How do manage to write through tough scenes?

[Ivonia]

Well, I'm about to start rewriting one of the toughest chapters in my book. The thing that makes it tough is that the main hero's sister dies.

And she doesn't just die in any simple way either, imagine Pearl Harbor occuring in space, except the attacking force is three times larger, they leave absolutely no survivors (per order of their leader), and the bad guys test out one of their newest weapons, a large ship (several times larger than the good guy's biggest ship, and is designed to resemble a hydra, which focuses several beams of light to destroy targets, kinda like the Death Star in Star Wars. The attackers are expanding their empire into the good guy's territories, and this attack is the "opening volley" as well as an excuse to test the praticality of their new "super weapon").

I had a really hard time writing it the first time, because I have to kill off one of my main characters (and I'm not very forgiving either, I often put the hero and his friends in a lot of danger after this chapter, but for some reason, it's not as hard to write through those), and I seem to be having a hard time trying to get back and revise this thing.

And yes, this death is necessary, because it'll propel the hero into acting to fight against the bad guys (he's been trying to avoid that stuff prior to this chapter, trying to "live life normally" if you will). Without this event happening, the hero (and to a lesser extent, the reader) will otherwise not feel as attached to the new dangers that erupt form this consequence (i.e. war).

So, any advice on how I can try to minimize the "shock" and just get it done? I keep trying to find excuses to avoid rewriting, but I know I need to get this done too. But it's hard to do, as I've lost people in real life through death too, and writing this is hard as a result (I am trying to channel those "feelings" though, I do want this to be one of those types of scenes that people will talk about for a long time).

[Mistook]

Well, to address your predicament... Does the scene really need to be depicted? You could just skip past it and fill-in what details we need to know through the reactions of other characters as the story moves along.

I know... that's probably a cop-out.

Who's POV is it? That might help to figure out the approach. If it's our doomed heroine's POV, then I guess, show her the seige as she experiences it, give her her dignity, and... maybe to avoid being over-dramatic, don't show us the actual death. Leave it at a penultimate moment and cut to the next chapter where we hear about it.

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[MacAllister]

I usually just clench my teeth, close my eyes, turn my head as far away from the computer as I can, and type as fast as physically possible.

Seriously? Just write it as best you can. Fix it as many times as you must. It's usually easier to tone words down, than it is to make them more intense.

[zornhau]

I've killed off four likable characters in my WIP, one of whom was a viewpoint character, and another who was such an interesting person he deserved his own novel.

In my humble experience:

It's easier to write and reads better if you keep the conflict going through the scene, don't just make it a virtual execution or a slo-mo car crash.

Show your character struggling to beat the threat and nearly making it, or accepting their doom and going down fighting, a pile of dying enemies at their feet.

If it's a surprise attack with instant death, then give the sister her own interrupted arc so that you can show some sort of conflict just before WUMP! Say she's inerpreting sensor readings or arguing with a superior about her inutition that the Bad Guys Are Coming:


"OK, Ensign Herosister," said the Captain. "You've made your point. I'll escalate your analysis."

Herosister blinked. She'd finally convinced him, just like that. Suddenly a whole new glorious career path seemed to open up before her. That's funny,she thought. The walls are glowing. I-

No real conflict, no scene.

[oswann]

Ivonia, your scene sounds like should flow out with ease. This isn't a hard scene to write, from what I understand it's a hard scene for you to re-read.
Remember - no emotion in the writer, no emotion in the reader. Go for it.


Os.

[Old Hack]

I had to write a scene where one of my characters died (a child--hard for me), and I found it very emotional. How I did it was to write really close up to my character's mother, who didn't know what was happening. It was in third person, and I described the landscape, the weather, all very slowly and carefully (took place on a summer afternoon, so it felt right--indolent), so the scene was set and it all seemed quite innoccuous. As the summer afternoon picnic was so peaceful, when the accident happened there was suddenly a huge contrast. I do think that it was the detail, the scene-setting, and the closeness with which the mother viewed it all (even before the accident) which made it work in the end.

