The Truth Journey (or Inner Journey, or Spiritual Journey) for your character Part 3 Okay, I’m just going to say it, and I’m using my Mom tone. The Black Moment is the POINT of your story. Because without the Black Moment, there is no epiphany and no character change, and if you are writing a romance, it is Absolutely Required. If you don’t have a black moment in your story, then you don’t have a story. Sorry if that hurts…BUT, we’re going to fix it, right? Last week, I talked about building the black moment. Today, let’s revisit that a moment, and talk about how to weave in the lie for effective character change! Step Five: The Black Moment In this step, the lie rears its […]
Read the RestTag Archives | What is the Black Moment and how do I create it?
So, how do you make it BLACK? (Setting up the Black Moment)
Yesterday we talked about the elements of the Black Moment – gathering up the pieces. Today, let’s put them together! First, you need to start with…The Hint… At the beginning of every great novel, or movie, there is a hint at what a character’s greatest fears might be. It can be something they experience and never want to repeat. It can be something a friend has gone through. It can be something they witness…but we need to see if (even if we don’t recognize it as the hint…although now you will!) Because it will give us that dark foreboding we need to make the fear seem…well, dark. One of my favorite hints is in a movie called The Hostage…the hero is negotiating the release of a […]
Read the RestIt’s bad…very very bad. (aka: Crafting the Black Moment!)
I love the black moment in a novel. (or a movie!) I just saw Avatar…(so, spoiler alert!!)) The black moment is when the humans come after the blue people in the tree and take it down despite his efforts to stop it. Of course, he’s lost the girl, he’s lost all hope of getting his legs back, and all hope of being a blue person, too. He’s a nobody. Just like he was when he started. This is a great black moment, and one where we are fully invested to root for him as he tries to save the day. A great black moment is Personal and Overwhelming. It’s also Plausible and sets up the Epiphany of the novel. We’ll talk about the components of the black moment […]
Read the RestWhat makes a great black moment?
So, we’re almost to the end of our Heroes’ Journey! We’ve had our character change (and we touched on the Black moment in that discussion) and we’re off to storm the castle in our last battle. He’s been changed by events, and is a new man, and is trying to apply everything he learned…. But, before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s go back to that Black moment and just touch on the elements that make it profound. 1. Attack their Greatest Fears – emotionally and physically. Since the beginning of the story, you know what your hero fears the most…and you’ve been slowly pushing him to this place. You know that Frodo fears succumbing to the ring, or worse, his own hobbitness. You know […]
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