Writing Problems! Yay!

[Scribe Lord]

I've been having a ridiculously annoying problem with my writing recently. Everytime I get the first section of one of my books written and the major plot points sorted out, I stumble to a halt.

And the problem is this. In my works I usually have a few select POV characters (Maybe 3 or 4). The thing is, some of these characters end up doing things and thinking things that I don't want the reader to know right away. There are betrayals and other reveals that I think would take away from the plot if the reader knew about them immediately when they are conceived. There are also somethings about certain characters that I what to keep... I don't know, mysterious.

But I can't really change the POV characters because, well, then the book wouldn't really work either.

I don't know if this is just a silly newbie writer problem that I've built around myself but it's given me too much agony to keep bottled up anymore.

So. Please.

Comments? Thoughts? Advice?

 

[johnsonjoshuak]

I think a good way to handle that is by omission.

Spoilers (kind of) for A Song of Ice and Fire, A Feast for Crows

Spoiler

You could take a page from the Cersei chapters. There is a great deal of plotting that goes on off-screen so to speak but we still get those POV characters and only later do we see what happens.

I have run into the same problem before with some of my POV characters and I've found that foreshadowing the thing without outright describing it works out pretty well.

 

[KC Trae Becker]

I agree. Write it out in your rough draft to figure out what happens and where the story is going. Then edit carefully so that the reader gets the right info at the right time to maintain tension and mystery.

 

[FifthView]

If I'm understanding your dilemma, these are POV characters so you must include somewhat regular POV chapters or scenes for them because too long without those and it messes things up (can't have them "disappear" for the reader.) BUT, they know things or are involved in things at certain points in the story's timeline, and those points in the timeline are too early for those things to be revealed to the reader.

This is a tough one. Probably your best option is, in those cases, to give those POV character a different mental focus for a chapter. Let's say they are still involved in the same activity or know the same information, for that chapter; instead of having them mentally focusing on whatever it is they are doing, you can have them still active doing it but maybe obsessing over something else mentally. That's a little like me driving to work and only paying the barest amount of necessary attention to the road and other drivers while thinking over events from the day before or events to come. So for instance, imagine a POV character chapter where he's breaking into someone's manor: You can give scant information about the manor, guards, dogs guarding the place — suppose the POV character sees them and changes course — while having the character mull over the troublesome allies or party members he has. That way you might be giving glimpses to the reader of whatever he's doing without revealing exactly what he's doing while at the same time not having to ignore that character for too many chapters at a time. That sort of thing.

Edit: Or, vice versa. So for the example above: Have him focusing on all the details of the manor (the break-in) so you don't have to show his thoughts/plans involving betrayal of others. Depends on what you want to hide from the reader.

 

[Penpilot]

I agree with what Fifthview is saying.

I'd also like to add. When keeping secrets, you have to make sure the secrets are worth keeping. Some secrets revealed quickly add to the story. Some secrets kept for too long can sink a story too.

In addition, not everything can or should be a secret. If everyone and everything has multiple secrets, and those secrets are a significant part of their lives, then what the heck is left for them to think about?

Warning Dune and ASOIF spoilers ahead.

If memory serves, in Dune when the Doctor character first meets Count Leto he thinks to himself I'm going to betray you, or something to that effect.

In ASOIF the incestuous relationship between Cersi and Jamie is revealed almost immediately and sets the stage for many things to come.

Revealing secrets to the reader can garner tension because of the possibility of your characters getting caught in their deceptions.

So yeah, choose what secrets to keep wisely, because you can't keep them all. The reader won't stand for it, and won't continue to read a story that refuses to pay anything off.

 

[K.S. Crooks]

What if when it's a time when a character would have thoughts you don't want the reader to know about you write from someone else's perspective. Also why does the character have to have a particular thought at that time. If they have a plan already they don't need to be thinking about it and if they don't, you don't need to show when they come up with the idea.

 

[skip.knox]

@Scribe Lord: examples? The advice from the other members is all good, but it's hard to know what's relevant without knowing the situation.

You say this is happening regularly. Every time you get to the first section of one of your books. That puzzles me, that you would have precisely the same problem at more or less the same point in multiple books. Have you written a full novel to completion? This may be more of an organizational issue. But again, insufficient data for meaningful answer.

