Fixing Deus ex Machina

In the previous post, I pointed out how even an accomplished author such as Robert Harris can get caught in the Deus ex Machina trap. Let’s talk about how to avoid it.

The Machina bit—how to tell

It can be hard to identify this. You may have had a sudden brilliant idea which would work things out for your heroine and wrote it out. But when you’ve done that, pause for a moment.

First off, take a skeptical look at your climax and resolution. Is there enough build-up to make both credible? That is, is it what most reasonable people might do to resolve their problem? Does the heroine have the skill, experience, guts, etc. to pull it off? Or has someone suddenly ridden out of the blue for the rescue? And yes, Prince Charmings would fit this description.

If you’re not sure, ask friends, family, etc. They don’t have to read the whole novel. Just explain the issue that the heroine is facing and how it is resolved. If you get nods, you’re probably good to go. If you get puzzled expressions and lots of questions you may have an inadvertent Deus ex Machina.

The fix bit

It may look like an insurmountable mountain but actually, the fix can be easy although possibly time-consuming.

Deus ex Machinas, almost by definition, come out of nowhere. And make the solution you propose unlikely or unbelievable.

But the answer is not necessarily to change the ending. The answer is more likely to be going back into your story to introduce enough elements so that the resolution doesn’t feel to your reader like an easy way out for you.

An example

Let’s go back to our hero on a crumbling cliff. A bomb goes off and kills the enemies but not the hero. If you really want to keep this ending, think about how to make it credible.

Could the hero take a huge risk and jump down to the rocks beneath the cliff before the bomb goes off? If so, you need to establish earlier that he is a dare-devil type with highly developed agility (and show, don’t tell, please).

Or could the enemies be fairly incompetent bomb makers and the bomb just stuns them? If so, you would need to have more than a couple of scenes showing the enemies’ incompetence and particularly in bomb deployment. An opportunity for some humor if you want to take it that way?

I’m not saying that any of these would be fabulous saves to your story but the point is that you can go back into the story and build in what you need to make the ending credible.

For example, in Munich which we discussed in the last post, the author Robert Harris could have included some subtle scenes where the secret agent/secretary does things which are unremarkable at the time but, on reflection, are clues the reader fails to pick up. For example, the hero could be irritated because the secretary keeps trying to tidy up his papers. Or he keeps running into her as he is going about his mission. He remarks on it but in a by-the-by way.

It is often effective to introduce these hints when the reader is being distracted by some high drama related to the main plot.

So, it’s not that you can’t have a bomb going off. But make sure there are enough illustrations/clues/hints in the preceding scenes so that your reader’s reaction is “How clever,” rather than “Huh?”

Love Robert Harris’ novels

I just want to repeat this as I would not want to put you off reading Robert Harris. He is an exemplar in using research to illuminate and not drown the story (memoir and historical fiction writers, take note). Fatherland, one of his earliest, brilliantly uses what might have happened in Nazi Germany after the war. The Cicero Trilogy is another example of meticulous research turned into compelling reading. He also writes exciting contemporary novels like The Ghost, which has been turned into an equally gripping movie called The Ghost Writer directed by Roman Polanski. So, are you convinced that I like his writing? Let’s proceed.

What is Deus ex Machina?

Deus ex Machina is a literary term which loosely means that the writer writes himself into a corner. He creates a great dilemma for his protagonist but there is no way out. The hero is on a crumbling cliff and his enemies are waiting just below him on the mountain. Suddenly, a bomb goes off and blows up his enemies. Our hero makes his way safely down the mountain and lives happily ever after.

Which leaves the reader thinking, “Wait a minute—where did the bomb come from?” and/or “How come the blast didn’t destroy the cliff, too?” This is Deus ex Machina. The resolution to the story through an unexpected and often unbelievable event not engineered by the hero.

Robert Harris’ Munich

Munich covers the events which led to the signing of the Munich Pact in 1938. The Pact was negotiated between Nevil Chamberlain, the then Prime Minister of Great Britain and Adolf Hitler, Chancellor and dictator of Germany. It was Chamberlain’s attempt to stave off conflict with Germany through yielding to Hitler’s demands and is widely seen as an at least an ill-advised and at worst, a shameful piece of appeasement. Which did nothing to prevent the outbreak of war.

Hugh Legat is an ambitious but junior member of the British diplomatic corps who is taken to the Munich conference because of his friendship with Paul von Hartmann. They met at Oxford and Hartmann is now with the German Foreign Office but secretly opposed to Hitler. He has promised the British government a document damaging to Hitler only if he can turn it over to Legat.

He does so but it is stolen from Legat’s briefcase and it seems inevitable that Hartmann will be arrested.

Okay—spoiler alert but necessary.

All is saved because a British secretary, also in Munich, but barely mentioned in the rest of the novel, is a secret agent who stole the document for safekeeping.

This comes out of the blue. Harris is known for his clever and unexpected endings but this one, I think, slips into Deus ex Machina territory. Instead of “Oh, how clever—makes sense but I didn’t pick up the clues,” I thought, “What? Where did she come from?”

Tag: Deus ex Machina