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What are the two or three biggest stakes in your story?
So I’m going to be using the story I’m writing with my siblings, because my solo novel that I’m currently working on is still a baby.
The MC Bennet’s main goal in the beginning of the novel is to get enough money so he no longer has to steal for a living.
In the beginning, the two biggest stakes if he doesn’t achieve that goal is one, his younger brother will be sent to foster care because Bennet didn’t have enough money to be a good enough guardian. And two, he’ll never be able to afford collage for an engineering degree which is his biggest dream.
Then later on in the story another stake gets thrown on which is possibly getting sentence to prison for life for first degree murder. But that’s a spoiler hehe.
What are the two or three biggest stakes in the story you’re currently working on?
for my WIP Spirals, the stakes are the choices between life and death. Hope, the MC, lives alone in the wild and wants a “family” more than anything: parents, friends, anyone. Every decision she makes decides if she’ll survive the next morning. The people living in the post-apocalyptic world are basically insane so she never knows who is in their right mind and who isn’t until the person attacks her. She has to stay in hiding for that reason.
And, there are multiple gangs searching for her bc she beat up some of their members.
So, yeah, pretty high stakes XD
what we do in life echoes in eternity
-gladiator, 2000@kathleenramm I’m gonna use the current arc of Thirteen Ways since the stakes are the clearest. Basic premise: they need to gather ingredients for a spell to vanquish a demon. If they don’t, then some friends and family are lost forever to the demon.
In order to collect the ingredients, they must defeat the guardians of some of the ingredients. And if they don’t, they get killed.
So, yeah.
Lately, it's been on my brain
Would you mind letting me know
If hours don't turn into days@kathleenramm intriguing!!
My plot stake? in my fantasy it’s these:
Stake 1: If they fail the world is destroyed by giant dragons.
Stake 2. If they fail they die in painful ways and goblins take over what is left of said demolished world.
my sci-fi novel…
1: If they fail to keep away from the lab that screwed up their genetics and made them scary mutants in the first place, and the scientists get the MC or the clone child (SPOILERS), it means capture or death. Or if they aren’t dead they will wish they were.
2: If the MC doesn’t be extremely careful she’s going to lose anyone she ever called friend and there will be mass murder of people because if her friends become her enemies… they have enough power to take out nations. (good to note that she’s a typical girl who also has a bit of mental instability due to said genetic weird stuff, so…)
I'm 'a homeschooler' because cookie-making writing artistic animal-whisperer isn't a job title
That sounds really interesting! The world where anyone could be insane is so cool and works so well with the MC’s desire for family. It sets up a really clear desire vs fear.
Where did you get the idea for Spirals?
I really love these kind of simple yet really intriguing premises. I tend to overcomplicate things in my stories, but there’s something so nice about a simple but clear and important goal.
Plus a demon overtaking family members is such an interesting story idea.
Where did you get the idea for Thirteen Ways?
I love how different your two stories are from each other. One fantasy world with awesome dragons and one in a sci-fi world with mutants. But the stakes in both are so important.
Where did you get the idea for theses two novels?
@kathleenramm This is actually the sequel of a sequel of a spinoff for my original idea for Thirteen Ways, ha… It started out with me wanting to make a world where I could escape to, and gradually I just added on, and on, and on… And now, thankfully, I’ve run out of ideas for it.
Lately, it's been on my brain
Would you mind letting me know
If hours don't turn into daysHmm…The biggest stakes in my stories…..
I’ll use my latest fanfic. The stakes of the story are introduced somewhat later in the plot. The MC, a warrior cat apprentice named Crosspaw (adult name Crossfire, if you’ve ever read the Warriors series you’ll understand), needs to keep a secret from his father’s clan, because if he fails, they’ll kill off the rest of his family (they had a sort of history with them), and he possibly could get killed along with them. This also ties in to the lie for his arc (a positive one, by the way–at least I think it’s positive)–he went off searching for his father because he felt his mother, Feathertail, and his warrior mentor, Echopelt, didn’t understand him. But now he feels trapped–leave the clan and risk leading them to the rest of his family, keep the secret and risk letting it out someday (or someone figuring it out), or tell the clan straight out and risk possible death, of him and of his friends and family. Obviously he doesn’t want Feathertail and Echopelt to die, and neither does he want himself to die, but all his options seem to lead to destruction.
