novel. It can't just happen. It needs to happen for a reason. If it's simply to shock the reader, or to solve a "problem" that the writer has written themselves into, then that's a cop out. It's . . . lazy. If this comes up while you're writing, then it's a sign that you, as the writer, need to sit down and figure out a different way to create that problem, or a different way to resolve the problem. In this instance, death is too easy. And because it's easy, it's going to feel like a cheat to the reader, who may chuck the book across the room and never pick it up again.

And I guess that's my main point about death and how it relates to the writer and the reader and the characters: Death should never be easy.

It shouldn't be easy to the writer. If it is, then I'd question whether or not you, as the writer, are relating well enough to your characters. I personally am invested in my characters, even the "evil" ones, and so when one of them dies, it's rather traumatic to me. I know that for one character's death in particular, I was crushed. I cried when I wrote the death. I thought that would be the end of it, but I cried again during the revision, and then AGAIN during the editor's revision process, and AGAIN when I got the galleys . . . well, you get the picture. I think this death in particular hit me hard because it hadn't been planned. It came as a shock to me when I finally realized that this character WAS going to die. I literally stopped writing when it struck me and went, "Oh crap." Because I realized the character was going to die a good 200 or 300 pages before the actual death. So if I figured it out so early, why not stop it? Well, the story demanded it. It was too perfect, so even though I hated the fact that a death was involved, it had to happen, whether I liked it or not.

Of course, not all of the deaths affect me that badly. But they affect me to some extent, even if it's just a vicious sense of judgment on my part. Meaning the character deserved to die. I'm still emotionally involved with that character. The same is true for evil characters, because if you're writing well, you know that the evil character isn't evil in their own mind. They have their own goals and agenda and friends and feelings, and so their death should be just as significant to the writer as the death of a good character. The difference is that the death of the good character and the aftereffects generally take center stage, while the aftereffects of the death of an evil character (how it affects their friends, etc) generally isn't center stage. But the writer should still be aware of it, even if it's all happening backstage.

The reader should be emotionally involved with the characters as well. I personally take the email from a fan saying that they couldn't believe I killed such and such off, how evil could I be, to be a good email. Because it means that I've succeeded in making someone care about these characters, so much that they're invested in the character's life. And when that life ends, for whatever reason, they were involved enough to send me an email. I just hope they realize that I more than likely had the same reaction to the character's death as they did. Death should not be easy for the reader, not if the writer has succeeded in what they've attempted when writing the book.

But in the end, I think it's the characters themselves that are what the writer should focus on, and this idea did come up at the panel discussion at Boskone. A death has consequences, for everyone surrounding that character. Traumatic consequences. And a writer should never, ever, gloss over those emotional changes that everyone else should be going through. If death becomes easy for the characters, then the book has failed. If a character kills someone, and then just moves on to the next part of the quest, or if they witness a death and just move on, or if they inadvertently cause a death and just shrug and move on, then there's something seriously wrong with the book. A death, any death, should shake up everyone involved with that death, even if they're only involved peripherally. I don't mean they should all burst into tears and sob over the grave. But it should affect them in some way. Even if they simply go quiet and walk away, never shed a tear, etc. In that case, they've internalized the death. So while there's no outward sign it has affected them, there are probably some rather interesting things going in internally for that character. In the end, these reactions are the most important part for the death of a character. Because they affect the story. If a character dies and no one is affected . . . then I'd say that that character probably shouldn't have been in the story.

And again, I mean all of this in layers . . . or as I said early, where the death appears on stage. If it's a major character, then the affects should be center stage and gone into explicitly. If it's a minor character, then these affects won't be center stage necessarily. And if its the death of a spear carrier, someone who doesn't even have a name, then perhaps the affects won't be seen onstage at all. BUT THE WRITER SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE AFFECTS ANYWAY. No matter where they appear on stage. Because they'll still have minor ripples elsewhere on stage that should be noted.

And I think that's all I wanted to say on the topic at the panel. As I said, most of this got mentioned at the panel in some form or another, and this post isn't supposed to be a hardcore "essay" on the topic in any sense, just me rambling. I'm sure I left something out. But that's what comments are for! So comment away and I'm sure we'll catch anything I missed.

Comments

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

I'm not a writer nor a critical reader (just like good stories). I was a medic in the Air Force. Death in real life rarely has any meaning. People try and find meaning in a person's death but usually, it's just random chance. Not sure how that gibes with writers and their worlds. Still, some interesting ideas here.

[janni.livejournal.com]

I think it's almost because it makes no sense in real life that it has to make sense in fiction, if that makes any sense. In much the way all of fiction has to make some sort of sense, while none of life does.

At least that's how it works for me, as writer and reader. I know in real life it's different; but in fiction, every character's death needs to somehow be ... a piece that fits into the larger story.

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

Cool. That makes sense. Yeah, novels are a way of figuring out what's going on in life, even in Fantasy and SF.

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

What Janni said, plus in books, it's usually what the survivors are dealing with that's important to the story. So yeah, there may be a reason for the death of a character, or not, but it's what those that are left do and how that death drives them that's important. Because they're going to try to make sense of the death, just like we do, and they're going to try to give it meaning, just like we do, and that's usually what drives the plot and character forward.

