Writing Roots

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, is a common element when writing fiction. Authors are known to put their characters through traumatic events or to give them traumatic backstories. It’s likely that your characters hasn’t made it through life without some event that could have caused them to experience PTSD. The difficult part, then, is writing the disorder accurately.

The most common elements to see in fiction are often the more rare or infrequent symptoms. They’re used because they’re dramatic. However, PTSD is more than just flashbacks. It’s more than just bad dreams. There are a lot of other daily habits and responses that are far more subtle which are part of PTSD.

In this episode, we talk about some of the common traits and causes, and how to best write PTSD into your story.

First aired October 24, 2022.

The post S36E7 – Dark Psychology: Writing Realistic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder appeared first on Writing Roots.

Imprisonment has a major effect on the minds of both the captives and the captors, which is important to remember when including this theme in your story. Not only are there plenty of fictional works which tell the tale of a prisoner and their life after release or escape, such as The Count of Monte Cristo or Les Misérables, but this idea of captivity is used as a subplot in many other stories.

When you choose to write captivity into your story, you’ll need to look at the psychological impacts. For the imprisoned, there is a major change in how they manage their own lives. They no longer have control over things as simple as choosing when to eat or when to sleep. For the impact on the captors, just look at the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment’s impact on normal students. The guards became sadistic within just a few days and the whole experiment had to end early because of the strong negative influence it had on both sides.

You also need to think of why you’re including this theme. Is it to tell the story of imprisonment like in the examples mentioned above? Or is your villain trying to get information out of a hero’s ally? Will their be torture involved? All of these things will change how you approach imprisonment in your story. Listen to this episode for a further breakdown of how and why to include this trope.

First aired October 20, 2022.

The post S36E6 – Dark Psychology: The Effects of Imprisonment appeared first on Writing Roots.

If you’re writing a thriller with a caretaker character, you may consider Munchausen Syndrome as a plot device. It’s when someone either pretends to be ill or even makes themselves ill in order to garner attention. This psychological disorder has been seen in several works of fiction, including The Sixth Sense, Supernatural, and even in It. In this cases, as is true for most cases used in fiction, it’s Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, where someone will make their victim ill for the same intent.

Because this is a psychological disorder, it’s important to write it carefully. In this episode, we talk about what it means, how it presents, what it’s not, and how to use it most effectively in your writing.

First aired October 17, 2022.

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Of all the topics we’ll talk about this month, brainwashing is the one with the least basis in reality. Certainly, brainwashing is absolutely a real technique and has been used in many wars and even cults. However, when most people think of this kind of mental manipulation, they think of various shows or books. They’ll think of something like Captain America: The Winter Soldier and the keyphrases to trigger the switch in Bucky’s mind in order to keep him as an obedient soldier.

In a way, this provides authors with a great opportunity to mold it to fit what your story needs. Like any writing advice or rule we talk about, however, it’s important to know what it really is before you bend it to your needs. In this episode, we talk about what brainwashing really is, the process, and share examples both realistic and fictional, to help if you choose to bring this piece of dark psychology into your writing.

First aired October 13, 2022.

The post S36E4 – Dark Psychology: Brainwashing in Fiction appeared first on Writing Roots.

When you’re building a backstory for your main character, it’s likely that you’ll include an Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE). Psychologists with the Centers for Disease Control have determined a list of ten things which qualify as an ACE, which can contribute to problems with mental health as an adult. The unique part of an ACE is that it is usually an accumulation of experiences rather than a single event that causes PTSD.

The responses to ACEs vary, which means you have an opportunity to use these in a variety of ways in your storytelling. Those who go on adventures are rarely those content with their lives. Characters with ACEs are likely going to deal more with things like depression and substance abuse, or even have physical health problems related to the heart and lungs.

Listen to this episode for the list of ACEs, and the possible impacts of each one.

First aired October 10, 2022.

As a reminder, we are writers, not psychologists. We took our time to research these topics and are handling them with as much care as possible. However, nothing said on this podcast should be used to diagnose yourself or anyone else. This is simply information given as a tool of storytelling.

The post S36E3 – Dark Psychology: Adverse Childhood Experiences appeared first on Writing Roots.

