Need help creating a plot that involves a female lead that isn't into watching sports

I think someone that didn't play sports did something mean to him once

 

You think I can reply to every response everyone has given me? Sorry, I can't. But I've read everything. It's taking a while to consider your proposals.

But please, a storyline where the FL doesn't win anything or saves people is dumb. Anyone planning to make those kind of suggestions should stop and avoid posting here.

And SashaMerideth, if you think that I am not listening, maybe you should avoid this thread because I am. Do you expect me to take EVERY reply into consideration?

What more do you need to have evidence that I am reviewing your proposals?

 

Given that you have stated that
1. Saving people takes no effort
2. Anything that does not involve winning something is dumb

You have evidently been reading. Thus far you have stuck blindly to your preferencses and your prejudices. You are no better than those drunken slobs that sit around in a sports bar cheering for your favorite team while wasting their lives away. We want you to be better than that. Open your eyes and sober up. Anything sports related is quickly forgotten by everyone except the losers that base their entire life around sports. If you want your female lead to out achieve your male lead, sports just won't do the job.

 

Winning and sports do not have to go together. Winning can happen without sports. Sports? Not needed for winning. Winning? Does not require sports.

"Winning" can involve contests in science, or music, or the arts, or many other things. Are you aware of that?

Answering that question, which I have asked several times, would help as evidence that you are reading some of the responses.

But for that matter, why don't you just give up on this plot and _have her win a sports contest_? It appears that you are truly unwilling to consider the world outside sports in any way whatsoever, so if you're not willing to consider it, why even try? Why address a part of the human experience (that is, the entire human experience outside sports) that you have such a very, very strong resistance to thinking about or attempting to understand?

Yes, if you want to be a writer, you will someday have to think about the human experience outside sports, but it's clear that you really, really don't want to do that right now. So why not wait until you're ready?

ChickenFreak

 

Thanks ChickenFreak. I know there are many competitions. But how does this sound? Perhaps she can win some kind of competition where most winners go unnoticed but dominates it so well (making all the other competitors look like amateurs) that she improves its popularity. If you haven't noticed, the people who grab the headlines most of the time are celebrities, politicians, and superstar athletes. She could join them by dominating some kind of activity and show her expertise at it.

Think of how Bobby Fischer heightened the popularity of chess back in the 60s and 70s. She could do that to some other activity that's doesn't grab headlines. Perhaps basket-weaving or something like that. And because of her uncanny expertise, she becomes a celebrity.

It's very hard to have her achieve "celeb" status when only talentless reality stars, Disney stars, pro athletes, and politicians grab the headlines.

 

Seriously, OP, just write whatever you wanna write. The whole idea of a novel centred around winning a competition is, it appears, relatively unpopular on this forum. It could still be a good idea if it were a teenage novel perhaps, as I've read one or two like that.

The fact that you think a story where the MC doesn't win anything is dumb, and that saving people don't take effort sorta worries me, but hey, what the heck eh.

But either way, you don't seem all that open to new ideas or a new way of seeing things - you have your own vision for this novel, and that's great - so for goodness' sake, just write it.

Instead of bumbling on here, why don't you go grab a few novels that are similar to what you wanna write and get studying how they went about it? Might be more helpful.

 

To be honest I can't name too many sports stars. Can however tell you many authors, artists, academics, historians, archaeologists, broadcasters etc. Why not get her to win something that allows her to become a reporter. Maybe she could win the Pulizter Prize, the Turner Prize (I can name several winners of that), a Nobel Prize, the Booker Prize, or if she is British she could receive a DBE or higher. All will get her recognition that she can captitalise on.

It all depends on what you value how famous people are. I knew who John Barrowman was before he went into Dr Who and Torchwood because I had seen him in Sunset Boulevard, Beauty and the Beast and a Panto. His rear stood out lol The people who you don't think of as famous can be massive in their own circles and actually receive as much attention as a result.

