The Trouble With Fridge Logic

[Ireth]

TVTropes defines Fridge Logic roughly as the questions that only occur to a person when, after contentedly sitting through a movie and going to the fridge for a drink, some element of the plot that didn't jive quite right comes back to nag at one's memory. As the thread name suggests, I had this same issue with a plot point in one of my own WIPs.

The plot: Loegaire, a Fae, is on the run from the Winter Court after breaking a condemned princess out of prison and killing an armed guard in the process. Separated from the princess he helped set free, Loegaire seeks shelter in the home of Vincent Hawk, who keeps him safe (albeit reluctantly) until some members of the Winter Court track Loegaire down to arrest him. Loegaire is caught, and Vincent and Ariel are arrested for harboring a fugitive. Vincent's brother Dom, who is visiting Vincent at a very inopportune time and knows nothing of Loegaire's presence, is taken under arrest as well. The three humans and Loegaire are tried by the Kings of Faerie; Vincent, Ariel and Loegaire are found guilty of their respective crimes, while Dom is innocent. As punishment, Vincent and Ariel are ordered to find the fugitive princess so that she may serve her own punishment.

The problem: My initial idea for the story was to have Vincent, Ariel and Dom all sent out in search of the princess, while Loegaire acts as their guide. The story would focus on the antagonism between Vincent and Loegaire slowly turning into friendship as they learn to trust each other, on top of the moral conflicts of having to bring the princess, their friend, to her doom.

The Fridge Logic: Why would Loegaire, who is biased both toward the Hawk family (by means of his paternal affection for Ariel) and Meabh (by means of being her lover), be trusted with such a mission? At least one of the kings knows about the bias, and would certainly let the other know if it mattered that much. And surely the kings would count on the fact that he would try to sabotage the mission, whether by dallying about until the deadline or trying to keep the princess away from them somehow -- which, as the plot originally intended, is exactly what he does.

A solution?: I came up with the following idea -- have Vincent and Ariel sent on the quest with another, non-biased Fae as their guide, while Loegaire is kept in custody for his crime, and Dom is held in custody as leverage to ensure the Hawks do their job right. The problem with this is that the character development I had wanted between Vincent and Loegaire is made impossible. Having Loegaire break out of custody and try to find the princess himself, and finding the Hawks again and joining their quest, would be very out of character since he is known to learn from his past mistakes, and his last attempt at breaking someone out of prison (in this case the princess) did not go as planned.

What should I do here? "Murder my darling" by scrapping some of my original ideas and try to work out a new story with the plot options that make the most sense for the characters, or try to find another way to achieve my original goal?

 

[CupofJoe]

If Loegaire likes the Hawk family and Dom is kept as hostage; could he not be trusted to perform if either or both Ariel and Meabh use blackmail [moral or physical, actual or implied] to keeping to Loegaire to his task?
I'm thinking of him being susceptible to their worries and fears rather than the "do this and I'll sleep with / or never talk to you" approaches.

 

[ThinkerX]

Hmmm...

You have four characters:

Loegaire - a fey ...renegade... of sorts.

Vincent Hawke - a man with ample reason to distrust fey

Ariel Hawke - Vincents daughter (and star of the earlier book)

Dom - Vincents brother, gay.

You wish for Vincent and Loegaire to develop a relationship.

Therefor...

Dom, Ariel, and the 'new fey' are sent out in search of the runaway princess.

Vincent, because he managed 'unauthorized entry' INTO fey in the previous book (making him at least potentially dangerous) and Loegaire, of demonstrated dubious loyalty, are held hostage against Ariel and Doms success.

Vincent and Loegaire develop their rapport while being held hostage. Possibly they spend part of their time trying to come up with a 'Plan B' - something they can use as leverage against the fey king holding them captive.

This still leaves the issue of Ariel, Dom, and the 'new fey'. I have a suggestion here - Dom is gay, and the fey are supposed to be 'hot'. Have Dom develop, or appear to develop a passing (?) infatuation for this fey...perhaps enough to throw said fey off balance when things start to get interesting.

 

[Penpilot]

The common pressure point for Vincent, Dom and Loegaire is Ariel. Neither wants anything bad to happen to her, and so it would make sense for her to be the one held hostage while the others go searching for the princess. She's also the youngest and putting her in jeopardy instead of one of the others will probably resonate more with the reader. Also now you don't have to add any characters, and you still get to have Vincent and Loegaire become friends on the search. In fact it gives them both something else to bond over, worrying about Ariel's welfare while they're gone. My gut tells me this would probably let you keep most of your original plot intact too.

