Hey everyone, Abby here with another writing post! Today I’m talking about that one thing we all hate to love (and really love to hate) in our writing, and that’s prophecies.
What is a prophecy?
In any dictionary, a prophecy is just a prediction. In the writing world, however, the prophecy is often what sends the hero or your group of characters on some big journey to find the magical flower or defeat the Big Bad™. A good example of this in the fiction world is the Warriors series. This series was all about their prophecies, a few of which are below:
“Fire alone can save our Clan.”
“Before there is peace, blood will spill blood, and the lake will turn red.”
“After the sharp-eyed jay and the roaring lion, peace will come on dove’s gentle wing.”
(Can you tell I used to be a big fan?) For anyone who has read the Warriors books before, you know exactly what each of these prophecies means. But for anyone who hasn’t, there’s a lot of possibilities, right? This is the essence of a prophecy.
Do I need to include a prophecy in my story?
Nope! It’s completely dependent on the story you want to tell.
What are the main elements of a prophecy?
The main aspect of a prophecy is the foreshadowing it provides for your story. This is one of the most blatant ways you can tell your readers, “This is something that is going to happen in the story and I’m not outright telling you how it goes down yet.”
Look at the first prophecy on the list. What can you gather from that? There’s fire, and it’s going to save a Clan. That’s what you can get from the surface, and that’s the foreshadowing that carries throughout that first series. That’s what you know is going to happen, but you don’t know how; it’s giving you some information, but not enough that you lose interest in the story itself.
The second element is symbolism. Prophecies hardly ever say exactly what is meant (how much fun would it be otherwise?) and this is something you can play around with a lot.
In the second prophecy, the phrase “blood will spill blood” sounds… weird. Is that even possible? This is when we look further. We get the idea that someone is getting injured, but what does blood have to do with it? That’s where you bring your readers into the story; capture their interest and keep it. (The same concept applies to the third prophecy as well.)
The third aspect is vagueness. You have no idea exactly what’s going to happen when each of these three prophecies comes to pass. I’ve read a lot of prophecies that give exact information, like: “On the ___ day, ___ will get the ___ that they need to defeat ___.” Where’s the fun in that?
Look at the prophecy you have now. How vague is it? Ask someone to read it, then guess what’s going to happen. If they can tell you exactly what’s going to happen (or close), then you may need to rework a couple of things.
Incorporating Mood
The language of your prophecy will heavily affect the moods and the symbols conveyed. Maybe you want your prophecy to suggest that a girl needs to get a magical stone to defeat the evil king. The two prophecies I have below are meant to convey the same thing, but you’ll be able to see how the language and the mood affects the message.
The beholder of the stone shall unleash the power to send the dark crown toppling.
Or…
Yo, she’s gonna get the stone and just frickin’ send it, there goes the king.
They convey the same message but not the same mood. When you’re working with prophecies, the mood you’re writing with is going to play a lot into the reader’s interpretation, so that’s something you’ll want to keep in mind while you’re writing.
So, that’s all I’ve got for today! Prophecies are one of those things I love to hate so I had a lot of fun writing this post 😀 If there’s something you want to see me write about in my next post, please don’t hesitate to leave a message in my ask! Until next time, much love <333
Do an
outline, whatever way works best.
Get yourself out of the word soup and know where the story is headed.
Conflicts
and obstacles. Hurt the protagonist, put things in their way, this keeps
the story interesting. An easy journey makes the story boring and boring is
hard to write.
Change
the POV. Sometimes all it takes to untangle a knotted story is to look at
it through different eyes, be it through the sidekick, the antagonist, a minor
character, whatever.
Know the
characters. You can’t write a story if the characters are strangers to you.
Know their likes, dislikes, fears, and most importantly, their motivation. This makes the path clearer.
Fill in
holes. Writing doesn’t have to be linear; you can always go back and fill in plotholes,
and add content and context.
Have
flashbacks, hallucinations, dream sequences or foreshadowing events. These
stir the story up, deviations from the expected course add a feeling of urgency
and uncertainty to the narrative.
Introduce
a new mystery. If there’s something that just doesn’t add up, a big question mark, the story becomes more
compelling. Beware: this can also cause you to sink further into the mire.
Take
something from your protagonist. A weapon, asset, ally or loved one. Force
him to operate without it, it can reinvigorate a stale story.
Twists
and betrayal. Maybe someone isn’t who they say they are or the protagonist
is betrayed by someone he thought he could trust. This can shake the story up
and get it rolling again.
Secrets. If
someone has a deep, dark secret that they’re forced to lie about, it’s a good
way to stir up some fresh conflict. New lies to cover up the old ones, the
secret being revealed, and all the resulting chaos.
Kill
someone. Make a character death that is productive to the plot, but not “just because”. If done well, it affects
all the characters, stirs up the story and gets it moving.
Ill-advised
character actions. Tension is created when a character we love does
something we hate. Identify the thing the readers don’t want to happen, then
engineer it so it happens worse than they imagined.
Create cliff-hangers. Keep the readers’ attention by putting the characters into new problems and
make them wait for you to write your way out of it. This challenge can really
bring out your creativity.
Raise the
stakes. Make the consequences of failure worse, make the journey harder.
Suddenly the protagonist’s goal is more than he expected, or he has to make an
important choice.
Make the
hero active. You can’t always wait for external influences on the
characters, sometimes you have to make the hero take actions himself. Not
necessarily to be successful, but active
and complicit in the narrative.
Different
threat levels. Make the conflicts on a physical level (“I’m about to be
killed by a demon”), an emotional level (“But that demon was my true love”) and
a philosophical level (“If I’m forced to kill my true love before they kill me,
how can love ever succeed in the face of evil?”).
Figure
out an ending. If you know where the story is going to end, it helps get
the ball rolling towards that end, even if it’s not the same ending that you
actually end up writing.
What if?
What if the hero kills the antagonist now, gets captured, or goes insane? When
you write down different questions like these, the answer to how to continue the
story will present itself.
Start
fresh or skip ahead. Delete the last five thousand words and try again. It’s
terrifying at first, but frees you up for a fresh start to find a proper path. Or
you can skip the part that’s putting you on edge – forget about that fidgety
crap, you can do it later – and write the next scene. Whatever was in-between
will come with time.
*Blinks* I-I’m not the only one to call writer’s block needing to un-stick the story?
foxboylucien 