My husband and my mother share a birthday. A fun coincidence, and one that probably wouldn’t bother readers if I used it in a story.
But how about the time my son bumped into his former
teammate while waiting in line to visit the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam, 4,000
miles from their high school? It really happened, but I doubt readers would buy
it if they thought I made it up.
Some more famous coincidences might also strain credulity if
used in fiction, like the fact that Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died
on July 4, 1826, precisely fifty years after they declared American
independence. It’s almost too perfect an ending to their shared history.
Arguably, most stories begin with a coincidence. If Mr. Bingley hadn’t coincidentally rented a manor near the Bennet family, Elizabeth and Darcy would never have ended up together in Pride and Prejudice. If Bilbo Baggins hadn’t coincidentally picked up a ring, there would be no Lord of the Rings
But while coincidences to get characters into trouble are
great, says former Pixar storyboard artist Emma Coats, coincidences to get them
out of it are cheating. Her view echoes that of golden age mystery writer S.S.
Van Dine, famous for his “Twenty Rules for Writing Detective Stories,” who
insisted that the author must play fair with the reader.
Readers are willing to suspend a certain amount of disbelief
when it comes to fiction. They can accept a coincidence or two along the way,
but when a writer uses coincidence in lieu of convincing plotting, or as a lazy
way to solve a thorny issue, they are letting those readers down. One can’t
solve a mystery alongside the detective if the solution depends on an
unforeseeable fluke or some kind of implausible serendipity.
Amazing coincidences happen in real life, of course. But as
Mark Twain wrote, “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is
obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.”
How willing are you to accept coincidences in the fiction you read?
I tend to be skeptical of coincidences when I read, but last night made me wonder. Having just moved, I went to a prospective newcomers temple event. The membership chair, who I had talked to on the phone, welcomed me and turned me over to another member of the committee (my keeper/guide). As we talked, I discovered she had moved to Atlanta a few years earlier from California. When I asked from where in CA, she said I probably wouldn’t have heard of it but it was Southern California. Having a sister out there, I pressed her for more info. She finally told me the town she figured I had heard of. I said I had been there many times as my sister lived one town over. As I said the town’s name, she froze. Turned out not only was that the same town she came from that nobody ever knew, but as we developed our info bit by bit - they lived a block from each other … and when I told her my sister’s name, the woman not only knew my sister but they had been temple volunteers together and had driven carpool together for their youngest children. If I read it in a book, I would have said you can’t make that up and be believed.
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