Storytelling: Do You Remember The Ripple Effect?

Eight years ago I wrote a blog titled “The Ripple Effect in Storytelling.” Recently, I was reading a novel by a seasoned author who failed to remember the ripple effect. It was so disconcerting, I not only stopped reading the novel, I also decided it was time I revisited the topic.

What’s the ripple effect, you ask?

It’s the consequences that ripple out from story action. Imagine a pebble tossed into a pond, it hits the water and then ever widening ripples reach out to touch more area than the pebble itself touched.

Instead of a pebble, think of a story element. For example, your main character is hiking through the woods and trips over a log and injures a shoulder. From that point forward, the injured shoulder must be included with that character until such time as the shoulder has healed.

The hurt shoulder is the pebble. Rippling out from that injury are consequences: the pain, inability to use the shoulder as one should, wearing a brace, or other characters remarking on the injury. These ripples, or consequences need to be part of the story.

Looking Deeper into the Ripple Effect

Now let’s look at the word consequence. It has two meanings: something that can be the result of an action or condition. Think outcome or repercussion or aftermath. Consequence also means importance or relevance. Something that can be the result of an injured shoulder might be the main character’s inability to climb a fence and escape the bad guys. Then, the outcome or repercussion could be that the bad guys catch the main character.

What triggered my need to revisit the ripple effect? In the story, a residence incurs an explosion and subsequent fire. Although the house wasn’t completely demolished, there was of course the usual debris from an explosion and the resulting fire. And the water damage caused by the fire department dousing the fire. Think soot, ash, water damage, and the smells associated with burning a house and its contents.

Scene is Set, Now What?

The next morning, two story characters enter the house via a rear entrance and go into the kitchen. The description of the scene includes “a layer of soot had settled on every surface.” On top of the smells of an extinguished fire, we now have soot covering every surface. This does not stop one character from pulling out a kitchen chair and sitting at a table or 2) putting a file on the table top.

Where’s the soot? Where’s the ashes?

I went back to make sure I had read the scene description correctly. Why didn’t either character comment on the soot that “layered every surface”? Not once did the character who sat on the chair mention soot.

Not only did the characters fail to comment on the soot, what are they doing in the house at all? There’s was no mention of any fire official authorizing entry to the house. Nor did the characters seem concerned with the health risk of inhaling soot or ash residue.

Where Were the Ripple Effects?

There were no ripple effects from the explosion and fire. It happened, the characters went into the house, had a nice sit down in a soot covered chair, sat at a soot covered table and proceeded to study the contents of a formerly clean file folder.

As you build your story scenes, think about the consequences of what you write and how it impacts the characters. Don’t leave your readers wondering why a character had no reaction or thoughts about a soot covered chair.