Act 4 Common Mistakes
I Have an Idea for a Novel. Now What???
The sprint from the climax through the novel’s end is a ton of fun. But getting through the section from the midpoint to the climax? That one can be pretty tricky. You’ve just plain got so much to juggle here: subplots and side characters and theme and….
Yeah. It’s a lot.
Sometimes, just knowing the types of wrong turns that are commonly made in this section can be enough to avoid them (most of the time).
So let’s take a look at 4 of the biggies:
Mistake #1: Failures Feel…Random
This can even be true if your stakes are raising. Problems are increasingly bigger. Missteps can be absolutely heartbreaking. But, look, if they aren’t all pointing to something, even the most devastating scene can ring a little hollow to your reader.
The Fix: Tie everything back to your main character’s lie. The false belief they started this novel with and the same one they will abandon at the novel’s end. You’re getting pretty close here to the character having to abandon this lie. So that abandonment will make far more sense if it is really hurting your main character (and the people they love) at this point.
Mistake #2: You Let Them Off the Hook Too Soon
Horrible things should absolutely be snowballing for your main character here. And—here’s the thing—this act ends with the dark night of the soul moment. That moment where, if your main character had no backbone at all, they could very well just shrivel up and accept defeat. That’s how bad things need to be for your main character.
The Fix: Pile on. Make one defeat lead to another, another. By the end of this act, your character needs to be Rocky, panting in his corner of the ring, eye swollen, not sure he’s going to be able to support his own weight again when he stands.
Mistake #3: The Lie Loses Its Logic
Now, we saw that we want to tie missteps and failures back into the lie. But you don’t want your main character to seem stupid for hanging on to the lie, either. In fact, there’s often a point toward the end of the book when the main character is tempted to act in accordance with their lie and it will still look like a win.
Think of that moment in Pretty Woman when Richard Gere’s partner offers him up a deal basically on a silver platter. But Gere doesn’t sign it. He is no longer using people transactionally; he’s a changed man as a result of his love affair with Julia Roberts. But that deal? That actually, on its surface, does look like a win. But it’s not anymore, because of the emotional change Gere’s character has undergone.
The Fix: Make sure the world around your main character—the one that helped support their lie—hasn’t changed. It will still offer your main character the chance to slip back into old habits. But your character won’t be able to do that anymore because of the change they’ve undergone.
Mistake #4: Subplots Come to Tidy Endings
The opposite can happen, too. Subplots can peter out or wander off or kinda just…hang around limply. But personally, I find the tidy ending scenario far more likely. Look, a subplot isn’t your main storyline. It does not have to come to a satisfying conclusion.
The Fix: End your subplot messily. Be sure to end it somewhere before the climax, but end it in an unsatisfying way. Your main character has been hurt by it. That can absolutely be rocket fuel for finding the strength to get back up and gear up for the fight of their life at the climax.
We’ve hinted a few times here at what should be happening at the end of this act as we head into the climax, but I wanted to address the end specifically in our next post, to make sure we do, in fact, get the momentum we need for that biggest-fight-of-your-main-character’s-life event at the climax.