Tropes that work their way into your WiPs again and again...

lvae · Nov 30, 2010

Does anyone else do this?

When I began the initial drafts of my WiP, I had my characters attending a neo-Victorian private school exclusively reserved for the kids of the super rich.

Then I hit a wall, and I tried to work through what was going wrong, and then I realised for all the WiPs I ever plotted my characters always attended private schools reserved for the kids of the super rich. No matter the setting - dystopian! historical! fantasy! contemporary! - no matter the circumstance - teenaged angst! The end of the world! Authoritarian governments! - I always, always fall back on that trope.

It get worse. In my WiPs, there always has to be that one character in my novels that has to be good looking to the point of ridiculous. The super-rich-but-entirely-not-suited-for-the-heroine guy always falls for the heroine. There is always unrequited love. There is always a masquerade ball past the halfway mark of the story.

For my current WiP, I managed to avoid some of these tropes (some, sadly, not all) and I realised how much easier it was, to be relatively trope free. But then when I started plotting for my next WiP, the problems came again. Somehow, I couldn't manipulate the plot so the characters didn't attend a ridiculously wealthy private school.

So I trunked it. And my new plan of attack is to purge my system of the urge to fall back on my usual tropes - by writing a story that features all these tropes, write it with gusto and all the extravagance and OTT-ness my inner twelve-year-old can muster... and hopefully I'll never touch stories like that ever again.

But writing a story filled with tropes to end all yearnings to write said tropes isn't as easy as it sounds in theory. Currently I'm in plotting hell. I really want to do this though, because if I brainstorm another plot that involves my characters attending a preppy private school filled with rich kids, I am sure my brain is going to explode.

So.

Tell me I'm not alone in my clichéd insanity. Who else has tropes that they turn to over and over? (You don't have to hate them by the way. I secretly like the masquerade thing... and the unrequired love thing...)

maggi90w1 · Nov 30, 2010

I have the opposite problem. I'm a total TV Tropes addict and every time I visit this page I find new shiny stuff that I have to cram in my story. Doesn't works too well, either.
Now about your problem: Maybe the preppy-private-school is just your thing? If that's what you want to write about, then why don't you just write about it as much as you want.
Maybe you could take your favorite project and turn it into a series. Then just spit out preppy-private-school novel till you run dry.

Captcha · Nov 30, 2010

Is there an underlying theme that you might be trying to explore, via your prep-school obsession? Because I agree that it sounds like you've gone overboard on that particular setting, but I think if you could boil it down, you could find something that resonates with you but that could be expressed in a wider variety of settings.

Most novelists return to similar themes, book after book. Think of your favourite multi-book authors and try to find theirs. I know that my books all tend to deal with the effects of difficult childhoods on adults, characters who are their own worst enemies, etc. These are things from my life that have leaked into my writing, and I don't think it's a bad thing.

So if you could figure out what it is that intrigues you about the private school setting, maybe you could use that broader theme, without using the trope itself. Is it the lack of parents? The struggle of people who can have every material thing but still can't find wisdom/happiness? The isolation from traditional family structures and the need to find something else? I think there's lots of good stuff you could work with, outside of the school itself.

lvae · Nov 30, 2010

I wish it was so deep that I'm trying to explore some hidden and meaningful issues (and you brought up some pretty good ones, Kate. I could only wish!). I'm not sure why I'm so drawn to private schools. I suspect it might be watching one too many asian dramas set in private schools. But the real problem whenever I get sucked into WiPs that somehow fall into the setting of private schools is that the main conflict always happens between the super-rich-hot-guy and the shy-but-secretly-kick-ass heroine.

It's actually quite fun, in a frustrating way, plotting my way through my trope-filled WiP to end all my trope-ly yearnings. It's given me a lot of insight into my plotting process. First and foremost being... this private school obsession must end.

KimJo · Nov 30, 2010

Maggi, you visit TV Tropes? You brave, brave person... Every time I go to that site I get sucked in for hours and get no writing done at all!