 

[Ireth]

If Loegaire likes the Hawk family and Dom is kept as hostage; could he not be trusted to perform if either or both Ariel and Meabh use blackmail [moral or physical, actual or implied] to keeping to Loegaire to his task?
I'm thinking of him being susceptible to their worries and fears rather than the "do this and I'll sleep with / or never talk to you" approaches.

Well, Ariel doesn't want him to perform the task either, since she is a friend to Meabh as well. And Meabh herself, while she does show up well before the climax, certainly doesn't want to be handed over to her father, but nor does she want Loegaire to suffer her fate in her place if he fails at his task. Also, Meabh will be in disguise for the majority of the book, such that Loegaire himself does not recognize her, and so having disguised!Meabh try to blackmail him would probably only make him suspicious. Meabh has good reason not to throw off her disguise, since the Fae Kings are tracking their every move via scrying, and she doesn't want to show her father where she is for her own life's sake.

Hmmm...

You have four characters:

Loegaire - a fey ...renegade... of sorts.

Vincent Hawke - a man with ample reason to distrust fey

Ariel Hawke - Vincents daughter (and star of the earlier book)

Dom - Vincents brother, gay.

You wish for Vincent and Loegaire to develop a relationship.

Therefor...

Dom, Ariel, and the 'new fey' are sent out in search of the runaway princess.

Vincent, because he managed 'unauthorized entry' INTO fey in the previous book (making him at least potentially dangerous) and Loegaire, of demonstrated dubious loyalty, are held hostage against Ariel and Doms success.

Vincent and Loegaire develop their rapport while being held hostage. Possibly they spend part of their time trying to come up with a 'Plan B' - something they can use as leverage against the fey king holding them captive.

This still leaves the issue of Ariel, Dom, and the 'new fey'. I have a suggestion here - Dom is gay, and the fey are supposed to be 'hot'. Have Dom develop, or appear to develop a passing (?) infatuation for this fey...perhaps enough to throw said fey off balance when things start to get interesting.

Firstly, Dom is not gay, he's just a bachelor. Any Fae he develops an attraction to is going to be female, full stop. (Besides, I had an idea for that further along the line anyway.) And having Ariel develop an attraction to the 'new Fae', if male, probably isn't feasible as well, since that was kinda the point of the first book -- Fiachra, while gorgeous, was evil enough to keep her from falling for him in the slightest, and no doubt she feels the same way about the rest of the Fae population as well, whether or not they actually are evil. I'm sure she'd prefer to have a boyfriend who won't force her to change what she is (i.e. becoming part-Fae by staying in Faerie for the rest of her life) just so they can be together. Besides, I don't want every other male Fae she meets to automatically get the hots for her, it seems kinda cliche.

That said, I do like the idea of Vincent being held captive with Loegaire instead of Dom. Even though it makes less sense to me to send the innocent party off questing in place of the guilty, that's exactly the sort of twisted logic one might expect from the Fae. XD But on the other hand, Dom also broke into Faerie with Vincent in the previous book, so he's on the "potentially dangerous" list as well.

Also, minor quibble -- the Hawks' surname has no e.

The common pressure point for Vincent, Dom and Loegaire is Ariel. Neither wants anything bad to happen to her, and so it would make sense for her to be the one held hostage while the others go searching for the princess. She's also the youngest and putting her in jeopardy instead of one of the others will probably resonate more with the reader. Also now you don't have to add any characters, and you still get to have Vincent and Loegaire become friends on the search. In fact it gives them both something else to bond over, worrying about Ariel's welfare while they're gone. My gut tells me this would probably let you keep most of your original plot intact too.

That's a very good idea, and it would also parallel nicely with the previous book, with the main male characters all seeking her well-being in one form or another (misguidedly or not). I have the feeling that the bonding process is going to take a while though, since Vincent utterly resents Loegaire and his fatherly feelings for Ariel -- that's the whole cause of Vincent's hatred of Loegaire (and 99.9% of the Fae as a result), since it drove Loegaire to try to kidnap Ariel as an infant. He kind of ignores the fact that Loegaire later saved Ariel's life. It was Vincent's reason for protecting Loegaire from the Unseelie, and that's the end of that.

