: Re: Should I Kill My Main Character? I'm an aspiring writer who has been writing stories since Kindergarten (None released). Obviously I have a lot of experience, but I'm still unsure with extremely

@Carla500

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I had a fellow aspiring writer tell me that a major rule in writing was to never kill your main character. Not only did the concept of "rules" in writing boggle my mind, but I almost immediately thought of one of my favorite books which is "The Stranger" in which the main character is mostly waiting for his execution having killed a man for utterly no reason. Having said that, I think the suggestion (as opposed to rule) would be to not kill your hero heedlessly. A character is just that; a character. They might be despicable. You could create a character that the reader ends up relishing their death like in the book "Perfume" (the villain is the hero of their own story). Someone who is set up to be a hero, though, could/should die through a noble sacrifice.

You have somewhat of a Janus potential in your story. Maybe the second version of this man becomes obsessed with the first version of himself and despises him so much that shooting himself seems like a noble sacrifice.

But whatever you decide to have happen, there are no rules. Don't let anyone tell you there are. There are good guidelines for writing things that people will like (i.e. writing something popular) but you can randomly have your villain murder your hero at a pinnacle moment just because you think it's funny. Maybe the reader will hate that. If the tone is right, they might also think it's funny. You never know. I've written a couple of stories that friends found gross and horrifying and I've always asked, "but was it compelling." And usually the answer was yes. I'm more interested in compelling than entertaining, and the two aren't mutually exclusive, but ask yourself which you prefer, and write that story. Without the tone, I could see your story being tragic, comic, even heroic, or just dark. Try giving credence to one of those goals and make sure the character(s) narrative and thoughts suit that purpose.

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