I really need to work on that, but it is just a fanfic so it’s not like I’m going to publish it……
"When in doubt, eat cheese crackers."-me to my charries who don't even know about cheese crackers
Thanks! Well, i always had the idea for Hope’s character in the back of my head, but watching the Will Smith movie, I Am Legend inspired me to expand the plot. That movie, paired with Interstellar really sealed the bill for me. XD I love complex plots, high stakes, and characters searching for family/romance, so this story is basically my baby! XD
what we do in life echoes in eternity
-gladiator, 2000Uhhh…. tough question to answer ’cause I’m pantsing it all the way through. But since I have a vague idea of where the story’s gonna go next, I’d have to say
1. If they don’t win the war Kismena is crushed. Dead. Annihilated. Oh, and did I mention they’re in trouble? And if the kingdom falls, so do it’s inhabitants….
2. Umm… this is where it gets kinda tricky ’cause I don’t know exactly what’s gonna happen here, but some how Emeric needs to find out the truth about Torin or else… something bad is going to happen. Don’t ask me what yet. I just have a feeling in my gut 🙂 Cade could get hurt, and Anna, and everyone Emeric loves could turn against him, and everyone’s heart could be broken, and Torin might do something to Kell, and Kell might never find Cade, and….
this is my pantser’s heart on full display for y’allI’ll stop rambling now.That’s really cool how it started off as a world you wanted to escape to. It kinda makes me want to do the same.
I feel like it would be really fun, but also could be really cathartic and make an interesting story with all the freedom for imagination.
How long ago did you start making the stories?
With each sentence you wrote about the fanfic you are writing, it just kept getting more and more interesting.
I love both the internal and external your story has. And I really like how you put it, “… all his options seem to lead to destruction.”
The main character sounds really interesting and complex.
What is it a fan fiction of?
I love hearing what movies or books inspired writers to write their own stories. It’s so fun to see one person’s story inspire another story that possibly will inspire yet another person’s story. XD
It’s really cool how you were able to take all of your favorite things about stories and make them into your own story.
Have you ever written a story like this before?
I totally get what you said about if Emeric doesn’t find out the truth about Torin something bad is going to happen because of a gut feeling. I feel like so much of writing is just one long rambling of a bunch of random yet somehow connected ideas, and following feelings and your gut and crossing your fingers this will all come out into a somewhat cohesive and interesting story in the end haha.
Have you ever outlined a novel, or have you always been a pantser?
@kathleenramm thanks!!
the idea for the fantasy one was a griffin keychain pendant and an idea that sprouted from my childhood world I invented when I was about 10.
The inspiration for the sci fi was… um… good question. XD wanting to try my hand in it and the character was based on my personality but obviously not my life lol.
Honestly… In both cases, it was mostly because I want to write clean books for people. It is so hard to find books that don’t have a bunch of language and other junk in them.
I'm 'a homeschooler' because cookie-making writing artistic animal-whisperer isn't a job title
@kathleenramm About five or six years ago I started writing it. Stories, hmm…maybe it’s been a decade. It’s been a long time, ha…
Lately, it's been on my brain
Would you mind letting me know
If hours don't turn into days@kathleenramm It’s based off the Warriors series, about cats, but most of the characters are from Star Wars (such as Echopelt, whose real name is just Echo; he’s a clone trooper-turned-cyborg in the Star Wars animated tv shows). The rest of the characters, including Feathertail and Crossfire, are of my own creation.
"When in doubt, eat cheese crackers."-me to my charries who don't even know about cheese crackers
Good topic. I like yours. You have some good sounding tense stakes.
Stakes you say? So the current book I’m working on is bk three in a series.
Book one, my character’s decisions revolved around loosing friends and finding family, or fighting for friends and postponing the search for family. Pretty basic.
Book two, the mc’s stakes were protecting friends, by leaving them, and risking loosing them, or risking loosing them even more by staying with them.
Book three is still being developed, but it addresses my mc’s selfishness in always wanting what would best affect him. The stakes are from another character’s perspective, and it’s loosing a best friend(my mc), or fighting to keep his selfish nature from possibly destroying all they love, while trying to keep him as a friend and not make him an enemy.
Complicated, yes. And I am happy with the challenge this provides me with.
Boom. Those are my stakes.
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