My Plot was Paper Thin Until I Added These 6 Key Characters, Pt. 1
How fleshing out your characters will broaden your plot in no time. (It was so long that I had to split it up!)
All writers have modest beginnings. I myself started by writing a five-page wide-ruled double-spaced story about a Brazilian parrot who spoke Spanish (no, I did not know that Brazil’s native language was Portuguese).
Just a month ago, I finished my first real novel. It was 100,000 words long and had a nicely fleshed out plot that kept me going.
However, you might struggle with small word count and chronic plot thinness. Don’t worry— I was and still am there. I have to push myself so hard at the beginning to be able to write a story that’s up to par.
Maybe you know the feeling? You have a great premise that you’re excited to write about, but when you finally sit down to actually write…
Somehow the amount of plot suddenly feels small. The words come out, but it doesn’t feel like there’s enough to write about. Imposter syndrome kicks in.
Never fear: I escaped plot burnout, and you can too.
6 Archetypes
There are six types in the “life cycle” of archetypal character arcs. While many don’t like to categorize their characters and stuff them into a box, I say that these are outlines that help us know just how to expand our characters so that it feels natural.
If your story has all six of these characters, then chances are you’re going to have a nice, thick plot with lots of subplots to keep it going and tie together at the end.
The Maiden
The Hero
The Queen
The King
The Crone
The Mage
Though these names seem gender exclusive, they aren’t. Another note is that each character has gone through the arcs before it. The maiden is the only one without an extensive backstory, and the mage is the only one that doesn’t have much future ahead for them.
The characters might have fall arcs (don’t know what this is? click the post linked just above the next heading), or they may have succeeded; it doesn’t matter. It creates story either way.
After the short explanation of the arc, I’ve included some examples of when these arcs appear in movies or books. I’ve done my best to keep to mostly the same stories so that you can see how different characters evolve, how multiple arcs can be found in the same story, and how that makes a good, sustenance-filled plot.
1. The Maiden
The maiden is the character that is the star of the coming-of-age story. This character is trying to break away from their mother and father and see the real world for themselves. Unfortunately, they have no idea what true responsibility is.
The main beats of the maiden arc focus on the maiden’s journey from a symbolic setting of the home to the real world, which is symbolically a village.
For example, in my novel, the main character has a maiden arc and travels from her sheltered home to the rough world of her great-aunt’s house, where she must learn to live without money and servants and to love and abide with work.
Their antagonist is the predator, who is trying to keep them back at home, and their protagonist is the protector, who is aiding them on their way to a broader form of knowledge.
The predator is often the bad guy that the maiden’s parents want her to marry, and the protector is the person she will most likely end up marrying. However, because the maiden arc is not just for girls, Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon is an excellent example of a masculine maiden arc.
Hiccup’s predator is in fact the prospect of having to be a dragon killer, and his protector is Toothless the night fury. One clue about the protector is that he or she does not arrive until after the predator has staked his claim. (Note: Hiccup doesn’t realize that being a dragon killer is bad until he meets Toothless. This is key.)
In Jane Eyre, Mr. Rochester is an artfully played character who is a predator at the beginning, and changes into a protector by the end. Keep this possibility in mind! Again, these archetypes are only prompts for your imagination.
Examples of maidens in stories:
Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon
Anne in Anne of Green Gables
Sophie Sheridan in Mamma Mia!
Sophie in Howl’s Moving Castle (but she’s also a crone— keep scrolling to find the definition for this one. It’s super artful!)
Harry Potter in The Sorcerer’s Stone
2. The Hero
The hero is one of the most commonly used archetypes. Many think of it as overused, but it is so classic to the fairy tale and to fantasy fiction (and often romance as well) that it saddens me to see it so ridiculed.
The hero is still inexperienced, but they want to discover the world. Like the maiden, they don’t know what true responsibility means, but they are willing to find out since they do know that it will take a lot of grit and determination.
The hero’s journey is the classic knight in shining armor story. Often the maiden’s protector, they are the one who slays the dragon and saves the damsel in distress from her high tower. He’s got the bravery to go out and follow his quest at the beginning, but they only gain the bravery to defeat the dragon by the end.
His antagonist is the dragon, either literally or figuratively; and his protagonist is the mage, often in the form of a mentor-type character.
For example, in The Hobbit, Bilbo must defeat the dragon Smaug, and they rely on the wizard Gandalf for advice.
The hero archetype may be very frequently used, but that doesn’t make it any less fun: the hero’s symbolic setting moves from village to kingdom, which is the perfect path for an adventure!
Examples of heroes in stories:
Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon 2
Howl in Howl’s Moving Castle
Frodo in The Lord of the Rings
Luke Skywalker in Star Wars: A New Hope
Hermione Granger in The Sorcerer’s Stone
3. The Queen
The queen has just defeated the dragon and taken their place as the ruler in their kingdom. Beside them may be the maiden they have rescued and married, who is now going to go through a hero arc.
The queen is archetypally linked to the maiden arc. The queen views the maidens as their children, though they may actually be subjects, pupils, etc. The queen’s worst fear is that these maidens might get out of the house and discover that the world is not just butterflies and rainbows like they think.
For example, Bob and Helen Parr from The Incredibles (1 and 2) don’t want to let Violet, Dash, and Jack-Jack get out and use their powers, because they know it’s dangerous and don’t think that their children will be able to handle the world.
Eventually, the queen learns that their children must go out on their own and learn from experience, not from warnings. A healthy queen can, by the end of the story, let go of their children for the good of the kingdom.
In my novel, my archetypal queen character is actually the hero’s little sister. She doesn’t want to let him marry the maiden, because she feels like she is letting her dead mother down by not protecting him. However, she learns that he can fend for himself, and he has actually made a very good choice in who he marries. (In this example, my queen’s child is a hero. Like I have said before, these are only outlines, not rules.)
The queen goes from the setting of the kingdom to the setting of the empire. Their antagonist is the invader, and their protagonist is the maiden, as already mentioned. The invader is the person or group of people that the queen is protecting their children from, usually a broader vision of the maiden’s predator.
Examples of queens in stories:
Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
Stoick the Vast in How to Train Your Dragon
Aragorn in The Return of the King
Bob and Helen Parr in The Incredibles 1 & 2
Harry Potter in The Order of the Phoenix
Next Time…
On Monday I will be sharing part 2, because as I was writing this post, I realized that it was far too long. Make sure to subscribe so that you can get the next installment!
Oh dear, that first paragraph made me laugh out loud. XD Alas, my problem seems to be having too MUCH plot, not too little. . . *stares dismally at 75-page brainstorming notebook and additional 25K worldbuilding doc with still no coherent outline*
You have no idea how happy it made me that you included Sophie Sheridan as a character example 😆