My "pet trope" in my YA tends to be outsiders. In my Reality Shift series, Shanna's very shy, is teased and bullied, and her mother's abusive; Jonah has a good home life, but he does things like meditating in the school lobby, so kids either make fun of him for being weird or accuse him of devil worship. In my Dark Lines series, out of the primary characters I have a boy who's pretty much had to raise his mother since he was five, another boy who was put into foster care because his mother turned him over to the state, and pretty much all of the characters are outsiders anyway because they have psychic abilities that they don't want their peers to find out about.

Abusive/neglectful parents or living with a guardian instead of a parent are a couple of other tropes that tend to pop up pretty frequently in my stories. (I once challenged myself to write a character with a healthy, stable home life and biological parents who were still married to each other...that worked great until the character's younger brother died fighting a force of darkness, and then the whole family went to crap.)

LadyA · Nov 30, 2010

I, after reading one too many regency romances, have always had to include a few members of the Aristocracy (I mean come on, check out my username!

) - my MC's best friend will inherit a Viscountcy (whether he wants to or not) and another best friend has a Baronet for a granddad.

Another favourite theme is what someone on another site (the name of which i can't remember for the life of me) called 'man in jeopardy'. I'm not one for the hot jock, or anything like that - i prefer my male MC to be a little misunderstood, and a bit of a loner.

eyeblink · Nov 30, 2010

I've had Polish characters more than once. I'm not Polish, though I have visited the country.

CheyElizabeth · Nov 30, 2010

My characters are always eating Taco Bell.

FalconStorm · Nov 30, 2010

I have to confess, I like to do the whole 'heroine in distress' thing with the guy that comes along to rescue her...although sometimes he's the reason she's in distress too, although generally inadverdently on his part.

But, yeah. That trope creeps up a LOT in my stories. If they're ever published, I'll probably have feminists all over the world breaking down my door to beat my head in. *shrug* Oh well.

KimJo said:
(I once challenged myself to write a character with a healthy, stable home life and biological parents who were still married to each other...that worked great until the character's younger brother died fighting a force of darkness, and then the whole family went to crap.)

This sounds sooo familiar. It does occur to me, though, that happy home lives, while pleasant for the person living them, are really, really boring to write about. *grin* Most of my characters have problems with family too. Reality is, most people have family problems, some more severe than others. Having a healthy, stable home life is almost more fantasy than the messed up home life.

maggi90w1 · Nov 30, 2010

I thought about this again and I found a trope I use pretty much every time.
A ragtag bunch of characters forming a family type group. A Werewolf pack, a rebel group, a group of apocalypse survivors, a group of hunted wizards...

Stunted · Nov 30, 2010

I've discovered that I really love writing stories about socially unacceptable characters who find a way to turn their deficits into strengths.

I also have realized that every novel, I have to edit out a possessed character before I can really get going. This time around, I edited out one, but another appeared and seems to be staying!

bertrigby · Nov 30, 2010

Boys who get awkward and blush a lot.

UST relationships where the MC and LI can't be together for some reason or another, so they angst about it a lot!

amlptj · Dec 1, 2010

My characters are always geeky kids who were bullied at some point...

mickeyDs4 · Dec 1, 2010

All my MCs names end the same way. Ithaca, Veronica, Lyrica and Bianca. Three of the four have crappy relationships with their mothers. I tend to have them be from the wrong side of the tracks in some way. Ithaca (MC in A Ghost of You) is HIV-positive. Veronica (1st MC of An Egyptian Secret) dresses in the Arabic style while in the US. Lyrica Holly (2nd MC of An Egyptian Secret) is literally from the wrong side of town. Bianca (MC in Days Like These) is homeless since Hurricane Katrina.

KimJo · Dec 1, 2010

FalconStorm said:
This sounds sooo familiar. It does occur to me, though, that happy home lives, while pleasant for the person living them, are really, really boring to write about. *grin* Most of my characters have problems with family too. Reality is, most people have family problems, some more severe than others. Having a healthy, stable home life is almost more fantasy than the messed up home life.

That's true, but with some of my characters I go to the extreme... They're always strong characters who don't let their home lives or their pasts keep them down for long, though, so I guess that's another trope.

erin_michelle · Dec 1, 2010

Most of my MCs come from one-parent households with the mother usually dead or not in the picture, which is odd because my parents never divorced and my mother is very much alive. I guess that's my subconscious telling me I have Mommy issues.

