The Villain

Sup writers?

In this post we will be covering the villain in your story.

Your villain (or antagonist, the proper label for this character) opposes the goal of the protagonist (hero), as you probably know.

1. You must establish motive, even if it isn't obvious at first to the reader. Motive can be anything, from a broken family to aliens wanting to conquer the earth. However, as one author once said (paraphrased), "The most scary villains are the ones that we agree with." If we can logically follow their train of thought, and they believe that they are right, then that freaks me out especially. They are not your 6-year-old evil "bad guy." They are a twisted version of innocence.
2. Why did the villain clash with the hero? What happened to set them against each other, Is the villain attacking the hero's homeland? Were the two once best friends? Food for thought...
3. Optional: Give the villain something distinctive. Make him memorable. He needs to be separate; not cliche. Please don't give him an eye-patch, UNLESS it flips up and fires a small missile out of the socket. That would be cool.
4. Again, Optional: The villain usually overpowers or outnumbers the hero at first. But, that is up to you. If the villain is easy to beat, then that's boring. 
5. How can the villain manipulate the hero's emotions? This does not mean that the villain steals the grandma of the hero; that's a LITTLE cliche. But what can the villain do to our hero to play with his emotions?

All of these are optional; some are more optional than others. However, most, if not all, are good, and proven to work.

Before we leave, I have a small update: A couple projects are in the works, among which are:

• A PDF of 100 Writing Prompts (Free)
• A new book, called Floor 17
• A Pinterest Board for our community! 
• A condensed PDF of my blog (that will come later) 
• Miscellaneous projects, including my online art store.

I can't wait to show you guys; it should be awesome! Good night, and Epic Writing!  XD

An Update for You...

Hey again.
This is an update for you, and why I haven't been posting recently...

• The first two weeks because of graduation, and
• The past week and this week because of miscellaneous reasons,

But now I am planning to update this blog more often. I thank you for your patience.  :D

Plot Lines - Part 2

     So I don't have any excuse. I should have posted. I'm sorry. I do have a life, but this time, I have no excuse. So anyway,
     Hello, writers!
     In the last post, we went over plot lines. However, I want to stress something that I didn't go over last time:

• Interconnecting plot lines

     Let me show you what I mean:

     This picture (taken from Google Images) is a small example of an interconnected story-line between two people. A story is SO much more lifelike if it is interconnected. If you think about it, your life is not a single trial of events. Your relationships are not single trails of events. Instead, they all affect each other. A few examples would be:

• Your life is not a trail of single, unconnected events. Example: You may not see your coworker or get groceries every day, but they are a recurring relationship or "event" in your life.
• Your relationships are all interconnected. For example, Princess Lexi doesn't want her mother, the queen, to know that Princess Lexi is in love with the lower-ranking knight, when her mother wants her to marry Prince Dumbperson. (don't judge me - he couldn't take a hint) 

Don't you just love it when the author shows clearly how one piece of the puzzle involving story-lines is connected with the last piece? Take Count of Monte Cristo. (The movie sucked when it came to the interconnected elements in the book, but it's a start) That leaves me satisfied, when I can read the last page, and the whole story comes together.  :)