Right and Wrong

Have you ever had those scary thoughts that tell you that Right and Wrong are not really concrete, established rules? After all, everything's relative and in the end, we're just people.

I love philosophy. I like to think of big questions that I couldn't possibly answer and wouldn't expect anyone else to either. It's fun to explore "what could be".

In YA books, normally all characters go through Right and Wrong dilemmas, but when I'm writing these scenes, it usually takes me forever to finish them because I don't really want to believe that these things are just black and white.

Don't be scared, I have a good moral compass. I was raised with a very strong believe system so I'm not like a sociopath or anything.

What annoys me sometimes when reading YA is that some authors take the Right and Wrong thing too far. Their characters will discuss what's Right and Wrong about everything. One specific situation really annoys me sometimes. One character wants to go off and save someone alone, but another group of people want to come along and the character says no, that it's not right for them to risk their lives.

If you ask me, that person just has a really big ego and needs to learn to accept help sometimes. The character still ends up with the other group of people usually, but why waste words on that silly situation? Nobody likes being alone in a danger zone, plus characters are only human. Sometimes they need to cross into the gray zone.

You know, sometimes authors include that situation in there for a reason. Perhaps their character is really stubborn and headstrong so they put them in that situation so that they can grow from the experience. That's okay by me most of the time.

We need to remember that our characters are not saints. Sure, we want them to be role models, but who says saints are? Part of being human is making mistakes and learning from them so that you can acquire that moral compass. Make your characters step into the gray zone once in a while.

You know who is a master at creating those gray zone situations? Ilsa J. Bick. Read her book "Drowning Instinct" and be astounded by the humanity of her characters. You'll learn a lot from her writing.

So yeah, I'm just saying...Remember that you want your characters to be good people, but also remember that they're human even though they're fictional.