Happy Fall, dear readers!
I've been watching the weather all summer—anything to help my garden grow and flourish. And I've read on my phone plenty of news reports on severe weather occurrences. Take your pick: wildfires or floods, hurricanes or searing heat—the catastrophes are running as rampant as the pumpkins in my pumpkin patch.
That got me to thinking about writing a thriller, but not just any thriller: one that pits character against nature.
I went looking for inspiration and advice and found plenty. The character vs. nature category was previously called man against nature. It's one of three main kinds of conflict a writer can use in creating a story, the others being character vs. character, and character vs. themselves.
At NowNovel [https://www.nownovel.com/blog/man-vs-nature-conflict-in-fiction/ ], I dug into the nature aspect and learned that while Nature can be a storm or other weather event, it can also be an animal (or a monster). Think of the shark in Jaws. Or the alien in, well, Alien.
I learned that this conflict type is often seen in dystopian novels, in which society or the lack thereof can cause the challenge for the main character. "Nature" can also be a virus that wreaks havoc on a population; need I say more . . .?
NowNovel offers great advice on how to craft a compelling tale using this approach to conflict. One tip is to reveal the conflict a little at a time. If the challenge is a storm, for instance, the main character can be presented with signs (darkening sky, radar warning, a funnel cloud, etc.) that the severe weather is drawing near.
Over at storyboardthat [https://www.storyboardthat.com/literary-terms/character-vs-nature ], I gleaned other ideas for what form Nature could take: earthquake, drought, or even a disease like cancer. It's a force that the protagonist has no control over. Some experts lump the idea of a person's "fate" in with Nature, since it too can't be controlled or stopped.
At the movie site Shadow and Movies [https://www.shadowandmovies.com/the-most-difficult-type-of-conflict-man-against-nature-jurassic-world/ ], they said this type of conflict was the most difficult to do well in film. (Not sure about books and short stories, so maybe I'm safe.) Their big tip is that Nature must have a major role in order for this type of conflict to work. In movies, this often means it's a survival film—think Titanic or North Face. They also argue that unless you are writing (or filming) paranormal, you must follow the laws of physics (and nature) when writing your scenes or you'll lose your audience. A human, for instance, can't outrun a healthy lion.
Kristin Lamb [https://authorkristenlamb.com/2012/04/man-against-nature-how-to-make-it-work/ ] points out that this type of conflict often also brings in other types of conflict as the protagonist battles Nature: character against character and character against themselves. The opposing views of the sheriff (close the beaches) and the mayor (keep them open) in Jaws shows the former. And the starvation facing the Uruguayan rugby team in Alive shows the latter.
Now that I had the conflict nailed down, it was time to look at how to write the thriller itself.
At MasterClass [https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-write-a-bestselling-thriller-novel#quiz-0 – ], I could pay for a full course on how to write one, but the free link offered the basics: six elements of a thriller novel. They are a clear threat, high stakes, twists, dynamic characters, memorable locations, and action. Check, check, check, check, check, check.
Adding to that, Reedsy [https://blog.reedsy.com/how-to-write-a-thriller/ -] gave me seven heart-stopping steps to writing a thriller. I learned that a thriller has more driving action than suspense, which seems to be a good fit for featuring severe weather. Perhaps a hail storm that flattens my asters?
Turning to a real pro, I read a post on Literary Hub [https://lithub.com/ian-fleming-explains-how-to-write-a-thriller/ ] in which Ian Fleming explains how to write a thriller. In part, he says: "There is only one recipe for a best seller and it is a very simple one. You have to get the reader to turn over the page." Easy to say, harder to do, I think.
I had to let the editors have their say as well. The New York Book Editors [https://nybookeditors.com/2019/07/how-to-write-a-thriller/ ] weighed in with this advice: The reader must follow the protagonist between risk and reward. Got it!
But enough reading on the subject. It was time to watch a video. Alexa Donne [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymjt75htlAw ] led me through how to set up beats in a thriller.
Now I was nearly ready to put fingers to keyboard and crank out my story. I knew I wanted a weather event as the focus. For more specifics on what to include, I turned to the severe weather section of ready.gov [https://www.ready.gov/severe-weather ]
And finally I dipped into the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration site [https://www.weather.gov/safety/tornado-survivors ] for their tornado survivor stories.
Before I get swept away by all this, I'll wish you happy writing!