Identity and Placing Yourself

In any story there's a baseline plot, correct? Whether it's a love story where firsts are experienced or a science fiction story focused on revenge, we can all spot some basic plot structures. We know the bad guys lose, the lovers get together, and that sometimes no one wins.

Even in the most fantastical of stories, we're able to identify with these basic plots and that lets us know subconsciously that we've seen this before - and we kind of like it.

What you may not know is that we can do this with characters as well. It's by following your characters that the reader becomes familiar with your story. In movies it might be that one guy thrust into the action and asks that question of "what the heck is going on?" that you yourself are thinking.

Here are four examples of characters that allow your audience to identify with:

1. Harry Potter: One of the best bits of the Harry Potter series is that we get to follow Harry from childhood. We get to see him experience the wizarding world and to be amazed by it. If Rowling had written the book from Ron Weasley's point of view (someone born to the wizard world), we wouldn't get the same experience of discovery at all.

2. Riley Poole (National Treasure): In the film National Treasure, it's obvious that the audience is caught having to rely on Riley Poole who has the role of sidekick. This means enduring the agony of hearing him complain about not knowing what's going on and repeatedly asking what Cage's character is talking about. Could his role as an identifying character be any more obvious?

3. The Joker (The Dark Knight): One of the best characters to let your audience identify with is the villain - in part for the reason that they don't want to. Take the Joker who talks about things as if we're all too caught up in them. What's wrong with a little chaos? Why do anything? He asks the fundamental questions of life and it's his job to make you want to choose bad. His role is a seduction.

So here's a suggestion to you. If your readers are confused, if they can't relate to your story, toss in that person they can identify with. But do be careful, this can be difficult. If your character is familiar with the situation, it would be arbitrary for them to just yell, "Hey, I'm about to put our shields up because they are force fields that can protect our ship!"

So please - spare us.