I just finished a really well written and beautiful story called Pet by Akwaeke Emezi. The story takes place over a 48 hour period and the book does not have terribly many scenes. Instead we are taken on a journey through the world and lives of the character and it comes to life in such beautiful images that you forget that the story itself is not action packed. In short, the plot is no hero’s journey. It takes a few steps from start to finished. Yet I still felt fulfilled. I also felt bothered. I focus a great deal on plot and this is not that. More and more I discover that plot doesn’t have the value to readers that it once did. I can therefore argue that people are increasingly drawn to compelling characters and the voice that creates those characters.
Emma Donoghue’s Room comes in at 337 pages and, well, it takes place in a room. Still, there is more plot there than in Pet and somehow I felt closer to the characters in Pet through their moments than I did to the characters in Room who were experiencing trauma so vivid that it became a movie. Pet is unlikely to be a movie in the way that there are certain books and stories that Gaiman writes which will never jump to the screen. Those are the character stories. However, I want to find a way to do both. Can you tell a deeply character driven story but still have an extensive plot–a telling of events that are layered in significance building to a climax but also taking the character on a ride that has several powerful stops along the way?
I guess what I am saying is I am good at making up plots and decent at layering in twists and turns, but does any of that matter to readers as much as character? Plot is supposed to be what happens to characters, but in fact what we notice more is how they react to their world. Perhaps that is what we are trying to learn, experience, and even recognize of ourselves in our reading of them. That is not about plot. I believe it is time I grabbed hold of that understanding.