Thanks for all the feedback, guys. ^^

 

[ThinkerX]

Firstly, Dom is not gay, he's just a bachelor. Any Fae he develops an attraction to is going to be female, full stop.

Apologies about that. I seem to remember you having a story with a major gay character in it and assumed it was this one. My error.

That said, I do like the idea of Vincent being held captive with Loegaire instead of Dom. Even though it makes less sense to me to send the innocent party off questing in place of the guilty, that's exactly the sort of twisted logic one might expect from the Fae. XD But on the other hand, Dom also broke into Faerie with Vincent in the previous book, so he's on the "potentially dangerous" list as well.

With regards to keeping Vincent handy and sending Dom off with Ariel and the 'new fey', your fey King would be taking out some extra insurance. Both Dom and Vincent broke into Faerie: together they'd be a greater risk than if separated.

As I remember with this tale, you also have at least one other major 'fridge logic' problem: your runaway princess is fundamentally doomed. She goes back to Dad's castle, he's (probably?) going to kill her - unless she has an edge of some sort.
Therefore, the whole notion of her returning to the castle, even disguised, doesn't hold up. THe fey King, not being stupid, would see through the disguise in short order anyhow - and she knows it. Remaining in faerie, where her father weilds immense influence...also not very smart, and she likely knows this as well.

But how great is the fey Kings influence in the mortal world? Suppose the runaway princesses plan involved fleeing to earth, and instead of hanging out near a portal where the fey could easily crossover, she intended to venture far far away - like Fiji or South Dakota. (not normal fey hangouts.) When Ariel and company catch up to her, she just hasn't made it through the portal to earth yet, or needs something to activate it.

In other threads, I pointed out some of the issues which arise from letting your fey pass back and forth between faerie and earth too easily. I suggested fey smugglers - fey who would sneak into the mortal world, pick up fabrics, odd metals, stuff that might be useful in faerie without being intristically dangerous, and bringing it to fey to sell or trade. Possibly the 'new fey; could be involved in this traffic

You might also want to consider sharp limits on just how often the fey can pass between worlds: maybe they can do it only near a very few dimensional 'weak spots', and/or only during certain days of the year when 'the stars align' or some such.

 

[Ireth]

Apologies about that. I seem to remember you having a story with a major gay character in it and assumed it was this one. My error.

No worries. The major gay character is in my vampire novel, for future reference.

With regards to keeping Vincent handy and sending Dom off with Ariel and the 'new fey', your fey King would be taking out some extra insurance. Both Dom and Vincent broke into Faerie: together they'd be a greater risk than if separated.

Ooh, good point.

As I remember with this tale, you also have at least one other major 'fridge logic' problem: your runaway princess is fundamentally doomed. She goes back to Dad's castle, he's (probably?) going to kill her - unless she has an edge of some sort.

Well, that's been my plan for the start. It was never going to work out nicely for her. Either she suffers a fate worse than death as per her father's command, she chooses to die for real rather than suffer that fate, or she escapes again and spends the rest of her life in hiding.

Therefore, the whole notion of her returning to the castle, even disguised, doesn't hold up. THe fey King, not being stupid, would see through the disguise in short order anyhow - and she knows it. Remaining in faerie, where her father weilds immense influence...also not very smart, and she likely knows this as well.

Well, the Fae have the power to disguise themselves even to each other, so he wouldn't necessarily see through her disguise tight away. I was never going to have her return to the castle at all -- the Kings are going to follow the hunters in secret, and catch up with them once their deadline is up. Meabh's whole plan was to find the Summer king and swear proper fealty to him, thus escaping any power her father would have had over her, but again, I didn't and don't plan for it to end well.

But how great is the fey Kings influence in the mortal world?

Uh, pretty much nil. But, see my response below.

Suppose the runaway princesses plan involved fleeing to earth, and instead of hanging out near a portal where the fey could easily crossover, she intended to venture far far away - like Fiji or South Dakota. (not normal fey hangouts.) When Ariel and company catch up to her, she just hasn't made it through the portal to earth yet, or needs something to activate it.

Escaping to Earth was the plan, at least so they could skip forward through time to pass from winter to summer and escape Madoc's time of authority. Staying on Earth isn't too desirable for the Fae, what with the prevalence of modern technology, pollution, and masses of iron and steel.

