More tropes today. Thankfully the TV Tropes website is vast, so I may never run out of material for this blog.
Today's trope is the Orphan's Plot Trinket. I had mentioned Tad Williams's Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy previously as containing elements of another trope (Rightful King Returns) but it also has plot trinkets galore. (Still worth reading, in my opinion -- if carrying around volume three doesn't break your back.)
I do have an orphan in my story. But she only becomes an orphan halfway through, and she does have a couple of trinkets, a ring and a knife. But the ring was merely a gift and means nothing; it's just a reminder of someone close to her and has nothing to do with her heritage. The knife does have to do with her heritage (at least it's not a locket or something) but everyone from the upper classes in the city of her birth has one. So it's not unique to some royal line or something. Her heritage is in her looks -- people can tell who she is, because she has something of the look of her father about her.
I'll be honest, I did have another ring involved but decided to take it out after thinking about this. I have said I'm not going to let the TV Tropes website dictate what I write, but the first ring (the gift) and the knife are important, and will come up later. The second ring was something I threw in but that doesn't need to be there as it serves no further function. So why not make the situation less complicated?
No comments:
Post a Comment