I definitely agree after having read it. It leads me to my next question. I’m not going to lie, there are multiple heart-wrenching moments for many of the characters. As an author, what is it like taking these characters you’ve created and love, and putting them through these situations that elicit a very emotional response from the readers?
There are a lot of different ways to respond to this. … On one hand, most of the times, since I’m an outliner, I’ve been able to see it coming for a long time.
So on one hand I don’t have the same sort of anguish that a reader might since I’ve had that time to get used to the idea that this is what this character’s arc is going to be, this is what is coming, and I’m prepared for it. Sometimes in the middle of writing you realize there is something (as an author) you need to do, and one response to it is an excitement, not because we’re sadists, but because as a writer as you’re creating a piece of art like this, and bringing it together, and something clicks where you say “Oh, that’s what I need to do” — the kind of moment of excitement, relief.
I’m not sure I can explain the feeling of satisfaction when these things come together, and a little bit of awe that the process is actually working. Every writer I know has this sense in them that yes, they’ve been able to write books in the past but is this actually going to work this time? Is this the time where it’s just not going to come together, and the book is going to fail?
There is always that worry.
And when a book is snapping together, even when it involves something really traumatic happening to a character, there is a part of you that is just so glad that it’s working, and so excited by how it’s working. Like I said, it sounds a little sadistic but often times the response is “ohhhh, that’s right, that’s absolutely right.”
… Then there is the sense that books are catharsis. Books are a way for us as human beings (to) learn to deal with trauma and emotion in a safer emotional environment, even though they can be heart-wrenching. … When you can elicit strong emotions in readers for things like this, it’s in a way, hopefully, what we’re trying to do — making it so that the person is able to cope with that better in the future when it happens in their own life.
There is this sense of — and maybe I’m over-inflating my own usefulness in the world — but this is one of the things we try to do actively as writers is come up with these powerful scenes and emotions just to give you a chance to feel that before it blindsides you, perhaps, in real life when it happens in a more real and much more powerful way happening to yourself, or to people around you.
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