Whereas I couldn't give a monkey's about England winning the ashes or who the captain was.

 

Basketweaving? I really have to take this fishhook out of my mouth. But here I go again anyway:

And why is achieving "celeb" status important?

GatorLover, you are falling in with the idea that the only thing that matters is something that grabs headlines and attracts the attention of every single human being who has a television or passes a newspaper box. In your case, you seem to be saying that the reward of mass publicity should go to the truly worthy, but you don't seem to be questioning, even for a moment, that that reward is the highest reward that one can aspire to. And... it's not.

Is that the lesson that you want your story to tell? "Don't bother being a lifesaving doctor or a writer that changes the face of the American novel, dear; you'll hardly ever get to be in the papers! Change the face of basketweaving, instead!"

There are thousands, tens of thousands, an infinity of major accomplishments that a human being can make, and most of them are not going to grab front-page headlines.

And, by the way, there are plenty of people that _don't read the sports page_, so most sports accomplishments are among them. I couldn't name a single football player, and neither could a large percentage of my friends. You think that pro athletes are important, because you read that part of the paper. But that's your individual point of view. Other people's individual points of view think that things like book awards or art awards or, oh, the Nobel Peace Prize, are important.

Your story seems to be based on the idea that (1) your character must have a major accomplishment and (2) the whole world must know about that accomplishment through the mass media. (1) is fine, but (2) is a strategy pretty much doomed to failure. In a movie, with a lot of stirring soundtracks and expensive sets and wind blowing through your character's hair, that _might_ work long enough to get people out of the theater without demanding their money back--though the movie would still probably have to be a comedy. But it's not likely to work in writing; it's just too shallow to carry a plot.

And, heck, for that matter even a crowd-pleaser like _Legally Blonde_ thought that getting through Harvard Law was enough of an accomplishment, even though the Blonde didn't get in the papers. _Legally Blonde_ had a deeper plot than the one that you're proposing--substantially deeper. Please think that over.

A story with the goal of demonstrating that celebrity should be awarded to the "right" people is a story with, IMO, a really shallow goal--and an impossible one, because there are too many deserving people for all of their names to become household words. And a story with the goal of demonstrating that only a celebrity girlfriend is worthy of a boyfriend who's a sports star has an even shallower goal.

Sports are very important to you. Celebrity (at least among sports fans) is a big part of professional sports. It appears that in your effort to at least glance at the world outside sports, you're taking the values of pro sports with you, and demanding celebrity in other areas of life. But that demand just doesn't fit. You're showing a major lack of respect for those other areas of life by demanding that they follow the values of pro sports.

I've tried suggesting things that would work with your plot structure--for example, she could write a bestselling book. (The author of Eat Pray Love is extremely famous.) But I'm realizing that your plot structure simply doesn't hold up. It's based on "celebrity" as a major value, and celebrity simply isn't that valuable.

ChickenFreak

 

Thanks ChickenFreak. It's been a week, but I guess nobody here likes my proposals.

However, let me say one thing: the idea of having her save people is so stupid that it makes winning a beauty pageant look like the best of ideas. If anyone offers suggestions to me next time, please don't offer those kind of suggestions because that's just stupid and would never fit with any of my stories.

Anyone suggesting that my female lead save others is a dumb, worthless, incompetent writer incapable of helping anyone or writing captivating stories.

 

Delightful.
Hey MisterOz, I often scan the birthdays on the front page to see if good wishes might be passed on to a familiar or regular user. Remiss of me not to congratulate on your twenty-seventh bithday t'other day. 27 eh!

 

Excuse me, but I think you just insulted me. If you go back to read my post (quoted below) you will see that I had ONE sentence that suggested saving other people during a natural disaster. You latched onto that and kept repeating it. I never repeated it, and I don't think any one else suggested it. I made the suggestion taking into account that you said your character has asthma. I know people with asthma often have attacks when they get excited. So for a person with asthma to stay calm enough to help other people during a time when she is fighting to breathe takes a lot of courage and fortitude.

