Plot - Repeating Details
Perforations of a Paper Mind (A Writing Guide to the Aspiring Author)Details go a long way, especially when the same details are mentioned again.
A lot of readers out there love huge confessions, big skinships, and angst. They all love a climactic moment, and they love it when there's a ton of those. But sometimes they like the details. Sometimes, it's the details that get them.
What's even better are repeating details, which I will mention.
Repaeting details is a part of consistency. If you mention something significant in the early chapters, it's great to mention it again with a different point of view. This normally works best with long fics, since you have time to develop characters more. If you want a consistent plot, then make sure to tie up the details that are important to you. People don't normally get the feeling of satisfaction at the end of a story unless most, if not all, loose ends are tied. You could have a premise of a guy's unrequited love for a girl, and beneath that, you could have subplots: the guy is her current boyfriend's brother. It creates the setting that by the end of the story, you as the author can't simply tell the story of the guy getting the girl. You as the author are responsible for explaining why his brother got the girl, and not him.
Movies love repeating details. Wreck It Ralph, Inception, Monster's University, etc. I don't want to use movie examples too much for fear of spoiling anything for readers who haven't seen the aforementioned movies, but I think most people have seen Wreck It Ralph, so I'll use a part of that.
(Just for the record, Wreck It Ralph was an amazing animated movie and I cried. I'm a wimp.)
In the beginning of the movie, you see Ralph attending a support group with other 'bad guys'. At the end of each meeting, they're given something to say: "I'm bad, and that's good. I will never be good, and that's not bad. There's noone I'd rather be than me." Before, the way he said it was lackluster and annoyed. That didn't mean much to him. It was just something he said. But when it came to saving the arcade world, and he believed he had to sacrifice himself in order to save the lives of others, he said that same quote one more time, and this time, he meant every single word he said.
Because of that, he changes our perspective of the quote, because his own perspective of it changed, as well. Before, it was an anthem he didn't believe in. Later, it became his story.
I'm going to use examples from my stories.
In Entry 5 of Silver Heart, Emer explains how much she hated Luhan's smile. "I hate that smile. I hate it." Then, in Entry 17, her perspective changed. "I love that smile. I love it." It's a tiny detail, but it shows a great deal as to what has happened since the moment Luhan step foot in her house.
In the first chapter, Emer believed that Luhan, and even Hara, who was at least half human, didn't have hearts. She believed she was the only one with something genuine. Yet when we reach the end of the story, Emer acknowledges that Luhan definitely had a heart.
"He may not have been made human, but he lived human. I don't think being a human has anything to do with your make-up. I think it has to do with your heart. And if there's one thing that Luhan had a lot of, it was that. He had a heart."
Although having a heart was already a running theme in the story, reidentifying that small detail further enforced the idea that it isn't about simply having a heart that makes you human, but how that heart functions in a non-physical aspect.
In Ephemeral, Yongguk has the OC try jjampong. She refuses to eat it, and when she tries it, she still dislikes it. It isn't exactly something she enjoyed, but it was something she did with Yongguk. When Yongguk leaves and she and Himchan are busy reminiscing about their life when he was still present, she agrees to buy jjampong with Himchan. Doing it with Himchan isn't their way of forgetting Yongguk. It's their way of remembering and honoring him.
Here's another one. I think a lot of people really like this one, but I only get that impression because it's the one I've gotten most comments in when the story ended, LOL. Anyway, in Bad Boy, Kai does all kinds of things to the OC, like be a rude jerk, take her to the spot behind school, or park improperly. By the end of the story, Kai admits that all the stupid things were on purpose, and that parking improperly and doing it in front of the OC's car was intentional. It was his roundabout way of trying to reach the OC. Stupid, but that was part of Kai's personality, and he wasn't going to just tell her that he liked her.
Basically, pay attention to details! They go a long way in advancing your plot and tying ends. If you say something in the beginning that you believe is important, make sure you see through what you said, and repeat it again at a later time, whether it be the same words with a different perspective like Wreck it Ralph, or different words said in the same way, like Silver Heart. People love the big things. But sometimes, it's all about the little things.
Let me know if you have questions!
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