In other threads, I pointed out some of the issues which arise from letting your fey pass back and forth between faerie and earth too easily. I suggested fey smugglers - fey who would sneak into the mortal world, pick up fabrics, odd metals, stuff that might be useful in faerie without being intristically dangerous, and bringing it to fey to sell or trade. Possibly the 'new fey; could be involved in this traffic

I'm not sure how interested the Fae would be in exchanging commodities with Earth, though -- the main thing they take from Earth is human children, which does not go over well with any who find out. (Case in point: Vincent Hawk.) Given this, they probably limit their time in Earth anyway unless it's absolutely necessary. Also given the contempt many of the Fae hold for the advances of modern technology and the fact that it pollutes the world so much, I really doubt they want anything to do with it.

You might also want to consider sharp limits on just how often the fey can pass between worlds: maybe they can do it only near a very few dimensional 'weak spots', and/or only during certain days of the year when 'the stars align' or some such.

That seems feasible. There are a few stable gateways in fixed places (ex. Stonehenge), but I've also previously established in-canon that sometimes less stable gateways open and close randomly -- this is very important to Loegaire's escape to the mortal world, before the guards actually capture him.

 

[ThinkerX]

Escaping to Earth was the plan, at least so they could skip forward through time to pass from winter to summer and escape Madoc's time of authority. Staying on Earth isn't too desirable for the Fae, what with the prevalence of modern technology, pollution, and masses of iron and steel.

Say your runaway has been to earth a few times into the past...and wandered into a 'tourist trap' type shop during one of these expeditions, seeing row upon row of postcards featuring exotic earth locals NOT polluted or heavy on tech...and far from the location of any stable portal to faerie.

 

[Ireth]

Say your runaway has been to earth a few times into the past...and wandered into a 'tourist trap' type shop during one of these expeditions, seeing row upon row of postcards featuring exotic earth locals NOT polluted or heavy on tech...and far from the location of any stable portal to faerie.

That would do to give the runaway a bit of hope, but again, I'm not writing toward a happy ending. It'll be bittersweet at best. Even if the runaway escapes to Earth, both she and the Hawks will suffer losses along the way. And with the new plot ideas involving one or more of the Hawks being held captive until the others find said runaway, I'll need to figure out a lot of different possibilities for them whether or not their quest succeeds.

 

[ThinkerX]

That would do to give the runaway a bit of hope,

That is the idea. Because otherwise, without a plan, the runaway is behaving in an...extremely stupid manner.

 

[Ireth]

That is the idea. Because otherwise, without a plan, the runaway is behaving in an...extremely stupid manner.

Well, she's running for her life, probably panicking a lot. She never asked to be broken out of prison, it just happened, and now she has to flee or suffer. Someone in such a state of mind can't be expected to be entirely of a sound mind, can they?

 

[ThinkerX]

Well, she's running for her life, probably panicking a lot. She never asked to be broken out of prison, it just happened, and now she has to flee or suffer. Someone in such a state of mind can't be expected to be entirely of a sound mind, can they?

I would argue - and this is 'fridge logic' kicking in again - that she's not been under ANY illusions as to the true nature of dear old dad and her loving brother for a long while. She might not have expected to be broken out of prison, but she would certainly have had contingency plans of some sort. In that environment...such plans would be a 'must'.

 

[Ireth]

I would argue - and this is 'fridge logic' kicking in again - that she's not been under ANY illusions as to the true nature of dear old dad and her loving brother for a long while. She might not have expected to be broken out of prison, but she would certainly have had contingency plans of some sort. In that environment...such plans would be a 'must'.

Verrrry good point. But I don't imagine Meabh expected that she'd have to (spoiler!) kill her brother in her effort to help Ariel and her family. It's because of what she did that she is threatened with a fate worse than death, which she is currently trying to escape. Even the best laid plans can go astray, and things happen that we can't always predict in advance, contingency plans or no.

 

[Leif Notae]

If I may. It sounds like this story is getting to be thicker than mud (no insult to you or the story, but there are a lot of things going on). Sometimes to avoid things like this, you need to be simpler in your prose. Fridge logic only comes into play when you have a muddy story without the plan to get it finished.

I believe what you should do, much like the other side where we discussed when you wrote into a corner, might be to start cutting away some of this to take the weight off the story itself. While I am down with doing what you can to maintain tension and give your reader a surprise, it sounds like there are too many things going on with too many characters.

When you start overthinking it, the only person you are hurting here is yourself. It sounds like you have something intriguing, but you have it buried under a lot of strange quirks (again, no offense).

