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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/27183
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/27183
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

As you rightly perceive, the moments that have a potential for gut emotional appeal are well known, but merely creating the moment does not always produce the emotion -- precisely because we all know what the moments are: loss, sacrifice, enlightenment, affirmation, conversion, reunion, acceptance, marriage, etc.

There is nothing esoteric about these moments. They are the fabric of our lives. Our highs and our lows, and the emotions that they provoke, are the milestones of our lives. We expect them to be there in the stories we read, and by and large we understand where they come in a story and why. We see them coming and we are disappointed if they don't turn up when they are supposed to. They are what we expect from a story. They are what we read it for.

The structure of a story does have to lead up to these moments, therefore. In fact, it is these moments that define the structure of the story. But it is not the structure that produces the emotional response. The emotional response comes from our engagement. It comes from how much we believe and how much we care. If we don't believe in the people or the events, there is not emotional response. If we don't care about them, there is no emotional response.

People talk about their favorite characters as if they were real. That is how much they are invested in their stories. I heard once that the reason every character on a soap opera is rich is that if they put poor characters on the shows, the studios are inundated with care packages for them. (I don't know if it is true, but it is certainly plausible.)

When a charity wants you to give money to support poor people in foreign countries, they don't put out ads full of statistics, they put out ads showing individual children. They tell you their stories, how they and their siblings are being raised by their grandmother who is slowly growing blind. Some let you sponsor an individual child and exchange letters with them. It is all about emotional engagement.

The structure of your story will lead your characters to these moments of gut emotional appeal, but whether they pay off depends entirely on how well you have executed your characters and their stories, on how much your readers believe, and how much your readers care. It is not what happens -- it is the same old things happening that we have seen a thousand times, not only in fiction, but in life as well -- it is who it happens to.

Creating characters that people believe in and care about is not something that comes from a formula (much as some people may tell you otherwise). It comes from observation, sympathy, and caring.

Original score: 5