But no, it wasn’t. Not to Bridget. Not until now.
15. Final Image (page 268–271)
In a mirror to the Opening Image, we now have reached the end of the year and Bridget’s diary literally ends with a recap. She sums up all the alcohol units she drank, all the cigarettes she smoked, all the calories she consumed. And yet, despite all of that, she still calls it “an excellent year’s progress.”
Bridget has finally learned the theme: you can struggle and toil to change who you are, or you can just accept the fact that this is you and that’s “excellent.”
WHY IS THIS A FOOL TRIUMPHANT?
Bridget Jones’s Diary contains all three elements of a successful Fool Triumphant story:
A FOOL: As a thirtysomething single woman in London, Bridget is society’s fool in every way. She’s constantly laughed at, mocked, and asked why she’s not yet married. She’s an outcast and an underdog, and yet despite all of that, she still comes out triumphant at the end, by being herself.
AN ESTABLISHMENT: The world of Smug Marrieds (as Bridget calls them). This is the group of people that Bridget is constantly pitted against as a thirty-year-old “spinster” (as the establishment calls her) and the reason Bridget feels the desperate need to change.
A TRANSMUTATION: After being cheated on by her boyfriend, Bridget undergoes a huge transformation: she quits her job and takes a job in television, essentially reinventing herself as a new person.
Cat’s Eye View
For quick reference, here’s a brief overview of this novel’s beat sheet.
OPENING IMAGE: In the first diary entry, Bridget lists her New Year’s resolutions (aka everything she wants to change about herself).
THEME STATED: “How does a woman manage to get to your age without being married?” This is the question posed to Bridget at a party, implying that her single status is somehow her fault. This question introduces us to not only the establishment of this Fool Triumphant story, but also the lesson that Bridget will ultimately learn: she doesn’t have to change herself just to get a husband.
SETUP: As Bridget gets off to a poor start with her resolutions, we meet the A Story characters: her friends and Daniel Cleaver, who is her boss and her “bad boy” crush.
CATALYST: Daniel Cleaver sends her a flirty message at work, instigating a sexy office flirtation.
DEBATE: What does it mean? Does Daniel want to be her boyfriend? Or does he just want to sleep with her?
BREAK INTO 2: Despite finding out that Daniel just wants to sleep with her (and probably doesn’t want a relationship), Bridget makes the decision to sleep with him anyway.
B STORY: Mark Darcy (who is introduced in the Setup) embodies the theme in that he eventually falls in love with the real Bridget (without her even realizing it), proving that she doesn’t have to change who she is to find love.
FUN AND GAMES: Bridget and Daniel’s hilarious and dramatic on again, off again relationship delivers the promise of the premise as Bridget tries to determine whether or not Daniel is her boyfriend. Meanwhile, Bridget’s parents split up.
MIDPOINT: Bridget catches Daniel with another woman. Obviously, he’s not going to be her boyfriend (false defeat).
BAD GUYS CLOSE IN: Bridget picks herself back up by quitting her job and getting a job in television. Then, to her surprise, Mark Darcy asks her out, claiming that he likes her because she’s not like the other girls he knows, but when the night of the date arrives, he (seemingly) stands her up. Bridget later learns it was a misunderstanding.
ALL IS LOST: Bridget’s mother and her mother’s new lover get arrested for running a financial scam.
DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL: Mark Darcy flies to Portugal to try to bring Bridget’s mother home but then stops calling. Bridget wallows, returning to the familiar, when Daniel calls her, drunk and blubbering apologies.
BREAK INTO 3: Mark shows up on Christmas Day and asks her out again. Bridget says yes.
FINALE: Bridget and Mark have a wonderful first date in which Bridget realizes that Mark really does love her just the way she is.
FINAL IMAGE: In a mirror to the Opening Image, Bridget sums up her year in her diary. Even though she didn’t keep any of her New Year’s resolutions to change herself, she still deems the year “excellent.”
Buddy Love
The Transformative Power of Love (or Friendship)
WARNING! THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE FOLLOWING BOOKS:
Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell, The Fault in Our Stars by John Green, It Had to Be You by Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Me Before You by Jojo Moyes, Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks, Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon
Nothing is more primal than a love story. Don’t believe me? Just take a look at the one billion dollars in revenue that romance novels bring in every year. They currently make up over 33 percent of the US book market. Why? Because nothing hits home more than our human desire for companionship.
But love stories don’t always deal with romance. Yes, most romance novels do fit into this category, but our genre dubbed Buddy Love goes beyond just romantic love and, in fact, umbrellas every kind of love, from romance to friendship to even the love of a pet.
This genre is defined by its key characteristic: stories in which our hero is changed by someone else.