[PattiTheWicked]

I've written scenes where I killed off a character and then bawled like a two-year-old afterwards. I've also written some where it was simple, and yet still effective. This is from the first draft of one of my WIPs, in an early scene in which the MC's mom is ill and dying:

She smiled and held me close, and we lay like that for a long time. At some point, I think I must have fallen asleep, for when I opened my eyes, the sun was just beginning to creep through the windows. A light breeze blew through, and I realized that the humidity had vanished.
“Mother,” I whispered. “It’s cool today. Perhaps you can sit out on the verandah.” She didn’t reply. “Mother?”
Beneath my hand, she lay quiet and still. I blinked back tears, willing her thin chest to rise and fall, willing her to show me some sign of life.
But there was none.

We buried my mother the next day in the small family cemetery. It was only through Uncle Edgar’s intervention that my aunt allowed the likes of Maggie Doone to be laid to rest with the other Rogans. I stood in the rain, alone at her grave. Prudence and Edgar had returned to the house, and Aramatha couldn’t even be bothered to come out for the burial of her own aunt.[end]

While her mother's death is a pivotal even in her life -- because it leaves her orphaned and basically homeless -- what's just as important is the continuing conflict between the MC and the other characters. She's now at their mercy because her mother is no longer there, and her focus shifts from caring for her mother to surviving.

[maestrowork]

It can be difficult.

Sometimes I plow though them, knowing I will have to come back and fix them or make them better. Sometimes I just skip the scenes because I feel blocked and I need to move on...

[Ivonia]

Thanks for the suggestions and replies. Yeah, I've asked myself too whether I really need to show this scene, but ultimately, I managed to work it out that this scene adds to the overall story.

This chapter is kind of weird in the sense that this is the only chapter (besides the prologue) where the hero isn't anywhere near the scene. I'm generally trying to work with third person limited, limited in the sense that readers will largely only see the stuff the hero sees. And although I do "head-hop" from time to time, this only occurs when the hero is somewhere in the scene. In this chapter, the focus is mostly on three characters, the hero's sister, the commander of the bad guy's fleet, and the commander of the space station (although his role is small too).

To be more specific, I'm not terribly graphic on the violence (ships explode, and the worst is some get sucked out into space, but no one explodes or loses limbs or anything like that). I also don't specifically show the hero's sister dying. Rather, she sees her commander die in the medical bay, and finally sort of accepts her fate, finally realizing what's going on. Instead of cursing the bad guys though (like I'm sure some would), she simply prays for her brother's safety (who is still unaware of the events until a few days later, in the next chapter, since they are far away from their home planet). That scene ends with the room she's in with other wounded and dead filling with smoke and the lights turning off after a power failure.

Right after that, I cut to the bad guys "super weapon", which they use to destroy the space station she is on. While I don't specifically say she dies, I'm guessing readers can imply that's what happened.

To add even more emotion, the bad guy's commander is somewhat slow to "execute" them (as his emperor demands). I wanted to show some emotion in him because I want readers to know what one of the bad guys' is like after having gone through fifteen years of civil war, then twenty years of expansion (including a lot of fighting). And now here he's told to start yet another war (I can't imagine anyone sane wanting to constantly fight and still like it after so long. Of course, not everyone of the bad guys is like him either) I suppose he's one of those "tragic" characters, hopefully one readers will sympathize with (don't worry though, there's a ton of bad guys you can hate with a vengeance in this story hehe).

The chapter ends with the bad guy's fleet leaving (but not before the commander sheds a few tears for this battle), and a civilian transport ship arrives shortly after that to report the massacre (and to add to the confusion and mayhem that occurs right at the start of the next chapter).

I guess I'll just have to bear the pain while writing through it, and then reassure myself that everything will work out in the end (which it sort of does, I leave some big stuff unresolved, but I also imply that it's a relatively happy ending). It's just really tough to have to "watch" so many die (it's nothing too graphic, but war isn't pretty either). But I still feel that it's neccessary, because hopefully the morals I'm hiding in this story will become clear for people when they read it.

[katiemac]

Um, is it weird that I'm looking forward to my character's death?

[zornhau]

Ivonia - the way you tell it, it doesn't sound like the sister has much agency in the story. Is she in charge of anything? Can she affect the action? Is your real problem that it's not in the end a very interesting scene?