You asked for suggestions. Sometimes you may get suggestions you don't like, but no one is forcing you to use those suggestions. It didn't bother me that you didn't like that suggestion or any of the others. You are free to write your story any way you want and have your characters do whatever you want. But when YOU ask for suggestions, you have no right to disparage those who make suggestions that you don't like. I won't get into a name calling match with you. Life is too short. Good luck with your writing.

 

I am not too concerned. He has insulted everyone that has contributed to his thread. When prospective publishers tell him he needs to make changes, he will insult them as well. Until his attitude changes be will likely stay as one of the unpublished and we can only hope that he either gives up or chooses a different methodology.

 

That was extraordinarily rude. I see no reason to continue responding to your posts.

ChickenFreak

 

1. I don't understand why someone with asthma can't compete in sports. I have asthma, and I'm on a roller derby league. Which brings me to...

2. You should have her win a roller derby national championship.

Of course, that's probably a really stupid idea, and I should probably just avoid posting in this thread for being such a ridiculous person and thinking that the ideas you've given so far aren't good ones. But I just couldn't resist suggesting roller derby.

 

WITCH!!!

OK sorry I just had a powerful urge to say that.

Yeah because women belong in the Kitchen and should be making me my sandwich!

So now that I got the obligatory Sexist joke out of the way.

I have to ask. How exactly does me or anyone suggesting your female lead saving others make them a dumb, worthless, incompetent writer that is incapable of helping others or being able to write a captivating story? or something. You know that sorta sounds a bit redundant.

 

Is MisterOz a very persistent wind up merchant or someone really in need of a wake up call? It's difficult to know the difference sometimes.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I feel like these 'winning achievements' are pretty shallow. What is more important is that you can write a sympathetic character who is relatable and 'human' with vulnerabilities and strengths.

Maybe you have reached the stage where you think that winning a sporting competition is the highest possible human accolade and deserving of the most praise.

I'm afraid you're in the minority. In fact, the kind of attitude where physical prowess and genetics is the pinnacle of what it means to be a human being, is a bit, repugnant. There have been times in history that we've seen the ugly side of this. But I won't get into that....!

 

I've been choosing to assume the second, though the first has seemed far more likely all along. But now that he's become uncivil, I've lost interest in giving him the benefit of the doubt.

ChickenFreak

 

Wow...my cousin has been at the top in a few beauty pageants and she's like...16. It's not idiotic at all.

Oh yeah, I know that was the first page now, LOL. I support the beauty pageant idea if you want to go that route, though.

 

I know all of you don't like me, but I've mulled more ideas over. How about my female lead using her voice to win a singing competition that DISCOURAGES melismatic Mariah Carey wannabes? Or her beating a melismatic Mariah Carey wannabe in a singing competition? Would that sound nice?

 

Heres a better idea:

Why not write the story you want to write? If you want to write it then write it. Simple as that.

 

Again with the contests! Please sir, just one more turn of the thumbscrews

 

If you want to make it more original, you could make the lead male and let him win the singing contest against bland n'Sync and Robbie Williams-wannabes. (Or whatever them kids listen to these days.)

Or you could let him be the first man who wins a bodybuilding contest against better-looking contestants through his skill and personality - for example, by being a master at tap dancing. He could also impress the judges with his boldness by holding a speech about how superficial society's beauty ideals are.

 

or he could dress up in drag and win a beauty contest lol

 

Kids are listening to brokeNCYDE these days. I'd rather have my female lead stick with a sort of singing contest or "battle of the bands"/"battle of music" group contest with the prize being a chance to tour the world.

Her touring partners (Mariah Carey wannabes) could be the antagonists of the story, trying to upstage her.

 

You uh... do know what a body building contest is right? Because I am pretty sure there is no talent portion or well speech. Its about the muscles and poses and other things. Its not the male version of a beauty contest.