5 Tips for Writing Stories About Good vs. Good
“The best stories don’t come from ‘good vs bad’ but ‘good vs good.’” –Leo Tolstoy
It’s easy to know who you are rooting for in Star Wars or Harry Potter. The bad guy is the one in black with the menacing voice or creepy serpent-face. And while I love a good hero-villain trope as much as the next reader, the stories that have always enthralled me have been the ones where I am torn as to which side I’m rooting for because the answer isn’t clear.
(5 Moral Dilemmas That Make Characters and Stories Better.)
One of the first books I fell in love with was John Grisham’s, A Time to Kill. It was impossible not to have sympathy for the aggrieved father who heroically carried out the justice he was denied for his 10-year-old daughter who was brutally raped. And yet, what would happen to society if vigilante justice was tolerated? Another brilliant example was, My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult. How obligated was a sister, conceived for the purpose of being a donor, to continue to sacrifice for her sibling? There was no good or bad person in the story, just a whole lot of heartache and diabolical gray. And then there was the blockbuster, Me Before You, which forced me to consider what makes life worth living and who has the right to make that decision.
In my upcoming novel, Two Good Men, I address moral versus legal justice but with a twist. I pose the question of whether it is okay to preemptively eliminate a threat before a crime has been committed. Below are five essential factors to consider when writing a morally complex story of good vs. good.
1. Both Characters Need to Be Unambiguously Good and Sympathetic.
Choose your primary actors thoughtfully. There is no more important task than understanding who the story is about and conveying their motives and perspectives convincingly. This doesn’t mean they need to be perfect. (It’s better if they’re not. Flawed characters are far more interesting.) But it is critical that their backgrounds and circumstances are explained compellingly enough for their viewpoints to be understood.
Readers can see past shortcomings so long as they recognize why a character is the way they are and if they understand what drives them. Give insight into what makes them tick, why they’re doing what they are doing, and that what they’re doing is for understandable and compassionate reasons.
2. There Needs to Be a Real Dilemma in Which the Reader Is Torn Between the Two Sides.
Any good story has continuous conflict, struggle, and transformation. For a good-vs-good story to succeed, the two sides need to be pitted against each other in a face-off in which both perspectives are valid, true, and justifiable. That way, no matter how the story unfolds, there are dreaded consequences to what happens.
When one side wins, the other loses. Which means, regardless of who comes out on top, it hasn’t worked out wholly, and someone the reader cares about will have suffered. That constant tug of war is the driving pulse that compels the reader to turn the page. Ratchet up the struggle, and make your characters pay for their choices, then force them to witness the consequences, confront their decisions, and ultimately question their own point of view.
3. Be Objective.
Your job as storyteller is to present the characters and events in an honest and objective way. Embody each character equally and channel them without prejudice onto the page. The key to a successful good-vs-good story is for the reader to feel intensely for both characters and to be torn by the idea of only one being able to prevail.
Check out S. E. Redfearn’s Two Good Men here:
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4. The Characters Should Evolve to Understand the Other’s Views.
As the story progresses, both characters should grow and come to understand the other’s perspective. This creates internal conflict and the potential for a wavering of their conviction, even if they only admit it to themselves. The internal struggle is as important as the external conflict. It should not be easy for the protagonists to stay on course, and it should get more difficult as the story develops.
Raise the stakes and push the boundaries for what is right and how far the characters are willing to go to stand by their beliefs. Force them to make impossible choices that have morally ambiguous outcomes and then to suffer the consequences of those decisions.
5. Don’t Resolve the Dilemma.
Leave the reader to draw their own conclusions. The story is a shared journey, and each reader will experience and perceive it in their own way. Don’t impose your thoughts or opinions or prophesize or editorialize.
The thrill of a dueling tale of morality is that it makes the reader think and hopefully leads to lingering contemplation and meaningful discourse when it is done. If you’ve done your job well, there will be no clear answer only heightened perception of the question.
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