At long last, I’m on the other wide of a rewrite deadline and I can conclude our fairytale code series. The ending is simple. Happy. A fairytale like story, a romance, a sisterhood, even a thriller has to end with some level of happiness and satisfaction. What do we really learn from fairytale endings? The boy gets the girl. The dragon is slayed. The castle is stormed. Evil is defeated. Good wins. Even in the most thrill driven stories, these elements must take place for a solid story ending and wrap up. Cinderella is the classic happy ending. In the Disney version, Cindy and Prince marry because “the shoe fit” and boy, let’s not go down that symbolic rabbit trail, but her dreams came true because she believed. In Snow […]
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Fairytales: Taste of Death
At some point in every fairytale, there is a taste of death. Sometimes figuratively, sometimes literally. Cinderella, in the Disney version, was locked away in the tower when the king’s men came looking for the dream girl who wore the slipper. Snow White bit into the toxic apple prepared by her step monster and fell into a deep sleep that looked very much like death. The dwarfs laid her out in a casket and mourned. Aurora, the Sleeping Beauty, also looked to be dead. Photogen and Nycteris lost their entire worlds when they realized they’d been manipulated and all but imprisoned by the witch, Watho. At the taste of death, the story appears to be over. All is lost. Hope is gone. What about our modern love stories? While You […]
Read the RestFairytales: Scaling The Walls
The height to which your protagonist scale to achieve love, happiness or peace is the height at which your readers will love your story. At what price love? What will they do to win the intended’s heart? Or, find the killer? Save the family farm? Or, if you’re a fan of Firefly, fly into the black where reavers dwelled. (Shudder!) You must create a high wall for your hero or heroine to scale in order to achieve the dream. It’s not about the wall. It’s about the internal journey. The protagonist must come to her end, believe all is lost, then dig deep, find inner strength, and try one more time. Scaling the wall is not in absence of fear, it’s in spite of fear. It’s the moment of truth […]
Read the RestFairytales: Someone Needs to Be Rescued
Fairytales: Someone Needs To Be Rescued A good story is about a journey. A great story is about a journey that leads to overcoming. Finding hope. True love. Destiny. Fairytales masterfully use the elements of despair and hopelessness to drive the hero and heroine toward change. All is dark in fairytale world, usually manipulated by some supernatural, evil force, to confine goodness. To constrain voices of truth and love. To kill and destroy. Hum… won’t that preach? But we don’t want to preach in stories. We want to show. Typically, but not always, the heroine is the character in the most trouble. The one who needs to be rescued. Though on occasion, the hero can be a bit of a rapscallion and get himself in trouble. Beauty and the Beast […]
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