One of the more common types of abuse in fiction is a form of domestic abuse. It can range from physical or verbal, to psychological or financial. For many victims, abuse causes drastic changes in their daily lives, usually over time. An abuser will start slowly and with small things, until the victim no longer believes they can leave.

This episode is focused on discussing the psychology of both the perpetrators and victims. Any abusive relationship is a manipulative process. It starts with gaining trust, then getting the victim to rely upon the abuser. Whenever that trust is broken, the abuse frames it in a way to make the victim feel it was their own fault.

First aired October 6, 2022.

*Warning* This episode deals a lot with domestic abuse of all forms with as much respect to victims as possible. The same care should be taken when writing a relationship like this. If this is a sensitive topic, we suggest skipping this episode. If you are the victim of domestic violence, you can reach out to the Domestic Violence Hotline to get the resources to get out.

The post S36E2 – Dark Psychology: Writing Domestic Abuse appeared first on Writing Roots.

The human mind can be a dark and scary place, capable of much more evil than most people would even consider possible. As writers, we have a unique kind of permission to explore those dark crevices and bring them into the light of day. It can be the source of great inspiration not only for your villain, but for your storyline in general.

Unfortunately, because many of these darker aspects of human nature are all to real, it’s important to explore carefully within your fiction. Throughout October, we’ll be covering major themes regarding the evil capabilities of the human mind. As a warning, each episode will be talking about potentially triggering subjects, such as domestic violence, PTSD, imprisonment, and more.

In our first episode, we look at gaslighting. It’s a term coined by an early 20th century play in which the husband slowly convinces his wife she’s insane by messing with the gas lamps in the home. The perpetrator’s main goal is to exert absolute control over the victim by convincing them that they cannot trust themselves, and thus must trust the perpetrator. Common examples in fiction include the relationship between Mother Gothel and Rapunzel in Tangled, Dracula and Jonathan Harker in Dracula, and even Jim and Dwight in The Office. Listen for more about gaslighting and how you can use it in your own story.

First aired October 3, 2022.

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Few things throw readers off in a book like characters or objects suddenly teleporting in middle of a scene. We’re not talking about actual teleportation, which is more than plausible within fiction. We’re talking about blocking – a term borrowed from theater, used to describe the scripted motions of each actor with each other and with their surroundings. Bad blocking is when the author accidentally places a character at a doorway when seconds ago they were sitting on the couch, or when the physical choreography of certain scenes are simply too unrealistic. It can happen in fight scenes where a sword is accidentally pulled through a sheath because the author writes motions that aren’t possible with a real sword. It can happen when characters are interacting and accidentally reach through one another to grab something.

This problem is most often caused by a lack of attention, which is what makes it a big red flag for readers. If the author isn’t paying attention to the details of where characters are, then how much are they paying attention to the rest of the plot? In this episode, Ley and Leigh discuss the most common mistakes made when it comes to bad blocking, and the easiest ways to fix them.

First aired September 29, 2022.

The post S35E9 – The Confusion Caused by Bad Blocking appeared first on Writing Roots.

If you’ve been listening long enough, you’ve heard us tell you that clichés are a good thing. When applied correctly, they can help provide a framework for a character and even your plot as a whole. However, there is a fine line to tread between using these known elements to begin building your story, and using them to the point where it is just cliché.

The most egregious use of a bad framework for a character is to use the Mary Sue trope. That’s when the main character is, in the eyes of the reader, too perfect. A Mary Sue (or Gary Stu) fulfills the fantasies of the author, but usually feel bland and unrealistic. This isn’t the only trope or cliché that can be a problem. The list is much longer than we have time to cover. But there are things you can look for in order to spot a trope used incorrectly.

First aired September 26, 2022.

The post S35E8 – When the Cliché is Too Cliché appeared first on Writing Roots.

The last thing any reader wants is to be distracted while they’re reading. There are memes galore about it. What’s worse than someone deciding to talk to you as soon as you start reading, is the book itself becoming a distraction from the story. Many things can cause this, but it usually comes down to one thing: bad writing.

Anything from misspelled words and incorrect punctuation to words picked up in a thesaurus to tense consistency. Even the formatting of a book can be distracting if it was done improperly. Listen to this episode for a breakdown of the most common distractions in writing, and how they can be prevented.

First aired September 24, 2022.

The post S35 Bonus – Bad Writing Distracts from the Book appeared first on Writing Roots.