[Niapri]

Ivonia - the way you tell it, it doesn't sound like the sister has much agency in the story. Is she in charge of anything? Can she affect the action? Is your real problem that it's not in the end a very interesting scene?
My question is the same, but I was just wondering if there was a scene later where the MC gets the news about his sister. In that case, I would leave out the scene with the sister once, have someone else read it, and see how it flows. Then put the scene back in and have them read it again. Do the reverse with another reader.
It seems strange to cut away from the MC; perhaps leaving in only a scene where we see how much the news affects him would have more impact. The readers don't have to know the exact details of the sister's struggle to survive, because, as you said, what really matters is how the MC reacts to it - you said her death was what gave him his motivation to fight.

Another little question/suggestion: Does the scene interrupt the struggle of the MC with the struggle of the sister? Consider that for a while - you want the readers to want to see the MC get through his conflicts, right? Is it distracting to cut to someone else's conflict, even if it is temporary?

Sometimes these little problems we have when writing or rewriting a scene just means that we really need to take a look at the scene and see how it fits into the tale as a whole.

Just my two cents. ;)

[azbikergirl]

Does she know she will die? If so, what kinds of things would she want to wrap up? Does she have time to write a note to her brother? Tell that hot guy in 24B that she's long admired him? Sometimes the most interesting scenes are those leading up to death, esp. when the character knows its coming. How they spend their last moments is character-revealing.

I've killed off characters I really like. In fact, one reason I'm procrastinating on the sequel to my finished novel is because there's a very real chance the protag will die. I keep tissue near the keyboard. It's hard, I know. Find a time you can write without interruptions, grit your teeth, put your head down and just type.

[Ivonia]

I actually tried the "skip this chapter and tell us it via flashbacks/hints/bits of info revealed later on" thing, but for me it just didn't have the same impact. I just didn't feel that it the threat was as serious or dangerous unless I actually showed what the bad guys are capable of doing (That's always a good thing right? Otherwise why should the reader be worried about them if the good guys don't seem threatened?). I do leave a lot of those hints in, but I felt that by simply showing it, readers would understand the story up to that point a lot more (and it'll make more sense after they're done reading the book).

Regarding the hero, he always tries to protect his friends and loved ones (which he does quite often in the earlier chapters, including his sister, although she is capable of protecting herself a little bit. It's just that they get overwhelmed until he arrives to help, after having been seperated).

The chapter right after the attack starts out with the hero's friends gathering at a friend's house to hangout. They notice that there are a lot (and I mean A LOT) of military aircraft and vehicles moving around all of a sudden. But other than that, life goes on as usual...

Until the hero and his friends see his sister's last video message sent to him, which shows the bad guys firing in the background (but she thinks it's just another malfunction on the space station, as it's happened before). Shortly after this, they see the president on tv stating the attack that happened (they tried to keep it mum, but remember those transport ships arriving afterwards? Well, they um, called the "CNN" in my story, which broke out the news anyway, forcing the president to make this public). The hero and his friends take the news rather hard, and they all debate on what they should do

I think that by showing this chapter, it reveals that the hero can't always protect them all, no matter how hard he tries. He's not a super hero, even if he sometimes tries to act like one (I have nothing against superheroes and stuff, but I think a "mortal" hero who can only do so much is pretty cool too, not to mention more believable). He then decides to do what he can to protect not only his friends and loved ones (via joining the military), but also his homeworld and her inhabitants, since he simply doesn't want to let the bad guys run all over them without a fight, and to avenge his sister as well as the others who died that day.

The chapter is also a good excuse to flesh out the friends of the hero some more too. They all agree it it's sad what happened, but not all of them neccessarily resort to war right away, nor do they all go for the same reasons. Of course I do flesh them out throughout the story, but it certainly makes them more memorable and sets them apart from each other (I have to admit, they do seem too similiar to each other prior to this, but hopefully this chapter makes up for it, as I didn't want to go into "info dump" mode on them).

