Readers don’t often think about logic when reading fiction, but they know it when it’s not there: “That makes no sense!” Or, “I don’t believe it.” Or, even “But on page thirty, you wrote .…“
Fictional logic, by which I mean cause, motivation, and result, needs to be seamless, perhaps invisible, yet that logic is the inner core of the story. It makes a story go from page one to “the end.” Yet, it if it is too obvious, the tale seems predictable, perhaps dull. Too obscure and the reader can’t follow the trail. To make it more complex, I love the notion I have quoted many times, Robert Frost’s dictum, “No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.”
What’s a writer to do? He/she must imagine—and set down—the whole complexity of the characters’ world, but in the subtlest way possible.
As in life, all people are complex. Imbedded in that complexity are multiple choices. The complex character thus can logically do any number of things, and the reader will believe. Is that hard to achieve? Oh my, yes!