[janni.livejournal.com]

I had to kill a character during the revisions of my most recent novel. (My editor rightly pointed at that in this particular situation if everyone survived in this particular way, it wouldn't be believable--so I had to play a sort of fictional triage with my characters.) I kept hoping, when my editor received the revised manuscript, he'd tell me that I'd made a horrible mistake and must resurrect the character I'd killed, but no such luck. It is hard to kill characters off.

I also think it's harder to kill off one character you know and care about than to kill off millions of faceless/nameless characters you don't really know. (I mean, I didn't cry killing off millions of people before my novel ever began. That was way easier than killing off that one particular character I knew and cared about.)

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

If you can think of the characters as part of the "masses" then yes, it is easier to kill them off. That's the off stage kind of repercussions that don't often make it into the book. Which is why it doesn't affect us as much. It isn't central to THIS story.

The deaths that usually affect the writer most of the deaths central to the current story. And those typically hurt.

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

I think there should be a toll on the main character. Perhaps he's initially sickened by the first few deaths, but then they start wearing him down and he retreats into himself. That might be the whole point of all of the deaths. He's reacting by retreating and eventually it's going to blow. As long as there is some type of reaction from the main characters I think you're fine. It's when they hack through twenty of them without thought, move on to the next, hack through them, etc, and there's never any thought to what they're doing or how it might affect them that books go wrong.

[madkestrel.livejournal.com]

I remember people being surprised at Babylon Five because it was one of the first SF shows that would take the risk of killing off a major character. Up until then, shows might put a major character at terrible risk, but not kill him. Or if he DID die, some magical/technological way was found to bring him back.

As much as my heart might be broken at the loss of a character I loved, I'd rather they died and stayed that way than to have some contrived, unbelievable resurrection. The only thing that annoys me more is the insertion of the Magic Baby...but that's a subject for another time.

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

I brought that up in the panel: that in fantasy you can't have as good of an affect on the reader by killing someone off because there's always the niggling little hope that they'll be resurrected somehow. Unless this has been set up well before hand, the whole resurrection bit also ticks me off. It becomes almost a soap opera at a certain stage.

[vcmorris.livejournal.com]

I had to kill both a major character and a minor one in my 2nd novel. It just would not have been right otherwise, especially since it's a book involving the Civil War. Like you, I cried while I was writing it. I cried when I was editing it. I cried again when I read it in the finished book. I hated to kill her because we were just starting to understand who she was and how important she was to the main characters, but, war is hell and the death worked to harden the heart of another character even more. It gave the main character a great deal of motivation later in the book.

While the book was in its editing phase with the publisher, she sent me an email about this death. She thought I'd like to know how FURIOUS her head Reader was about it. "How could I do that? Why didn't she (the publisher) warn her about it? Argh! No, she can't be dead!" That kind of thing. It made me smile because, as you said, it meant that this character was loved and had become real to someone other than myself.

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I take those emails as a compliment. It means I got to them, or rather, the characters got to them.

Gandalf

[wortschmiedin.livejournal.com]

I never read tLotRs but my hubby read it to me when I was pregnant. He let me cry when Gandalf died, and all the time while I was finally coming to terms with the fact that he really is dead, like the rest of the fellowship. He let me start crying again, when he picked up the book the next day, but he stopped when Gandalf showed up again in white ;)

SO far, I haven't killed any major characters. I have let my MC kill someone who was after her, and she is still in shock about what she has done. Also, my first adult novel starts out with a just dead husband.
Personally, I don't think death is what writer's don't deal with so well. I think it is mourning.

Yes, it is hard to kill off a beloved Character, but what I find odd is that in most stories (and I don't even think of the soap operas where guys are like five times widowed and still are dating very other chick on this season whilst allegedly being a lovely men) is that the mourning get's so little *air time*.

Mourning is probaly the single most horrible conflict within life EVERYBODY knows he/she will have. Loosing someone you love, whether in a sexual way or differently doesn't really matter, is earth shattering. I don't think that that changes if you live in a society where death is more *normal* than these days in the western world. People wouldn't grieve less, they would be more carefull with their hearts, methinx. Probably the grief would be poured into other things like rituals and honoring the deceased ect ect. but the agony of the not-dead is, what IMO is emotionally charged.

Of course there are also ways of making death itself agony. Any form of sacrifice will be emotionally compelling. I am not belittleling that. But while I find parts of the LotR lengthy, in this Tolkien did it right methinx. Having Gandalf be mourned, then making a point of the necessity to delay the proper dealings for every one and distract them form their grief after some initial dealings. Giving the reader the time to mourn.

Then again, maybe I am just a watering pot ;)
Brooke

Re: Gandalf

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

That's kind of the point in my books. My main character goes through a bunch of different levels of mourning, from just feeling sorry about the death (because there wasn't a strong connection there) to all-out grief. And yeah, there are ways for the author to give the main character and the reader a moment to handle the grief before moving on to other things. Good writers will do this. I certainly hope I've done it well in my books.