A Little On The Dark Side

No, I am not someone going all geeky over the new Star Wars Trailer (although I do admit some of the clips look really good). Today, I want to take a brief moment to discuss the element in your story known as the DARK MOMENT,

First of all, let's define that the dark moment is that point in the story where it looks like all is lost. Everything that the hero and heroine have fought for seems to be for nothing and the two will likely not get back together. It is that moment when you really yank the carpet out from under the reader and leave them thinking about what they might have missed and what they could potentially do to get the hero and heroine back together.

I tried to find the clip for this online but for now, I will have to leave it up to your imagination. If you are familiar with the 80's movie, CAN'T BUY ME LOVE. You have watched Ronald and Cindy fall in love during their "rental" period of the relationship. Ronald has changed and grown more confident. Cindy has let her guard down. And then, after that great romantic scene watching the stars, Ronald brings up that the rental period is over and it is time to break up and they need to plan it. That is a dark moment.

For you see, when you look at the devastation in Cindy's eyes, you see that everything that you worked hard for might not have been what it seems. The viewer of the movie is sitting there in shock wondering what they missed. They were sure the two of them would fall in love.

And then it gets worse. The fight scene at school is horrifying and emotions are high. But it gets even worse when the world finds out that Ronald was all a fake and that Cindy did indeed get "bought" for that period of time (this comes out when her boyfriend returns from college).

It is here when the reader has to wonder if there is any hope or any chance of getting them back together.

The reader does not want a quick fix. They don't want a fairy godmother to come swooping in and fix everything. They want reality. They want to see the hero and heroine fix it.

And they do. Because Cindy and Ronald have to admit two major things. A) they truly are in love with each other; and B) the harder of the two points, that they were wrong and shouldn't have done what they did.

Your homework? Go work on that dark moment.