That first picture looks potentially very terrifying. Like, it might be nothing, but it might be the mouth of an Elder God come to swallow us whole and drive us insane, and not in that order.

To put my reaction in five words:

That’s what I’m talkin’ about!

I’ve talked at length to several fellow writers this weekend about stories, especially fictional ones, being about more than just themselves. Having something at the heart of them. A core, if you will.

This morning you drove that point home more eloquently than I ever could, while ranting about Star Wars and making me wanna do laser. So, thank you.

Thanks, @Josh! Took me a while to orbit the topic and zero in on it, but that’s sometimes how it goes. Writing blog posts like these help me figure out things.

Expecting a full report on the writer’s conference, of course.

We all have a gun at the base of our skull, it seems.

– c.

Yes! Yes! This! Thisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthis!

I’m an active member of this forum that has a “Library” section, where we discuss books and comic books and writing and we have this guy (two of them, but never on at the same time) who keeps starting these threads about books he’s writing.

And he keeps on talking about the setting, about which mythos he used and how awesome his character’s are and everybody’s just nodding along…

…until he fucking posts like three chapters of the thing. Then everybody starts wringing their hands to politely point out what he’s doing wrong and we can’t explain it to him. I will now PM him this post. It will do him laser.

I’m glad this post do laser.

One of the best posts I’ve read by you in a while, bro – and I mean that in a good way. In a field of roses, this is they giant hardon threatening extinction to all mankind. Like I said in twitter “Lucas stuffed the core with candy.” is a brilliant line. That would make a good t-shirt, too.

I think you are right on with disconnect between the first trilogy in the Saga and the second, but I will say this about the Matrix: Reloaded is a piece of crap, but Revoloutions got back to making it more personal, but not with Neo and the main crew so much. The fight in Zion, with the kid and the grizzled vet – that was good shit. I felt that, and knew it. However, so much of the rest of the movie was wrapped in semi-emo bullshit that it makes what really stood on its own kind of bog down.

One of the things I find difficult is injecting emotion without it feeling forced, but (big but) I find that after I’ve completed a draft, and I know exactly where the story is going, when I do the next bit what seemed to be heavy-handed authorial voice tames back down. Yes, you can plan and plan and plan, but without closure in your mind (ie, finishing) you can’t really allude to the more subtle sides of injecting emotion. Once you have that ending firmly in place, as you’re rewriting it becomes more subtle and less obvious – you get some foreshadowing going, some tension across chapters (as opposed to just the scene) and you set the character’s failures up to show that emotion – the conflict become much more dynamic.

Well, that’s what I’ve found anyway

Again, excellent, excellent, grade A fucking post Chuck. Loved every word. It may not be anything new, but it’s all in packing and hearing someones take on it, their experience and thoughts, makes it new.

Well, you just did laser to my skull, in a good way. Star Wars and slight disturbing images aside, it wasn’t until you got to Twilight that it clicked. My number one problem with the young adult market was that, a lot of the time, the emotional core becomes and emotional overcoat. My teens weren’t that long ago and I definitely don’t remember being quite that moody. More than that, it drove home what’s been bothering me about the main character of my current work in progress; she’s coming off as an emotionless automaton. Which, writing YA, is not a good thing. So now I have to slap myself around and remind myself that a little emotion doesn’t mean emo.

A++

Yay! A++! Thanks, @Kate.

Yes, emotion in a story is a good thing. A necessary thing. Though always an underlying layer — more an underground stream than a raging river.

– c.

@Rick:

Thanks, man. Planning doesn’t really help bring out the emotional core in a specific way, but what you can do is at least identify (even muddily so) the elements of your story’s emotional core early. It ties back to the “What Is This About?” question. The emotional core is one answer to that question. It’s about breaking the cycle of abuse. It’s about a love story in a turbulent time. It’s about revenge. It’s about this, that, or the other thing, with the thrust, the heart, the throughline, the core being the emotion that supports the whole tale.

– c.

Bitchin’ Post.

I admit, a good emotional core is usually transparent to me. It is implicitly the reason i keep reading, so I only note it by its absence (Why the fuck do i care?) or by it’s excess (Jesus Christ, we GET it already) – when I don’t notice it at all, that’s when I will tend to most impressed by it in retrospect.

