Congratulations!
Your MC has faced a great challenge. They have been tested and demonstrated that they’ve learned the lesson they needed to.
It’s time for their Reward, which can be an unexpected boon or something the MC has been struggling to achieve the whole time.
In either case, the MC and their pals get a moment to celebrate, to bask in their glory, to honor their fallen comrades, and to come to grips with what just happened before they move on to the next and final phase of the story (more on that in The Road Back).
But what makes a good Reward?
Should you just shower your MC with gold doubloons and call it good?
Think back to your MC’s starting conundrum. What they wanted verses what they needed. The Reward is most directly linked to what the MC needed. They may also get something they wanted if you’re a very kind writer. I prefer my little darlings suffer a bit more, but that’s just me.
Let’s look at some examples of Rewards and see how they’re tied to what the MC needed and/or wanted.
- ‘The Postman’ by David Brin
- Quick Look – A former Shakespearean actor poses as a postman to gain access to a safe community and finds himself leading the resistance to an authoritarian strongman intent on regional domination
- MC – Gordon
- Wants – A safe, quiet life
- Needs – A higher purpose
- Reward – A community, family, love and admiration for generations to come
- ‘Leech’ by Hiron Ennes
- Quick Look – The Institute, a collective of individuals controlled by a hive mind, sends a replacement doctor to a remote château to investigate the death of the previous Institute doctor and contain the parasite there
- MC – The doctor
- Wants – To find and destroy the parasite Pseudomycota
- Needs – To recognize and address systems of oppression and abuse
- Reward – A train ride
- ‘All Systems Red: The Murderbot Diaries’ by Martha Wells
- Quick Look – After ‘the incident’ a rogue Sec Unit has to pretend to be still under control while protecting their human crew from the threats of an alien planet and trying to catch up on their beloved entertainment serials
- MC – A rogue Security Unit AKA ‘Murderbot’
- Wants – To be left alone
- Needs – To interact with humans and learn to trust them
- Reward – A choice
Finding the right Reward for your MC can be a challenge. Consider whether they need a physical object, personal validation, or something else.
Writing exercise
Look around your vicinity and pick out three to five items. Write them down. Add three to five non-tangible things such as family reunited, a work promotion, that knowing nod from a revered role model or external validation, which can take a specific form such as a book contract or movie deal.
Flip the script. What are the bad versions of the items? What are the bad versions of the non-tangible things?
Write a starting scene where the MC has these bad versions. This is foreshadowing. Once you know the end you’re working toward in the story it’s easier to connect those points.
If you’re a plotter by nature, you’ll do this before you start writing or fairly early in the process.
If you’re the kind of writer who just sits down with a vague idea and a bundle of inspiration, great! But you’ll have to do this kind of work during the editing phase. Make peace with the fact that some stories meander and will require a lot of editing.
M. K. Martin 