Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

50%
+0 −0
Q&A How to handle a character's failure?

People don't behave rationally all the time, and neither do characters in fiction. Your characters don't need to make the right choices all the time, they just need to make believable choices that ...

posted 6y ago by Neil‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T07:02:34Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/30380
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T07:02:34Z (over 4 years ago)
People don't behave rationally all the time, and neither do characters in fiction. Your characters don't need to make the _right_ choices all the time, they just need to make _believable_ choices that we understand.

Spending some time on the character's motivations for taking this risk will help sell his choices to your readers. Perhaps Mike's relationship to his mother is very close, or maybe he feels guilt over something with her? Whatever the reason, he needs a motive for putting others at risk or he'll not be a very sympathetic character.

Perhaps by putting his comrades in danger Mike is, in some way, redeeming something else?

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-09-23T17:31:56Z (over 6 years ago)
Original score: 8