-Rob D.

I say there’s no real emotional core to a story until somewhere in there it reaches out its fingers, stabs them into your ribcage, and fondles and tickles and squeezes your heart. (Ripping optional. Not every story has to be an Aztec ballgame.)

This is why I too think Twilight is crap, beyond the bad writing: it’s not emotional but angsty, and it’s angsty for no good reason. Where’s the tension? Where’s the conflict? There’s no real down side to being a vampire in this world that I can discern. Without that, it lacks depth. It becomes swoony Victorian romance pap… which does have a place in the book market, because it’s what I call “junk food for the brain.” Healthy food is better for you and ultimately tastier and makes you feel good in the long run, but everyone except the most die-hard can’t deny that sometimes you just want something fast, sorta tasty, and crackalicious (burgers, donuts, tacos, cupcakes, fried anything, etc).

So too with books, hence my eyerolling “whatever” attitude toward Twilight. I can’t and won’t pry someone’s fingers off it anymore than I would a KFC Double Down, though I think they’re some of the worst things to happen to this culture.

But for something *really good* and worthwhile, something not candy floss, that story’s got to have at least the impression of a juicy, pulsing, intensely feeling heart in it.

Thanks, @Rob — agreed that the emotional core is best when not seen, but rather, keenly felt.

@Elissa — that’s why I’m not entirely certain that a story needs a squirming hell-beast as an emotional core. I agree that some stories are done well with very overt, very “grab you by the throat” emotional cores (any revenge story, for instance), but I’d caution against making the emotional core such a dynamic, heart-ripping critter in every instance.

My two cents, obviously.

– c.

Wow. Just… yes. That was like a bat to the head, which I needed desperately.

But I still wonder – Does the emotional core of your story just come? If you force it, won’t it suck? Shouldn’t it be natural? I guess I’m asking is the emotional core simply a needed byproduct of kick ass characters and plotlines?

And you say “Note there the absence of the word “should.” That word is meaningless. It either is, or it isn’t.”

How do you know if the emotional core of your story is touching your readers? I suppose this is more a problem of finding the right people to critique your work.

Perhaps I need more bat to the brain.

@Michelle:

Damn fine questions! My hastily-scrawled answers:

The emotional core of the story may already be there. You say, “Damn, I want to tell a story about a son getting revenge for his father’s murder,” you’re already hinting at an emotional throughline there — revenge, love, family, it’s all bundled together. On the other hand, you say, “I want to tell a story where a boy becomes a hero and joins a Rebel Alliance to fight a Galactic Empire,” well, where’s the throughline? What’s the emotional hook? Thus you’d need to take a little extra time teasing it out. Not in concrete terms, maybe, but you need to feel it out at least.

I don’t think it’s a byproduct, though, not automatically. It can be. But if you start without a comprehension of the emotional core from the get-go, or at least a feel of it, you run the risk of creating hollow characters and plotlines that serve only themselves. Again, you end up with (in my mind) potentially something closer to the new SW trilogy rather than the original: a heartless thing more about the arrangement of characters and plotlines rather than being about something, rather than having an emotional thrust that drives interesting characters (rather than interesting characters that drive an emotional thrust).

Er, if that makes sense.

As for whether it’s touching the readers — well, you won’t really know until someone reads it and feeds back. A good sign is, is it touching you? (Dirty!) By which I mean, are you feeling something during the writing, during the reading? That’s a good sign. In my repped novel, I feel so goddamn bad for the protagonist I’ve created, and I feel genuine guilt when I read what I’ve done — it’s a hard life for her, and so when I was writing it, I was writing from a real place of fear and guilt.

Did it work? I dunno. I hope so, but time will tell, methinks.

– c.

There’s a scene in the first Matrix that comes back to me a lot when I think about creating worlds within worlds for characters to inhabit and explore. It’s a scene the latter two movies don’t quite take the time to do.

While driving through the Matrix metropolis, Neo looks out the window and points toward a restaurant on a busy street. “I used to eat there,” he says. “Really good noodles.”

