: Re: What is the term for an accessible character that knows nothing? In a lot of books, movies, or TV shows, there will be a character that knows little to nothing about the subject at hand.

@Angie602

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I'm a computer technitian. Every week, here at the office, we joke about a NCIS episode where the hacker and another guy fight against another hacker by using the keyboard at amazing speed and writing random commands. Evertybody from IT knows that is ridiculous. Hacking does not work in that way, neither it's possible to stop an invader just by starting a typing race to see who is faster. But, on the other hand, it's really boring to use a real life hacking situations because they take a long time and deal a lot with social skills, even more than technical ones.

My opinion is that common sense is a great thing. Too much is something to avoid. What I mean is, it won't be good if you make really dumb real mistakes, but also it won't be good also if you make it so real that becomes boring.

Take Dr. House, for example. The show uses real life diseases, real life treatments, real life diagnostic procedures but, in overall, it won't work for a real life doctor. Even so, the show is good because in the extreme of luck, could work. Contrary to NCIS where the hacking procedure was completely absurd.

Recently I wrote a chapter where my character ends up being searched (I'm not sure this is the correct word) by airport personnel for drugs and smuggled money. I don't know how this is done, what the inner procedures of the airport police are, or even if they are police or just normal workers. I had to improvise. My way to do it was to get away from the details and describe everything in a way most people -- and even professionals -- could accept even knowing it was not perfect.

I guess your question can be answered by: It depends on the focus of your story.

If you want to write about medical stuff, like Robin Cook does, you need to know about medical stuff because that's the main focus of your writing. If you start to invent, it will become nonsensical. If you want to write about a normal character that needs to deal with specific knowledge in one chapter, it will be no problem at all -- as long as you do it right -- to overlook the details.

What I think you can't do at all, is to describe a specific procedure, like NCIS, in a completely wrong way. That goes for terms as well. If you don't know the name, use the description instead and skip the details.

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