 

[Ireth]

If I may. It sounds like this story is getting to be thicker than mud (no insult to you or the story, but there are a lot of things going on). Sometimes to avoid things like this, you need to be simpler in your prose. Fridge logic only comes into play when you have a muddy story without the plan to get it finished.

I believe what you should do, much like the other side where we discussed when you wrote into a corner, might be to start cutting away some of this to take the weight off the story itself. While I am down with doing what you can to maintain tension and give your reader a surprise, it sounds like there are too many things going on with too many characters.

When you start overthinking it, the only person you are hurting here is yourself. It sounds like you have something intriguing, but you have it buried under a lot of strange quirks (again, no offense).

I'm not sure what I can cut away without having to rework the previous book, though. The whole plot of the current story rests on the cause-and-effect of the one that comes directly before it. I DID have a plan for this story as originally intended, but it was one detail at the beginning that mucked it all up and made me start thinking of alternatives.

 

[Leif Notae]

As much as it sounds like this will be the most painful option, you might have to do that. Here's the reason why. The more effort and energy you put in here is at least 10x the amount you could do with the right storyline after some proper structuring and outlining. It sounds like this got away because there wasn't a strict adherence to the plot, which makes it worse than normal because it is an energy sucker.

This will allow you to really judge if the one detail is something that can either be ignored, or reworked into something more... useful.

If you insist, I'd say scrap the fridge logic part and find another way around it. This scene is tripping you up with the thickness of it.

 

[Ireth]

As much as it sounds like this will be the most painful option, you might have to do that. Here's the reason why. The more effort and energy you put in here is at least 10x the amount you could do with the right storyline after some proper structuring and outlining. It sounds like this got away because there wasn't a strict adherence to the plot, which makes it worse than normal because it is an energy sucker.

This will allow you to really judge if the one detail is something that can either be ignored, or reworked into something more... useful.

If you insist, I'd say scrap the fridge logic part and find another way around it. This scene is tripping you up with the thickness of it.

Well, the whole point of this thread is to have discussion that would help me find a way around the fridge logic part, so... :/

And I can't just cut it out completely, because it's critical to the plot. Half of the character development I'd intended for the story is Vincent and Loegaire learning to trust each other and get along as they travel to find Meabh while at the same time trying to avoid doing so. For that they have to be together, which means if Vincent is sent on the quest, Loegaire has to go too.

 

[Penpilot]

It sounds like this got away because there wasn't a strict adherence to the plot, which makes it worse than normal because it is an energy sucker.

Strict adherence to the plot depends on what type of story this is. Plot isn't the be all. In novels there's always a bit of room to wander.

A question to ask, is this a character first story with the plot supporting the character development, or is it a plot first story with the character development supporting the plot? It can't be both. There's only one driver's seat.

To me this sounds like a character driven story with the plot taking shotgun. Ireth, maybe thinking about things along this line will help sort things for you.

 

[Ireth]

Strict adherence to the plot depends on what type of story this is. Plot isn't the be all. In novels there's always a bit of room to wander.

A question to ask, is this a character first story with the plot supporting the character development, or is it a plot first story with the character development supporting the plot? It can't be both. There's only one driver's seat.

To me this sounds like a character driven story with the plot taking shotgun. Ireth, maybe thinking about things along this line will help sort things for you.

Yeah, it seems like a more character-driven story to me too, but there has to be attention paid to the plot as well. And most of the more complicated stuff aside from this bit of fridge logic is centered on the backstory of the characters, particularly the Fae, and how their actions and reactions shape the plot -- doomed romance, obsession that leads to mistakes, that kind of thing. The present story and its prelude are founded on that.

 

[Leif Notae]

Ah, but character driven stories have plots too. This isn't an excuse to have a sink drama, you don't have one character emoting in one room. There is a story for them to work in, as well as a story inside their head. People use it to flag lazier writing (not accusing anyone here of this, but I have heard our own members be lazy in this aspect) because they are afraid of story structure, a real plot, and don't understand instead of being separate entities, they work hand in hand together.

Sometimes the easiest way to get rid of an obstacle is to get rid of everything and look at it from a different point of view. Step away from the story and do something else. Write another piece, give it some time.

I still say blow this up, salvage what you can, and reforge a new story. Many writers do it. Heck, I've done it often as well. Sometimes what you know today doesn't compare to what you will know in six months when the fridge logic goes away.

Also, investigate some story structure sites and books. Perhaps they can shed some light as well.