CheG · Dec 1, 2010

I don't know if it a t**** (refuses to use word on basis of a cliche is a cliche no matter how hard you try to rebrand it) I would rather call them plot fetishes which recur. But I like rich people and noblility a lot. A lot of what I do revolves around characters from the nobility modern/fantasy what have you.

I like supernatural/paranormal/magic a lot. That shows up in my work.

Sometimes private schools, mostly just schools. I have a whole thing that revolves a library.

I also love tropical places! Anywhere warm is good for me!

The occasional orphan.

And vampires.

Shady Lane · Dec 1, 2010

Protective older brothers
Sick younger brothers
Sharing a sexual partner with a sibling
Siblings in general, let's be honest.
Half-Jews
More gay characters than straight characters

The_Ink_Goddess · Dec 1, 2010

Unbalanced (I will not call them crazy. They are not crazy. Well, most of them.) MCs. Usually female.

Unstable female characters in general.

Difficult family relationships, esp. mothers. Which is weird, because my relationship with my mother is great.

What TVTropes calls "darker and edgier." Every. Single. One. Of my MSs. Seriously, so dark I worry about myself.

Main character breakdowns. Usually in the climax.

Creepy-close friendships. Particularly between girls.

Ryan_Sullivan · Dec 1, 2010

Romantic scenes in parks.
Starting chapters with waking up. (huge bad habit.)
Parents with minimal roles.
Descriptions of light.
Mocking PT Cruisers.

ex_machina · Dec 1, 2010

CheyElizabeth said:
My characters are always eating Taco Bell.

I love you hard.

The tall, dark and snarky trope has had me in it's clutches since I was but a wee tot of ten.

Nightmirror · Dec 1, 2010

I used to be stuck on:

Teen boy hero. Seemingly normal and average, possibly a peasant and almost always an outcast.
Half breed of some kind: half-elf, etc.
Discovers he is not normal and he is destined to save his world.
Overcomes poverty, proves worth in combat, gets the girl.
Happy ever after.
Typical Star Wars / Eragon type of story.

I got bored of writing stories with that structure, so I started writing about a girl in an elite private school setting, where she has everything most people could ever want but is missing something that most people take for granted. I guess everyone has different comfort zones when forming plots.

Zoombie · Dec 2, 2010

CheyElizabeth said:
My characters are always eating Taco Bell.

Do they know how to use the three sea shells?

As for me, my trope has been and always will be the fundamental power of human creativity.

I rarely - if ever - do the "humans as powerless" in my urban fantasy. In fact, my two most recent urban fantasies have humans being the fundamental power of the universe.

In Wake Up, ALL magic derives from human dreams. Proof wakes people up, and so if you wake up enough people, then the dream collapses...and the dream is what powers creation, innovation, everything.

Why do you think the Dark Ages sucked so bad? People were using their magic so openly that the dream collapsed, and with it, the Roman Empire and western civilization.

China and the middle east were fine, though.

So, all the magic was based around the dreams of our modern era. Hence why the primary foot soldier of necromancers are the souls of people killed by car crash victims. And the main character is a magical hermaphrodite representing modern culture's struggle and confusion over sexuality and gender.

...I like Wake Up. I should write more in it's universe...

amrose · Dec 2, 2010

Ryan_Sullivan said:
Mocking PT Cruisers.

I just did this the other day.

My trope:

Having the MC left with a journal left to him/her written in code that she needs to decipher in order to move the plot along. Sometimes it's written in another language and sometimes it's just describing things they will come to understand later.

::shrug:: I've left that behind with my current WIP when I realized I was doing it.

CheyElizabeth · Dec 2, 2010

erin_michelle said:
Most of my MCs come from one-parent households with the mother usually dead or not in the picture, which is odd because my parents never divorced and my mother is very much alive. I guess that's my subconscious telling me I have Mommy issues.

Now that you mention it, my books always have a deadbeat mom/drunk mom/shitty mom/nonexistent mom. My mom is nothing like that.

Tropes that work their way into your WiPs again and again...

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