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Question about writing a scene from a villain's perspective
A guy in my online writers group told me to just "get inside the villain's head" and write whatever comes out... but that advice led me to a 3,000 word mess that read like a therapy session. I'm working on a fantasy story set in a crumbling castle, and my villain is supposed to be cold and calculating, not whiny. Has anyone else found a specific trick for shifting into that mindset without losing the edge?
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the_anthony3d ago
Three things that got me out of that same trap. First, I wrote a list of 10 things my villain would never say out loud, then made sure none of them ended up in the actual scene. Second, I gave him a physical tic like tapping his dagger hilt in a pattern every time he's about to make a move. That one detail changed how I wrote every line of his dialogue. Third, I cut the first 500 words I wrote about his feelings and started the scene with him already in action, like walking down a hallway and snapping a guard's neck without breaking stride. Cold and calculating means you see the choices, not the thoughts behind them.
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