I believe showing the attack also destroys the innocence that the story seemed to have had prior to this event (not counting the scary evil guy encounter in the prologue, but even he doesn't really show his true nature right away), and now they all have to deal with the new threat emerging or be destroyed by them (I do have other hidden goals here, but I don't want to give everything away right now).

I suppose this chapter by itself may not mean much, but it's not intended to be read alone, but rather to support the overall story (again, as it does tie in events that occurred in the prologue with the previous chapters), so that readers can get the "bigger picture" in the end. I guess I'll leave it in and see if it works out, even if it is hard for me to have to rewrite and reread it.

It's not that I'm not appreciating your questions, it's actually helping me because by you asking me, I can then ask myself those questions, and weed out the unneccessary stuff (I took out a cool fight scene which otherwise didn't add much to the storyline. Maybe I can implement it later though somehow).

[LloydBrown]

I gleefully attack things like this because I know what it'll do to the reader.

Ever read George Martin? He plays whack-a-mole with his characters. You know that as soon as you find a new favorite, his days are numbered.

[brinkett]

Like anything, you have to be careful not to overdo it. I like Martin's series, but I no longer allow myself to become attached to any of the characters. Why bother--they'll likely die anyway. It's dampened my enjoyment of the series somewhat.

(and he better have a damn good explanation for the ending of the last book...)

[trebuchet]

I tried something I have often heard people say is a cheap trick. I created a character just to kill him off. Just likeable enough that it would be sad when he died because of a promise he made to the protag that he would no longer be able to keep.

But, taking on a life of his own, as characters tend to do, he became beloved to me and when I got to his death scene I was really torn up about it. It was terribly hard to write, and from the protag's POV. I even tried to figure out a way to keep him alive.

It all worked out for the best, though. Without any previous intent to make it so, his life, death and legacy pervaded the entire book after that and resulted in my protag's growth-and the theme-in ways I had never even thought of.

[TheNightTerror]

Me, I absolutely adore writing nasty scenes, but I have trouble with death scenes if I care about the character. I'm quite looking forward to writing the section of my current story where there's a bunch of murders. But, when I was writing a scene where the main character found out the only real friend she'd had in a long while was dying, I started welling up. This story's full of scenes that are going to be hard to write, so I'm going to have to just deal with it, too.

I haven't written a scene where a main character was killed in ages, but I remember I used to just let myself cry as much as I wanted to, and if I couldn't even see the monitor, so what? I don't need to see the keyboard to type anyway. :tongue

[Kiva Wolfe]

I have a special place where I meet with my characters to talk about the scenes or chapters I am writing next, which happens to be the drawing room of the family's mansion. Whether alive or dead, they always live in my head. To me, they are actors I have come to rely on to shape my scenes, rework dialogue, heighten tension, and add realism. When they die to advance the story, I get choked up. I think the longest grieving period I had was two weeks when I killed off my protagonist's older brother in the car bay behind the house. I was completely shut down. I gained ten pounds from the chocolate malts I drove three miles on a dusty gravel road to get, just to ease me through my period of despair. Before I knew it, the brother was back sitting in his armchair reading the Sunday paper. He got up, gave me a bear hug, and congratulated me on a most gratifying death scene. LOL.

[Ronda]

Some people clean the house to avoid writing. I write to avoid cleaning! I love writing. The hard stuff exhilerates me.

I know a woman writing her first novel who has a tendency to write past the conflict, thereby avoiding most of it. That doesn't work and is not satisfying. We readers need to feel the conflict completely and let it propel other characters into their actions.

I know what you mean about hard scenes. I had the hardest time writing a couple scenes with horrible things that happen to my protagonist. I just set a box of tissue next to the computer and started writing. I let myself feel the emotion my characters felt and write. Afterwards, I put the work aside for several weeks. When I recently went back to review it, I got caught up in the emotion and conflict in a good way and did not feel I needed to do much revision. (What a publisher will feel I do not know.)

Write through the conflict, not past it, even if it's hard.

