Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
The protagonist sets out on a journey to reach a goal. But the further he gets into the story, the clearer he understands that the odds aren't in his favor. He experiences loss, frustration, anger, fatigue. He falls, rises again, and falls once more. When he seems to be running out of option, thought, a stroke of luck™ appears.
Will this be accepted by the audience?
The idea here is that sometimes, chance is in our favor. Sometimes good things do happen, so, by extension, they should happen in our stories, too.
Of course I'm interested in avoiding the Deus Ex Machina, were the resolution to a problem is delivered by the sheer force of will of the author alone. DeMs come with a set of drawbacks - first and foremost being very unsatisfying for the audience.
One of the best advice in avoiding DeMs is giving a proper foreshadowing to the readers - eg. introduce the elements that will eventually solve the dire situation before that the situation gets solved.
While I totally agree, I don't feel this is always applicable. Sometimes we are talking about random chance - no way to foreshadow that - and some other times the solution is being prepared outside of the narrator PoV.
In my novel, the MC has gone through a series of losses and she's rapidly losing hope. Somehow, I think that this will make any change of fortune more acceptable by the readers. The lucky event will bring to a resolution, but it won't solve all her problems; it will just point her in the right direction.
To sum up:
Is it possible to use luck (real or perceived) without making a Deus ex Machina? Does it help having the lucky event happen after a series of unfavorable ones?
I'll leave here a very related question that focuses on DeMs in general.
Related:
When you're worried about a stroke of luck behaving like Deus Ex Machina, it is reasonable to think of that stroke of lu …
5y ago
I'd rather make the luck indirect, I think it works out better that way. So if my character is hungry, the lucky thing i …
5y ago
Short answer: yes, with measure and forethought. Note #1: unless karma and universal balance is a defining characterist …
5y ago
3 answers
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When you're worried about a stroke of luck behaving like Deus Ex Machina, it is reasonable to think of that stroke of luck as something magical. Because of that, I believe invoking Sanderson's First Law of Magic is appropriate:
An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.
In the linked article he goes into more details about the word choices. For example, "to solve conflict" is important. As it turns out, you can use as much magic as you want to create conflict, but the reader better have understanding before you resolve conflict with magic. This opens all sorts of doors. For example, your stroke of luck can convert one conflict to another, minimizing that feeling of "resolving conflict." This leads to stories where one has a burst of luck, but the characters don't realize it was fortuitous until later.
A few answers mentioned things like karma. Karma works in stories because most readers have an intuition about how karma functions. As long as you play to that, it works.
Mystery novels often rely on giving the reader almost all of the pieces, before providing the last piece and letting it all unwind.
So there's many solutions, but I find invoking Sanderson's First Law is an effective test as to which solutions will be accepted and which will not.
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I'd rather make the luck indirect, I think it works out better that way. So if my character is hungry, the lucky thing is they find a piece of discarded stiff wire, but THEN they sharpen the wire on a stone, and bend it into a fish hook, and make a lure from a feather, and use the thread from their shirt as line to go fishing -- and they catch dinner. The discarded wire is a deus ex machina, for sure. Heck, the lake with a fish in it is a deus ex machina too! But it feels like the character was clever and diligent and turned a worthless piece of wire into a tool.
So I let them get lucky, but the luck still takes them some work and ingenuity, so it feels like they earned whatever boon they get out of it. And it shows my character is resourceful and doesn't give up.
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Short answer: yes, with measure and forethought.
Note #1: unless karma and universal balance is a defining characteristic of your world, previous bad luck does not count. That's just how our world works.
Note #2: there are great examples of book that handle great moments of luck, and base their entire plot on it. I am guessing this is not the case in this question, and that the stroke of luck mentioned above is merely being considered as a lesser plot device.
First and foremost: keep luck reasonable.
Luck should serve merely as an input, or a very small step towards the MC goal. Be careful to not make it into the meaningful event that allows reaching the goal: while being great, luck has the unfortunate habit of removing the conflict with the world that you have built in your story. Too much of it and you throw a well crafted plot into a flat and dull series of pointless events.
For instance, if the MC is out of money, you could make them win the lottery with a ticket they find in the street, or you could get them to find a lost wallet with very little money in it. It is also true that luck can get greater as time passes, see the next section for this.
Second: make your MC deserve their luck.
This is also about conflict. If the MC does not try hard to get somewhere, then they probably do not deserve to get there. If it has to happen anyway, then see the next section. From a reader's perspective: what am I reading if they struggle to achieve X but they get Y instead, which is great, but not what I have been rooting for? You need to build expectation. The greater the expectation, the greater the relief when a bit of luck helps the MC. If your novel is a 800 pages book about a poor person trying to get through in any possible manner, then yes, it is acceptable to win the lottery out of sheer luck on page 790.
Third: Get more conflict out of each stroke of luck.
Usually luck removes conflict, removes struggles, and flattens an otherwise multifaceted plot. To avoid this you can add more conflicts and struggles for every lucky moment. Build them out of the envy of less fortunate characters. Make sure that the MC know that their luck is someone else's misfortune, and make them sorry for it. For instance, if you want to make them rich by winning the lottery, then make them alone.
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