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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/47928
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/47928
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Is there a breaking point where people say, "that makes no sense"? Certainly there is, but I don't think it is anything you can quantify. In fact, it is demonstrable that that point is different for different readers, some condemning works for making no sense while others ignore the contradictions quite happily. Some audiences will quite happily ignore absurdities that others will not tolerate. And that is fine, because no book ever written has ever appealed to the entire world. Every best seller has its detractors.

Nevertheless, I think there are two very basic things you can do to minimize the risk of people saying that your story makes no sense.

First, understand the difference between a plot hole and a character inconsistency. Stories are basically about ordinary people in extraordinary situations. It is given to the reader that the situations that occur are going to be unusual, at least. They will forgive a lot in this department. But characters have to be consistent. If you start having one character act or talk in a way that is inconsistent with who you have shown them to be earlier in the book, the reader is going to lose confidence in your story pretty quickly. After all, if the interest in the story lies in how a person of a particular character handles the extraordinary situation they are in, all the tension and interest goes out of the story if they suddenly change character in the middle. So, worry much more about character inconsistencies than about plot holes.

Second, forcing your characters toward the climax where their character and resolve will be tested and where they will have to make a choice of values may involve creating some pretty unusual situations or events. But there is a simple technique for making the reader accept these situation and events. It is called foreshadowing. Thus if you need a tornado to hit the house at a critical moment, it will seem completely contrived and unbelievable if there has been no mentions of tornadoes previously in the book. But if there have been prior mentions of tornadoes, then the reader accepts that tornadoes are part of the world of the book and does not gape in disbelief when one comes along at just the right moment to force your protagonist to face their moment of crisis.

Often authors, having contrived some event to force the crisis in their novel, go back and find a way to foreshadowing it earlier in the book. I saw Bernard Cornwell at a conference once explaining that if he had Richard Sharpe escape through a door in chapter 10, he will then go back and have him walk through the same door in chapter 3. This simple foreshadowing is often all it takes to make otherwise unbelievable events and coincidences seem entirely plausible.

Original score: 5