Just to be clear -- I'm no expert. I'm seeking a publisher for my first novel.
Warmly,
Ronda

[Kiva Wolfe]

Hi Ronda:

Interesting that you mention keeping a box of tissues handy, in my case, it's a roll of TP. How does a writer avoid scenes with conflict? I can see where it really hampered her writing. I don't think I could write without them, because they're so exciting, but also grueling, and certainly, as you have pointed out, so vitial to advancing the story. I have been working on a scene for the past three weeks where the love interest must make a choice to save the protagonist, but it places her in a perilous situation. There I was typing and crying, as much as I wanted to skip to the next chapter, I wasn't able to write forward on anything until I worked through this one scene.

When you get through them, do you experience a sense of being elevated to a new level of writing?

[Lenora Rose]

Ivonia, you say this is a rewrite. I have a question. Are you rewriting for prose-and-sentence level polish, or is there a flaw in the pacing of the scene, or the action in the scene, that you need to fix?

If it's the former, one trick I used to distance myself from the whole thing where I get too involved in the conflict is that I go paragraph by paragraph from the back to the front. Or I snip the paragraphs apart, and shuffle, and reread them out of order. (If doing this, of course, Four word single-sentence paragraphs can be attached to another close up para') This works very well for keeping my attention on whether the sentences in each paragraph work as words, but of course, it makes it much harder to spot flow and the like.

I have had scenes on which, at rereading, I apologized to the character. I've had sentences which, because of the build-up to them, put a lump in my throat.

All those things go away if you read out of order - and those long clunky descriptive paragraphs? Boy do they stand out.

[Ivonia]

Ivonia, you say this is a rewrite. I have a question. Are you rewriting for prose-and-sentence level polish, or is there a flaw in the pacing of the scene, or the action in the scene, that you need to fix?

The rewriting is mostly to add more details, as I sort of summarized a lot of stuff, so my beta readers didn't fully understand everything, nor could they picture it as well in their head (ugh, I hate the mind's eye thing sometimes lol). But I also added a few things that wasn't in the previous version (there is a secret weapon the bad guys have, but in my first draft, it's not seen by the hero until the very end, although he sees pictures of it before that. I felt that draft was kind of weak, and if it's supposed to be such a feared weapon, why not have them destroy that space station as a "warning" to the good guys right away).

Also (again, this is a sci-fi/fantasy story), the two species that are attacked (dinosaurs and birds, which I call Ivonians and Avians in my story) by the third (snakes, Scalians in story) are supposed to be allied to each other, but in the previous version, I hardly show anything to let readers know that they respect and care about each other. So I felt that I should really start showing the dinos and birds trying to help each other out.

I've actually finished rewriting it although it wasn't easy. I believe that it certainly supports the story a lot more now however. By adding a few more scenes, it made the alliance I'm trying to show a lot more powerful, so that readers can see that they've been allies for a long time now. For example, in one scene, the bridge of the space station gets destroyed. Some die in the explosion, others get sucked out into space if they're unfortunate enough to have survived the explosion.

As it's exploding however, the commander (an Avian) tries to shield an Ivonian subordinate with his wings (the Avians have seperate arms and wings, kind of like those in the winged angel pictures), and other Avians do that as well to try and protect their friends from the explosion (not that it helps any :()

And the hero's sister, an Ivonian (a T-rex more specifically, my favorite dino hehe) sees her commander die before her in the medical bay, and she tells the sister to help others, shortly before dying, frustrating the medic that was trying to help her. She then honors her commanders last wish and attempts to help anyone else she can. One of her patients is an Avian, and it was kind of hard to write this part, because the hero's sister, like the other medic, isn't able to save her, despite all of her effort. I suppose I could probably strengthen this scene even more if it's a close friend, or even better, a bitter rival, and she decides to help her anyway (hmm... :D)

And finally, I added a little bit more detail to the Scalian fleet commander there, as well as his top ace pilot (who the hero will undoubtedly run into later on :D). These two are important to the story, because they also get involved in major parts of the story, and are one of the few bad guys I want readers to "like" (the rest I'm hoping readers will want to see dead hehe).

I felt that by adding all those scenes, hopefully the reader will able to connect more with the hero's sister, as well as the good guys in general when the war starts (it certainly is a war the Scalians start, and they do try to justify it, but not that it really matters to the hero when he starts to fight back).