 

[Scribe Lord]

First of all thank you to everyone who has replied so far. You are all being a great help

@skip.knox: Yeah I realize I may not have explained enough so here we go:

First of all I have never completed a full novel, only short stories. I had three recent WIPs and these has happened in the first two. I have only just begun the third but I can already see things leading this way. Anyways, here's a specific example from each book:

In my first book, I have a character who is a religious figure. Now in this world there is magic but it is rare and nobody really knows where it comes from or how to get it. He begins to perform some pretty spectacular feats and claims his god has granted him the power. He uses this to inspire a strong religious movement that affects everything in his part of the world. [My question is this. Can I make him a major POV character without ever revealing if his powers are granted by the god, come from somewhere else, or are even real at all?]

In my second book I have a character who is the general of a country. During the war, he betrays his country and joins the other. He has friends and enemies on both sides of the conflict and his betrayal tips the scales in the war. The story does build up to this, but revealing it too early doesn't really work well and also makes it somewhat anticlimactic. I think. [So my question is this. Can I have a major POV character planning something from day 2 but not revealing that to the reader until much later. But I don't want it to be completely out of the blue either...]

Also thanks again everyone. Your help is already allowing me to slowly sort this out.

 

[Penpilot]

From your examples, if the characters know absolutely what their actions will be or the source of their power is, I don't see how you could hide this fact without cheating. BUT you could approach each situation from a slightly different angle.

With the religious figure, you can just have them not know where their power comes from either. You can have them believe that the source of their power is X but never be 100% certain of it.

With the General, you could have them be presented with the opportunity to betray his country right at the beginning, and the whole story could involve him struggling with the decision of whether to betray his country or not. If you give him good reasons to make either choice, then the choice itself is more of the surprise, not the fact that he is the betrayer.

 

[BWFoster78]

I'm going to take a different tack than some of the other posters (I know, I know - everyone is shocked by me presenting a contrary view ...).

Sage advice from many sources indicate that new writers tend to want to withhold information in an attempt to surprise the reader when it would have been better to just clearly give the information at the start.

Take your religious figure: Say that he's faking his powers. Maybe this can be a fantastic source of internal conflict. He's lying to everyone but for a good cause. As a just man, can he excuse his bad acts for the greater good?

Obviously, that may not be him at all, but regardless of the situation, it can be used to up the tension. Whereas if you hide it, the only benefit is in the big reveal.

Seriously, from my own experience as a new writer, it's almost always better to reveal story information about the POV character as soon as it becomes story relevant. If you're GRRM and have been writing for decades, you can make just about anything work. For me, I like trying to keep things as easy on myself as possible.

 

[FifthView]

I think it's always a good idea to ask yourself why and whether a particular character should be a POV character.

Depending on your answer for why, you will have different options for what you write when doing his POV chapters.

It is possible to choose a POV character simply because he has a unique vantage point (say, he's an immortal being who can move invisibly through walls) without ever having to write about his thoughts, plans, etc., in the novel. He just sees and acts.

Alternatively, if you've chosen a POV character because you want to explore his internal emotional states, mental processes, and so forth, you will have a harder time writing his chapters without revealing his machinations. For example, perhaps, your religious leader and general. Penpilot's suggestion of showing those two uncertain about themselves might be a good way to work around this.

Now, it could be possible to show either the religious figure or the general just seeing & acting (like the aforementioned immortal), and so make mysterious their machinations; but you can't easily then have a POV character, in them, through which emotional and mental states will be shown through their thought processes without revealing those key details you want to hide. You could, perhaps, always have them focused on other things, like fairly trivial (although character-building) activities, and only allude to or foreshadow their ulterior plans. But could you make them interesting enough this way?

You could always skirt the issue by choosing a different POV character, a type of Watson to your Sherlock: The religious leader's assistant or the general's subordinate.

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

If your POV character knows, the reader should know as well. Anything outside of this is typically cheating and it won't have a good effect on your reader.

I agree with PenPilot's recommendation on the voyage of discovery. Voyages of discovery, where the POV is figuring things out (along with the reader) work very well. Bits of information can be doled out as they're revealed to the main character. These types of stories can be quite satisfying, mysterious, & immersive because the reader is an active participant in figuring out the puzzle. It's one of the reasons mystery/crime novels are so popular.

Fifthview offered another solution, that of the POV observer who discovers (along the way again) why these main characters act the way they do.

Another option is the use of the unreliable narrator, where the reader gradually discovers (or possibly realizes from the start) that the narrator doesn't impart details with honesty or as they actually happened, blurring the lines between what is true and what they present as true. In my opinion, an unreliable narrator can do wonders, but it also requires considerable skill.