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 Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2014 8:14 am
Situation: My friend tells me I write too many cute, fluffy romantic type stories.... and frankly I agree with him. To remedy this he gave me a challenge to write a dark, like dark dark, kind of story for my favorite pairing.
One where one of them dies and the other snaps and goes on a vengeful justice type hunt after the murderer, who was their friend, fully intent on killing them himself.
But he has never actually killed anyone before.... queuing the internal drama about should he really kill them? Should he not? etc. etc.
Basically ruining the poor characters whole psyche and dealing with betrayal.
Problem: I am finding it hard. I don't know if it is because I don't have an evil bone in my body or just have never really been in that intense of a situation.
I know what I want to do - I have the whole idea planned on a loose outline and I am interested in writing it but actually putting myself into the character and their emotional mindset.... feels impossible. I just can't find the inspiration or ability to become emotionally invested in it like my other stories.
To those who have considered writing a dark! story, or have written one before, perhaps about emotional/sensitive topics. Where do you find your inspiration? Music? Own experiences? Do you find it also hard?
Or if you don't like writing dark stories, why is that?
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Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2014 4:19 pm
I'd suggest reading other dark stories and watching films/shows with this revenge for killing my lover theme.
For these characters I'd try as hard as you can to put yourself in this situation. If you were ever betrayed and hurt like this, how would you react and what would drive you to killing someone who you once trusted? It's not always the killing itself that really damages people it's the after guilt and moral disputing of "OMFG I just killed someone!" and afterwords there's the question of "was it worth it?" and/or "now what?"
I would suggest looking at something like Sweeney Todd. Forget that its a musical for a second if you can't stand them.What Sweeney is about is how revenge eats itself up and never works. This is a story of a genuinely nice guy who was married to a lovely woman and all of that was taken from him, he becomes a serial killer out of rage and in a strange way necessity.
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Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2014 6:28 pm
Biggest tip I can give:
Read. Read, and read some more.
The more you read, the better you will get.
If you want to read some dark subject matter, a lot of the classics do have form of darkness. Read some horror, or maybe even some mysteries.
They don't have to be the same themes each time. It can be more than one theme. What matters is creating understanding for that darkness.
If you want to write of a certain subject matter, you may need to do some research as well, that way you have some sort of idea of the topic. If there are two sides of the subject, keep an open mind for both sides.
This includes reading, watching certain films, and etcetera.
For characters, I would suggest interviewing your characters. Then create their motivations (what do they want?), and give them obstacles that they must overcome so that their motivation is worth something.
Like in any piece of fiction, including fan-fiction. With dark stories, it's pretty much the same thing.
It will be hard at first, but I think it's all about breaking out of your comfort zone. Not just in what you write, but just of doing things you've never done before.
I hope this helps a little. These are all just suggestions (so you don't have to follow every single one of the suggestions). Just do what works for you. :3
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