How to write less coincidences?

[amortelito]

If you want to avoid thing being a coincidence then you have to think of action-consequence development. In your example of the blind boy, getting sold to an orphanage is not a cause by itself to get blind. What is the cation that achieves that?
Maybe he was mistreated and got beaten so badly that he got damaged.
Maybe he was upset and missing his parents and stormed off. he fell from the stairs and woke up blind.
Maybe it has supernatural elements and one night at the orphanage he saw a falling star, when he was at the window he saw a blinding light...

If he was destined to go blind, then you can hint that future purpose to the way he loses his sight.
I have a character who has a very clear destiny and all his intense sequences are related to thorns. Other characters also has a preconceived destiny and her most defining moments are related to thunders.

[personaghost]

ohhhh true, I'll look up some causes of blindness then
Thanks for your help, I'm still really rusty to writing things. I'm having a hard time pacing and plotting~~

It's so hard to make a series of events natural....

[personaghost]

thank you for replying me so quickly I really appreciate it.

but how do you (in your experience) make all the major events pushing character development...more natural? Like...it doesn't seem like it's main goal is to just make the audience sympathise with the character...hahha I'm so bad at explaining but I hope you got what I was trying to ask :')

[yansusu]

Ah, I wouldn't worry about that too much. It's always difficult to get back to it after a break but that's what revisions and edits are for, isn't it? So just take your time, write a draft and then you'll likely see all the issues that crop up and need to be taken care of. It doesn't have to be perfect right off the bat

[nostalgicroxas]

Look up diseases that can impact young developing youths in poverty. I'm sure there's at least 2 that can cause blindness, temporary or long-term.

[amortelito]

I understand, just a compilation of misfortunes tend to feel like a self-indulgent drama...I actually love those XD but if the purpose if to have a more natural well-written story then you would need to build up the moments and think of your characters as a real person.

A way to build up that worked well for me is to make readers sympathize with the character because of the way they behave in their everyday life, not only when something bad happens. One character is very tender and friendly, other is cheerful and energetic, other is very bitter but cares a lot for his friends. I add little scenes in which they can show their personality and be real people.

They have a life and they don't know what is going to happen to them.
So when the major events happen they react to that problem they way that makes sense for who they are. This can be difficult because we know beforehand what is going to happen and I think this is why we are tempted to just make things happen without much justification.

I always try that the story: a) has a logical sense of action-consequence b) the reactions make sense according to who the characters are. If something is going to happen to them it is either a consequence of something they did, or I have to show what external actions lead to this outcome.

[silverraven0]

Actually, psychological stress can cause vision loss (somewhat temporary)

https://www.google.com/amp/s/medicalxpress.com/news/2018-06-psychological-stress-vision-loss.amp

Whatever happened before the parent sold him to the orphanage can be made to build up his stress, and when he got sold, it eventually make him lost his sight from it. In which, that mean you gotta torture dem boi. (oh, well...)

Of course, you still need to do your own research to make them more believable and concrete looking. (I think I butchered my English in the last part, but you get the idea)

[Trevor]

natural blindness is definitely a real thing and can occur a number of ways whether it's a birth defect or a disease/infection

Visual impairment | Cause

this wiki page lists a good number of them, although I'd look for other sources describing how these illnesses work to get better and accurate details.

IF I were personally writing such a story, however, I would set a scene where the kid gets bullied at the orphanage periodically BECAUSE of his beautiful eyes, and then eventually set a part where the bullies force the protag to look at the sun for too long as a form of torture, but that's just my dark back story sort of taste talking

[borzoiteeth]

Most people are advising to do medical research for realistic approaches- which in general is important regardless of the possible abuse your characters are going to endure. But its going to take more than that. Even if you write about something that happens all the time in real life that doesn't stop things from feeling too coincidental or too fake. It doesn't matter that in real life anyone can drop dead from an aneurysm- in the world of fiction it can feel like a cheap attempt to make the audience feel sad.

Amortelito has the right approach in general. Action-consequence. A shared idea that also explores this is known as the Domino Effect, if you want to look into that. What is the purpose of the blindness? What else is suppose to happen in this story? Can any other big factors help foreshadow or lead up to the moment?

On the flip side, its not always bad to have multiple coincidences happen. A lot of guilty-pleasure stories are about shamelessly rolling with it and people still love them for it. It doesn't have to be shameless though, even if one day he just went blind -which is a thing- how you explore the contrast of someone having to adjust to that doesn't have to be cheap. Just don't make it a quick montage of, "this is my life now!".

While you do this research, I beg you to look into and study blind life so you don't fall into the stereotypical abled-romanticisms that tend to plague such characters. In fact, you might just find the right inspiration for your character reading other's experiences. I recommend this research first and foremost before just diving in and writing as Yansusu states. No first draft is perfect!

[Iris-Grimoire]

Research aside, don't forget that foreshadowing is a powerful tool to make things seem less random. Say a character is cursed until he's upside down and out of air and doesn't know this- if he happens to fall in water like that one day, it feels sudden, but if you sprinkle in characters saying the body of water has slippery rocks around or too many teenagers got injured playing around it, or even show close calls before they eventually do that, you smooth in the likelihood of it happening, and now it felt like a consequence of something that was being overlooked.

[AmysGames]

I generally agree with what everyone is saying, but I'm also wondering why the parents sold him to the orphanage. Usually when I need two events to happen simultaneously, I try to tie them together somehow, e.g. maybe reverse the order of events, so that the parents notice that their child is blind and decide that they didn't want to raise a blind child for whatever reason (they feel inadequate, prejudiced against blind kids, or whatever tone you're going for)

Generally speaking, it can be tricky getting stuff to happen for The Plot without feeling really contrived, lol. But as long as you have a story-established reason for the events happening as they do (foreshadowing, action-consequence, etc.), you can get away with a lot.

[personaghost]

Haha, that's true. I'll look into more possible diseases or injuries that causes eye damage. Thank you for your advice and encouragement

[TheXtraordinaryX]

Does he need to keep the eyes themselves?

[personaghost]

Yeah, he'll need the physical eyes there unfortunately. Preferably intact.

[TheXtraordinaryX]

Well there's certain chemicals that can cause blindness, some infections, and there's precise injuries that could leave the person blind despite the eye healing.

[Azifri]

He does? Aww, as I was reading this thread I had the dark thought of the parents selling their kid because of the corneas, to some shady organ trafficking orphanage.

About the coincidences, I agree with what others have said about foreshadowing. Even if you want to surprise the readers it might still work, I for instance really like when authors manage to hide their intentions and those foreshadowing elements only click into place when the event happens.

[borzoiteeth]

Should also add- readers are far more forgiving with coincidences at the beginning of a story than later. People want and expect the creator to establish the world fast enough so they can enjoy the ride. Sudden problems that need creative ways to be solved > problems magically being solved.

[personaghost]

Hey guys, thank you so much for your help. I've found my disease that causes blindness. I've been writing so much I haven't gone online yet other than to do research. :3

Thank you for all of your suggestions and advice, I've written them down to remind me what to avoid. It's fantasy/adventure and slight romance that I'm trying to write. So some of the diseases can be tweaked, I just didn't want it to be too far fetched. If you have any more writing tips please let me know, I'm all ears.

Thank you again <3

[Tanzer]

You could make the loss of their eyesight psychosomatic (caused by mental trauma). That way if you decide later you'd like to give them their vision back, you could do so in a meaningful way without it seeming cheap. Also I totally agree with the other users have said about foreshadowing.

[BurnMyShadowCom]

How about this - Protag loses his eyesight, due to natural causes - or whatever else you'd like - and because of it, his parents have abandoned him?