What he’s doing there is telegraphing not only the fact that they’re moving through things that used to be familiar to Neo, but are now strange (and we can all relate to the familiar made strange), but that Neo is moving along his arc. He’s in mid-change. He’s different than he was before and he knows it, even though he’s still interstitial. Plus, it shows us a human sort of reaction to all this, a minor realization, an echo of his past life. It’s short, it’s fleeting, and it’s a great little moment that points right past the kung fu and the leather toward the emotional core of the picture.

Interestingly enough, I think this made something else click for me. Have you read Terry Brooks’ novelization of Phantom Menace? I recommend it. Mostly because he does a masterful job of weaving elements into Anakin’s thought processes that foreshadow Vader. In a way that the kid actor just didn’t have the chops to pull off.

More precisely, he gave the story its emotional core.

Given that comparison, I think it’s now obvious to me what the emotional core *is*. Whereas before I had difficulty drawing the distinction between that core and other elements, such as theme and character arc.

Ok, that makes sense. I’m constantly reminding myself that my characters need proper motivation for their actions. Why does he/she/it do this? Why wouldn’t they do something different? Why, why, why?

I think all of those questions and answers revolve around the emotional core of my story.

And, yep, my story moves me at times. Not always. I’m in the rough draft, though, and hopefully edits and revisions will make it all really come together once I’m done.

Thanks.

[...] addition to being about something, having an emotional core as Chuck would say, speculative fiction lets a writer tackle issues, debates and controversies in a [...]

Really good piece of insight into it all by Mr. Hindmarch there – I never really thought about that exact scene in that way before. Good catch, sir.

Some great stuff here. I’d add the following. We have to remember that, when we’re dealing with character’s emotions, we have to deal with it the same way we deal with the plot elements. We gotta show, not tell.

I’ve read a lot of writer who’d never dream of telling the active story elements — they’re show show show right down the line. But when it comes to the character’s feelings, suddenly it’s exposition time. We get a solid page of text explaining what and how they feel.

So yeah, we need to know what our characters are feeling, what motivates them. But then we need to translate those feelings into actions that articulate them and not get lazy and drop a counseling session into the story.

And remember we’re dealing with feelings. Some ambiguity is fine. In fact, it’s probably necessary. We’re all a big wad of feelings, and a lot of them are contridictory. I mean Luke S is fun and all, but he’s a little monodimensional, at least for my taste.

Dan

@Dan:

Thanky!

Luke is very monodimensional, and certainly not a great example of a “real” character, but he is one that legions of people have responded to — in fact, sometimes, a single dimension can be more potent due to its simplicity. Not a good thing or a bad thing, but it remains a thing.

And you’re definitely right on show, don’t tell — that’s why it’s important to keep it at the core and not the surface. We as people don’t “tell” our emotions; we show them. Characters should do the same. Further, never should a writer explain that emotional thrust. If you can’t make people respond to it through the evocation of story, then the writing errs on the clumsy side.

Of course, once again: Twilight. Clumsy side. Sells billions.

*shrug*

So it goes.

– c.

@Will:

Nailed it.

Characters need touchstones like those, especially characters involved in Lofty Plans and Big Ideas.

Very cool thing I hadn’t considered before now re: The Matrix.

– c.

@Lugh:

I don’t normally like Brooks’ work, but his PHANTOM MENACE novel was actually pretty solid stuff. Definitely more compelling. Gave us much better characterization — not just the fault of the actors, but the script had very little of that in it. Plus, if I recall, he arranged the elements in a whole different way, narratively. Doesn’t it open with a podrace or something?

– c.

Here’s something, maybe fodder for a whole new post, but that I think is worth looking at: What’s the difference between the emotional core of a story and the emotional core of a character? (About 50 pages—zing.) But, seriously. These are often the same, and I see a lot of us talking about the emotional core of specific characters here, but sometimes these cores are different.

Or are they?

I withhold my own opinions until the subject’s been discussed more.

Dude.

Hell yeah.

@Will ask crazy good question.

Definitely post fodder. Still.

I’d say the emotional core of the story is very close to the emotional core of the primary characters — after all, it is their story you’re telling (and if it’s not, uh-oh), and so there exists some pipe connecting the two.

That said, a lot of the working bits of any story might have separate emotional cores — lesser characters, an antagonist, a setting, each scene. That’s what I was starting to get at with the “itty-bitty” core talk.

