The Harry Potter Alliance

Meet the Bloggers: Weird Question Weekly

In the spirit of getting to know your bloggers better, we will be answering a string of sometimes serious, sometimes silly questions in the coming weeks. Please feel free to ask us something in the comments. We want to tell you what you’d like to know!

Question of the week (from Alex): What is your favorite aspect of a story – for example plot development, writing style, etc?

Anna: My favorite aspect of any story – be it novel, TV show, movie, etc – is always character development. It fascinates me to see characters transform over the course of a series or movie, but for it to be truly successful, it has to make sense. It has to feel like it’s real and natural. My favorites for character development are both Willow and Cordelia from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Cordelia moves past her popular high-schooler persona and becomes such an engaging character, fully coming into her own in the Angel spin-off. As for Willow, we see her experiment with who she is and what her interests are, from computer hacker to witch and so on, and while she has huge stumbling points in her life, she still becomes her own person, rather than just “Buffy’s Sidekick.”

Kara: Without a doubt, my favorite part of any story is the characters. I’ll read anything if it has strong, interesting, believable characters. I want to read about characters that come alive on the page, characters that stay with me long after the books is finished and back on it’s shelf. I want to read about complicated characters that keep me guessing, and makes me think. That said, I also adore writing style. I read a lot of authors like F. Scott Fitzgerald simply for the way their words sound, and how they make you feel. That’s the magic of writing.

Emily:My favorite part of the story is the inciting incident. It is the starting point for all the action, emotion, and drive behind the story. Often, metaphors or flashbacks start from the inciting incident- Titanic’s stern scene or each first glimpse in Twilight are good examples. Obviously the boa constrictor scene in HP starts the journey to magic in the series. Bring me that inciting incident!

Erin: As a writer, this is a REALLY tough question for me to answer, because I deeply appreciate (and stress over) every possible aspect of a story. But if I have to choose…it’s a tie between character development and plot structure. I love these aspects most probably because they’re the things I stress over the most in my own writing, so when I see them done well, I can’t help but greatly appreciate them. Character development is so important to just relate to the story–it’s so important to know why everyone is doing what they’re doing, and it’s incredibly difficult to place that development gradually throughout the story. Likewise, plot structure–including foreshadowing, which I’ll admit I get a little fangirly over sometimes–is so exciting to me in the nerdiest possible way. I love reading a book and getting completely sucked into the story and fascinated with the mystery and staying up way too late at night wondering what on earth is going to happen next.

Quinn: I think more than anything, what I appreciate in a good story is a deep, interesting, and well-thought-out world. There are some quite popular series or books that I just can’t seem to get into because there are huge holes in the world, or things that I just can’t seem to get over. For example, one TV show that my best friend loves I just can’t seem to get into because I keep wondering why they don’t just destroy all of the things that are making a weekly apocolypse instead of just hiding them away. It’s never really explained. I’m the nit-picker. I’d like everyone to take the time to really get to know their world, and put together the political, social, and economic structures of that area.

Finally, a huge thanks to Alex for our question this week! Got a question for the bloggers? We’d love to hear it! Leave it in the comments below, and we’ll answer it next week.