How to make a dark story not-so-dark (Shining the light in darkness)
I'm writing a war story, and it's dark. However, I find that every scene turns out to be depressing because of it. Readers will be overwhelmed. Are there ways I can induce hope/shine the light in the darkness in my novel?
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What I would do, is give the characters something to look forward to. Give them something to fight for. They need a motivation to keep going, something to comfort them in their time of need. I think by giving the characters this, you'd be able to make them have more courage and generally be happier for what is to come.
Always give characters a motivation.
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You can talk to real-life veterans and see how they coped with war. One tactic is "gallows humor" or "black humor," which is seeing the humor even in grim moments (common to veterans, law enforcement officers, doctors, and first responders). The TV show MASH was essentially built on this. There are many examples on the TV Tropes page (consider yourself duly warned).
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