Why They Fail the First Time

Last week, Deep Lurker asked: If they [the characters] failed the first time, then why didn’t they fail the second time?

Why does anyone fail to get things right the very first time they try something? Because they tried the wrong thing, the wrong way, at the wrong time, with the wrong tools or the wrong skills or the wrong person – all at once, or one at a time. Why do they succeed on the second try (or third, or fourth)?

Because they have learned from their mistakes.

This is difficult for some authors to get their arms around, especially if they have a clear vision of the main problem and its solution from the very start. The solution is, to an omniscient author, so extremely obvious and logical that they can think of no good reason why anyone would try anything else. So they complicate and recomplicate the problem, until it is clear that their original, obvious solution will fail on the first try…only then they have no solution at all.

But even the most autobiographical wish-fulfillment characters aren’t as omniscient as this kind of author. They don’t know where the story is really going (though they often think they do). So why would characters try the wrong thing, or grab the wrong tool, or hire the wrong person, or make any other fundamental mistakes?

1. The characters don’t have the right information.

The characters may be relying on old data. Things have changed: the bridge washed out, the high-level contact was fired or died, the lab just ran out of dilithium crystals. Or, the characters may not have the right information because they’re trusting a source who is actively trying to mislead them – a spy or counter-agent, or just someone out to further a different agenda. Or they may not have all the information they need because it’s hard to find or apply – it took years for the Manhattan Project to get to a workable atomic bomb. Or they may not even know, at the start of the story, that they need it, which brings me to:

2. The characters have misidentified the problem.

A modern-day detective who’s investigating a body found in an alley with a torn-out throat is most likely going to think “Feral dogs.” or possibly “insane serial killer.” They aren’t going to start with vampires or zombies (unless we’re already in an alternate universe where those are obvious, known possibilities). If the problem is really a vampire, of course they’re not going to get the solution right on the first try. When you think you’re after a feral dog, you’re not going to bring the right tools to handle a vampire; indeed, unless you’re a fan of fantasy or horror, you may not even know what the right tools are for handling a vampire. Their first failure to solve the central story problem happens because they are trying to solve the wrong problem. (Frequently because of #1, but just as often because they jumped to an incorrect but plausible conclusion about what the problem is.)

3. The problem is much larger than the characters realize at first.

This can be an extension of misidentification. The characters’ sheep are going missing, and they’ll starve without them. So they set off to kill the wolves that are taking them. Only it isn’t wolves; it’s bandits…who turn out to include spies from the country next door that’s planning an invasion. The characters still have the problem of surviving the winter, but getting their sheep back won’t help if they can’t stop the invasion. In other words, the characters’ “first try” at solving the problem is aimed at something that turns out to be only one small piece of a larger problem that is the true central story problem.

4. The characters initially don’t have the right tools and/or the right skills to solve the problem.

The characters need to crown the true king, which means they need the actual royal crown, which they don’t have. First they have to find out where it is, then get their hands on it. The protagonist has an ancient tablet with the location of the treasure on it, but they don’t know the language and therefore can’t read it. The first “try” at solving the problem is their attempt to get the right tools or learn the right skills (or recruit someone who has them). In other words, the “first attempt to solve the problem” may not be a direct attempt on the central problem, but an attempt to collect tools, people, skills, or information the characters will need to tackle the main problem. Which can easily be harder than the characters expect.

Then there’s 5. Someone is sabotaging the characters’ efforts.

This can be a villain/antagonist, a misguided good guy, or someone who messes things up by accident. The characters may know from the start that they are up against the villainous Mr. X, or they may not realize until halfway through the story that their efforts are failing because Y keeps interfering.

And there’s always 6. The central story problem is big enough/hard enough that it will take a whole novel for the character(s) to solve it.

This covers pretty much every survival story there is, whether it’s Robinson Crusoe castaway on his island, Jack London’s heroes trying (and sometimes failing) to survive an Alaskan winter in the bush, or Mark Watney trying to survive on Mars long enough to be rescued. It also covers most disaster novels and disaster-prevention novels, as well as many medical mysteries (the kind where the scientists are racing the clock to find a cure for the latest plague).

Finally, it may be more productive to look at the generic plot skeleton less literally – instead of “They try and fail” as the second step, try thinking of it as “They try but something goes wrong” or “They make progress, but then there’s a setback.”