Published on: 14 Dec 05:59

Susan asks

I'm plotting a romance novel and I'm trying to think of something disastrous happening between my two leads. I've already had a bratty ex accosted them. What do?

My answer

How about ... ah, I've got a few ideas:

They're both hardcore authoritarian Stalinists, but met each other at the most groovy, laid-back libertarian rural commune you can possibly imagine, with ALL drugs free and legal as the Market intended, and I do mean ALL. Both loathe and despise this, so independently sneaked in, with fiendishly cunning disguises as right-wing libertarians, to undermine and obliterate such bourgeois filth from within.

Both met whilst both high as fucking kites, fell in love, fucked, fell in love more deeply, fucked again, then got plastered still further on both Adderall and mescaline to maintain their groovy-liberty facades. They're both terrified of being FOUND OUT by the wider commune, and feel they must take all the drugs in the universe, constantly, or their blitzed neighbours will start asking who are these uptight squares, are they the Filth or something?

Both are also terrified of endless drug tsunamis dissolving their focus and their masks and their beloved counterpart discovering their stalwart Stalinist hardcore ideals and losing the man and/or woman of their dreams.

They can't stay hammered! They can't not stay hammered! Both are internally panicking. Both are desperate to destroy their hated libertarian commune, yet Be With their beloved.

How? Easy peasy. Take the other hostage. Makes sense when you're sozzled. And all true Stalinists are armed to the teeth with Kalashnikovs. Right? Right?

The story's third act begins when both leads interrupt a particularly screechy group rendition of "Ron Paul Makes Me Foggy In My Soggy" and, independently and simultaneously, both brandish AK-74s and scream to the commune their genuine Stalinist loyalties, and they'll blow out the brains out of this other corrupt bourgeois scumbag unless the entire gathering hands over to them its remaining three tons of cocaine.

Bah Needs a ton of polishing. But there's a pair of decent-ish character arcs in there somewhere.

Source: https://www.facebook.com/groups/393804108644865/po...