I know it's good to make your character suffer but...
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I know it's good to make your character suffer but...
How much do you think is too much? :P In every chapter my two main characters just barely make it out of situations alive, sometimes doing some insane things that leave for really awkward moments, or they run into an enemy that just kind of plays with them until someone else saves them or one of the characters gets a good idea. But they just don't have a break. At first, I wanted to hurt them as it mean't for a good horror and such but now I kind of feel bad for them >.<''
Re: I know it's good to make your character suffer but...
Without really knowing the basic plot of your story, it's kind of hard to say, but it does sound like it may be teetering on too much. When I'm reading a book, I want to read more than just characters getting out of sticky situations because after a while it becomes redundant. Instead of making your character suffer new things every chapter, maybe split an event up into two chapters and develop the event a little more.
Re: I know it's good to make your character suffer but...
I agree with Booksntea in that a new event every chapter can get tedious. How much they suffer though, well that depends . . .
I use Dramatica Theory in my writing so there are some basic things that happen behind the scenes. All stories have a "story mind" that is trying to solve some kind of problem. The protagonist is one view of how to solve that problem while the impact character is a differing view on how to solve the problem.
In the manuscript I'm clearing up (two chapters ready for submission, more to finish the last revision), it was important that I didn't give the story mind an "out" at the end of the book. Without the impact character going through constant, tremendous suffering, then the protagonist view would have been correct. That's not the story I was writing. I had to set up the argument so the impact character's view was correct.
Long story short, it depends on the argument of your story whether or not the characters experience too much suffering.
Re: I know it's good to make your character suffer but...
I'm just going to add that if your characters are making it out of near-death situations every chapter, it's going to have the opposite effect you're looking for. The audience will stop worrying about them, because they've made it out every time so far; and they'll get less involved, because you just can't sustain that kind of intense excitement for ten chapters at a time. You need to give your characters--and your readers--a break to maintain tension, if that makes sense.