Guest Post: Which Came First?

Author Kait Nolan discusses her writing craft...

When it comes to writing, the great chicken/egg question is which came first? Character or Plot. Most writers, I hazard to guess, fall more firmly on one side or the other—naturally leaning more toward character or plot. I am firmly in the Plot camp, which is to say that when I come up with initial story ideas, generally they are related to a situation or a what if question. The specifics unfold later based on the characters I stick into that particular situation. My crit partner is my total opposite. She resides firmly in the Character camp and always thinks of character first, plot second. It makes for some interesting brain storming sessions, as we approach things from two very different directions. We each have our specific strengths, but in the end, a good story must be a balance of both.

Despite my natural inclination toward focusing on plot first, character second, my best work—the work that flows from the beginning and doesn’t require endless rehashing and editing—happens to go the other way. Forsaken By Shadow, my debut paranormal romance novella was like this. The hero walked into my brain, fully formed, with a nasty case of amnesia. Who he was—whether he remembered who that was or not—fully informed the plot in a way that just asking “What if a guy wakes up in a seedy hotel room with no memory?” would not. Every single choice he makes, from the moment he wakes up, tells the reader something about who he is. It certainly informed me.

Here’s the thing. No matter how fascinating and twisted a plot you envision, if you fail to know your characters, to understand their drives and motives and needs and how that plays out in their actions, the story is going to fall flat. So while I’m very good at thinking up “what happens next” and coming up with new and interesting plot twists, if I get too far down the plotting road, I wind up with a book that’s driven by my own logic rather than motivated by its characters. And that’s bad. That’s what leads to total rewrites.

I ran into this with the sequel to Forsaken By Shadow. I had this idea for a heroine, an archivist and historian for the fae, who stumbles across some information that makes it clear that all the signs the Council of Races (ruling body of my paranormal world) interpret as a coming war are really neon pointers that the apocalypse is coming. The entire point of the story was her having to fight to be heard. So with another novella in mind, I sat down and plotted out the whole story—every scene from beginning to end. And it was logical. But it didn’t work because I didn’t listen to her. It’s what I would do, not what she would do. Once I accepted that, Dahlia opened up, informed me she was in love with someone else entirely, and told me that I would be giving her a full length novel, thanks very much. :looks sheepish: Yes ma’am. Clearly sometimes I need a reminder that they are in the driver’s seat.

The take home message, for me anyway, is that when these totally plot-first ideas show up, it’s best to write down everything I know about the story, then set it aside in a file and wait until a character shows up to claim it.

What about y’all? As readers, do you tend to suspect whether a story began with plot vs. character? As writers, do you have a preference?

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For those who are interested, Forsaken By Shadow, is available at Scribd, Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and the iBookstore. It is the first in the Mirus series.

Synopsis: Banished from their world with his memory wiped, Cade Shepherd doesn’t remember his life as Gage Dempsey, nor the woman he nearly died for. But when Embry Hollister’s father is kidnapped by military scientists, the only one she can turn to is the love from her past. Will Gage remember the Shadow Walker skills he learned from her father? If they survive, will Embry be able to walk away again?

You can also find Kait at Twitter @kaitnolan or on Facebook