Though, I do wonder if you have to be careful: juggling too many emotional elements, especially ones that act as odds or are simply miles from one another in terms of context, could create something that is more “turbid broth” rather than “clean consomme.”

…

Goddamn food metaphors again. They’re like termites.

– c.

@Will – My take is that trying to separate the characters’ emotions from the story’s emotions is disingenuous. If the two aren’t related to and feeding into each other, then you’re probably doing it wrong.

Empire Strikes Back might be a good example to look at, though. Since we’re talking Star Wars and all. I’d peg the emotional core of the story as a whole as “This shit just got REAL!” Luke has the emotional core of the student, culminating in the decision of whether to sacrifice his friends or his training. (The whole “you’re not my father” bit is really just setting up the arc for RotJ.) Han and Leia have the emotional core of the growing romance, and fears about what strings are attached to it. Lando has the core of deciding how much necessary evil he can stomach.

These all weave together to paint an overarching picture of people pushed to the edge, where they can’t just flow with the status quo. If one of the characters had, instead, had an emotional core of overcoming past abuse, it would have jarred with the whole. In skilled hands, it might have set up a clever counterpoint. But, it’s more likely that readers/viewers would have felt jerked back and forth as you went into and out of this incompatible storyline.

I thank you for writing this right now.

It kind of helps me understand that when something rings false to me in my own writing it’s because it’s a forced element that’s basically bullshit.

Back to the drawing board.

[...] Your Story’s Emotional Core (Hereby Known As: “The Emocore Story”) [...]

So simple in theory, and yet almost no one (in Hollywood, anyway) seems to get it. They keep thinking that CGI and other hollow Cool Stuff(TM) will make a movie. That only works when the CGI and Cool Stuff are so exemplary, so ground-breaking that it somewhat makes up for the emotion/plot (i.e. Avatar). Even in those rare cases, though, it’s still only “somewhat.” Your Star Wars example is a good one; the special effects are really old and really bad, by today’s standards, and yet people still go back and watch ‘em over and over again.

Your post reminded me of something I read in Orson Scott Card’s _How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy_: the human condition is paramount. He noted that it’s rare for books without any humans in them to succeed, and they only do when those aliens have the same emotions, condition, etc. as humans. We need something to connect to. I’ve greatly enjoyed terrible movies that have a character in them that makes me go, “Dang, that sounds exactly like me!” The rest of it doesn’t matter as much so long as I’m emotionally invested in that one character….

Wow. What a ramble. Sorry about that.

This is what I was waiting for, and while I had an idea, I wanted to see how you’d lay it out.

The human condition is so important, so vital, so exactly what separates a story I get and one that falls flat for me nine times out of ten. (Especially true when I’m doing a crit for someone else.)

Thank you.

@Krystal: While I think you’re right that a number of big budget films put The Wrong Stuff forward, I don’t necessarily think that it’s an indictment against the process. I think, for example, most of the writers out there probably get it — but, Hollywood is a business more than it is an art form, and further, relegates filmmaking and storytelling to committee. That works when it’s a good committee (see the recent io9 article about television writer rooms), and bad when it’s not.

Avatar, in my mind, is not at all the worst offender — it may not have always been effective, but I think that has a very clear emotional thrust, though for some it rings hollow (I didn’t mind the film, and enjoyed it for the most part). You look at what’s coming out of, say, Pixar, and you can be assured that Hollywood has its defenders of the emotional core — and those defenders can be the same people urging the SFX and process forward. (Heck, The Matrix was that.)

Hollywood gives us lots of stinkers, but it also gives us a bucket of gems, too.

Same with any creative industry, I guess.

Some are misfires. Some are misfortunes. Some are misappropriations of idea.

Still, we as individual storytellers can strive to go as far as we can with this process.

– c.

[...] talked in the past about a story’s “emotional core” (in a post where I also refer to it as the “narrative vagina”), but here I’m wondering if the emotional core has a core all its own — like the black [...]

[...] cardboard people jiggling on strings I pulled in time to stupid unmotivated plot moves. I read this post on Emotional Core by Chuck Wendig - profanity alert- on the plane, so it’s put it big in my [...]