But I Just Want to be Normal!

“Why me?” the protagonist cries as she throws an angry lightning bolt at the sky. Ever since she discovered her superpowers and incredible strength, being a hero has been such a burden. She flops down on the still-smoking bench that seconds ago she hollowed out of a log using her pinpoint accurate laser vision. “I just want to be normal!”

A Normal Life

This is probably familiar to a lot of fantasy readers. Characters who suddenly find that they have special powers, that magic is real, that they are chosen for a great adventure, etc, seem to spend at least half their time moaning that they just want a normal life.

‘The normal life’ is an issue that many fantasy authors hit at some point in their work, and is handled in a variety of different ways depending on the character and the world they are in. While it can work very well in some stories, and is essential for creating realistic characters in many, there is a very fine line between realistic and annoying.

So What’s So Great About a Normal Life Anyway?

‘The normal life’ and what it means for the characters can be a very important consideration for the fantasy author. In particular, most urban fantasy and paranormal fiction tends to superimpose the supernatural on the real, familiar world. This means that the protagonist is often pulled into a world of weirdness from a life that was more familiar and normal. This is also true of a lot of portal fantasy.

However, this issue isn’t limited to urban and portal fantasy. Any character suddenly whisked away from the life they have always known and thrown into adventure is going to have some trouble adapting. This goes for the peasant girl who finds out she is the chosen one who can save the land as much as for the pampered prince who is driven from his castle and flees for his life across country.

Reading about exciting chases and fights is one thing, but consider how you might react if you actually found yourself in one. Many people with ‘normal lives’ would love to find out that they are more powerful than they thought, but if those powers came hand in hand with real life-threatening danger, day in and day out, would we be so happy?

When considering how much a character might miss or long for a normal life, it is also worth thinking about all the things in your own daily life that you would miss if they were taken away. Try giving up one favourite food for an idea of how the loss of even simple luxuries can affect us. Imagine that you have no comfy bed, no sofa, no shower, can never watch TV again. Imagine being in constant danger, or simply being so busy that you never have time to relax or read a book. These things might seem small in the face of exciting adventures and amazing superpowers, but as you start to pile on the unwelcome changes, on top of all the scary almost-dying that tends to happen to fantasy characters, you can see why a normal (but safe and comfortable) life might begin to look so appealing.

Balancing Pros and Cons

So how can you portray a character’s struggle with these feelings without frustrating the reader? This is where I think balance is key. Yes, a character may find a lot of things about their new life difficult, especially if they have been pulled out of a ‘normal life’ to begin with. Deciding how much this is going to be an issue for them depends on several things. What was their life like before, and what is their new life like in comparison? The pampered prince mentioned above would suddenly find himself deprived of a great amount of luxuries. A middle class American teenager whisked into a medieval fantasy world may find it hard to cope without the gadgets and conveniences (not to mention plumbing) that they are used to. A person taken from extreme hardship or poverty to join a quest, who is now given fresh food daily and access to good clothes and weapons trainers, on the other hand, is more likely to look on their changed circumstances as a blessing. A person in our world who still leads their day to day life much as they always did, but with the addition of magical powers, is going to get much less sympathy from the reader when they complain about their normal life being disrupted.

It is also worth remembering that while giving up a normal life might be tough, the character is probably going to gain things from their new adventure. Do the gains outweigh the negatives? Does the character recognise what they are getting, but also mourn the losses? Characters who complain about their lack of a normal life will quickly become annoying if the reader thinks they have gained more than they have lost. For example, consider the vampire who hates what he is and looks on his existence as a curse. This might be pitiable if being a vampire is shown to have drawbacks. Stripping away many of the negatives associated with supernatural beings comes with consequences, and one of these is that any longing to be normal becomes a lot less believable. If you want a character to struggle with their new existence, then really give them something to struggle with. Otherwise the reader won’t buy it.

Even if a character’s angst is perfectly justified, the reader is going to find it irritating if there is too much focus placed on it. This annoyance only increases as the character’s abilities grow in ‘awesome factor’. There are certain powers that everyone would love to have. If your character can fly, teleport, shoot fire from their hands, freeze or slow time, see the future, heal themselves and others, or if they possess great strength or are immortal, for example, then they are only going to get away with wishing they were normal under some pretty extreme circumstances.

One final point. It is very easy to throw in a character’s longing for something easier in an attempt to create tension and to illustrate the stakes of the mission. But this can come across as a cheap or shallow way to create drama. To avoid this, these moments are best kept to a minimum and reserved for times when the reader can truly believe that the character has been pushed to tipping point.

Returning Home

There is another reason why it might be vital to establish a character’s longing for a normal life, and that is the ending. If you are planning to end the story with a return home, a return to normal life, then the reader will need to know how the character actually feels about their life before the adventure. A character who daydreams of home sets up an expectation that can either be met or shot down at the end of the story, allowing for a happy, tragic or bittersweet ending.

If you are intending to give your character a happy ending by returning them to normal life, safe and comfortable after their adventures, then the groundwork for this needs to be laid earlier in the novel. These kinds of ‘happy’ endings can feel flat and leave the reader deflated unless we feel that the character really wants this. Avoiding the character’s issues with the difficulties faced during their adventure will lead to the impression that they thrive in this kind of life, and if they do not appear to miss anything they have left behind then how will their return to normal life feel like a triumph? This doesn’t mean that your character needs to be in constant torment throughout the book. Think about how returning home after a long activity-packed holiday feels. You had fun, but coming home feels wonderful too, and old comforts take on greater meaning.

Here, it is also worth asking yourself whether being normal or a return to normal would be the relief the character expects it to be. Have they come to enjoy adventure? Would normalcy feel disappointing and unsatisfying? In Neverwhere, for example, the hero realises just this, and returns to the un-normal life. Think about that holiday again. Yes, returning home can be lovely, but only because there is the prospect of future holidays and adventures to come. Or, think about Frodo and Bilbo at the end of The Lord of the Rings. Home and the everyday life of the Shire are treasured memories for them, but they both recognise that something has changed within them and that they can never return. This is also a common theme in western (cowboy) stories.

Finally, remember that there are certain kinds of characters for whom a normal life is never going to seem like a reward. Adventurers, spies, professional fighters, extreme sportsmen and women, etc, may have specifically chosen this kind of life because they love it. We might read about their great, death-defying escape and feel relieved when they reach safety. If it were us, we’d probably never go near the erupting volcano/monster-filled dungeon/enemy-occupied territory again, but they may jump straight back in with a grin on their face. Staying true to character will lead to a much more satisfying ending.

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