It’s true, all stories are about transformation (or should be!). The plot is set into motion by a key moment or event (the Catalyst) that will eventually lead to the hero’s ultimate change. But in Buddy Love novels, the plot that will bring about this change is usually set into motion by a being rather than an event.
That’s why, in the majority of Buddy Love stories, the Catalyst is the meeting of that very special buddy. This being—whether it be a love interest, a new friend, a pet, or even an inanimate object!—comes into the hero’s life and forever alters it.
Life doesn’t start seriously changing for feisty Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice until she meets the proud and disagreeable Mr. Darcy. Likewise, the world of Opal Buloni doesn’t get turned upside down until she meets the scruffy mutt Winn-Dixie in Because of Winn-Dixie. And the lives of both Phoebe Summerville and Coach Calebow are turned upside down when Phoebe inherits the Chicago Stars NFL football team in It Had to Be You by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.
Regardless of who the buddies are, the dynamics of the story are the same: Buddy Love novels are about completion. One person being made whole by another. Or at the very least, one person (or dog!) who is the Catalyst for bringing about a certain change that the hero desperately needs.
In Because of Winn-Dixie, eleven-year-old motherless Opal is struggling with loneliness in her new town. She wants friends. Enter Winn-Dixie. The dog not only becomes her first friend, but also ends up leading Opal to meet a whole cast of interesting characters who eventually become her friends too. And in the end, Winn-Dixie also brings about the ultimate change that Opal needs in her life: to finally connect with her father and realize that he is enough for her.
In Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth needs to learn how to get over her prejudices of others. Who better to eventually teach her to do that than the pompous Mr. Darcy, who turns out to be nothing like how she originally judged him to be!
Kissing scenes or no, these are essentially the same stories.
Both Elizabeth and Opal are made better because of another.
And even in the cases of stories where the buddies don’t end up together (like Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell or The Fault in Our Stars by John Green), the buddies of these stories still help change each other for the better.
Now,
don’t be fooled by the words “love story.” Just because your novel includes a love story doesn’t automatically kick it into the Buddy Love camp. The question of whether your novel is truly a Buddy Love depends highly on how you define your A Story and your B Story.
Remember, the A Story is the primary story line, what’s happening on the exterior, what the “hook” of the novel is, what’s driving the action of the plot forward, whereas the B Story is often the side story, a character (or characters) who in some way represents your hero’s spiritual or internal journey.
In Buddy Love novels, the A Story is the love story. It’s the whole hook! We pick up It Had to Be You because we want to read how tenderhearted Phoebe Summerville (who is absolutely clueless about football) clashes with the macho, hardened coach of the Chicago Stars. That’s the promise of the premise. Phoebe’s relationship with the players and the team managers, and her learning curve as the owner of a pro football team—those are the side plot. It’s the B Story that helps progress her arc.
Similarly, we pick up Me Before You by Jojo Moyes because the epic tale of ordinary Louisa Clark falling in love with extraordinary quadriplegic Will Traynor (A Story) touches our hearts. And even though, yes, Louisa’s relationship with Will does eventually push Louisa to learn the theme of living well (the way that all A Stories push your hero toward change), that theme is represented by Louisa’s tense relationship with Will’s seemingly cold mother, Camilla Traynor (B Story), who, despite her wealth, has been stalled in her own life as well.
On the other hand, in novels of the non–Buddy Love variety, the love story or friendship story is usually found in the B Story. It’s usually not the main focus of the plot.
But the ultimate test of whether your story is a Buddy Love is in the Catalyst beat. Is it the mere existence of another that sends your hero down the path to change? If the answer is yes, then you probably have a Buddy Love on your hands.
And if you do, then make sure you study the three elements of all great Buddy Love stories: (1) an incomplete hero, (2) a counterpart, and (3) a complication.
First off, let’s take a look at the incomplete hero. Whose story is this, really? Even though Buddy Love stories are innately about two people, there’s usually one half of the pair who will require the most work in order to get their life back on track. This is the person (or being) who has the biggest transformative arc ahead of them, who needs to change (and does change!) the most.
When studying Buddy Love novels, a hint is to look at who is narrating the story. If it’s a first-person account like in Me Before You (narrated by Louisa Clark) or a close third-person account—meaning we see the perspective of only one character, like in The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith (narrated by Hailey Sullivan)—then chances are that’s the primary hero the author has chosen because that’s whose head the author wants you to get inside. Same goes for when you’re writing your own novel. Who you pick as your narrator (or narrators) says a lot about whose story this really is.
Take a look at young adult best sellers like The Fault in Our Stars and Twilight. The female characters in these novels (Hazel Grace and Bella) are the heroes of the stories. The books are told through their points of view, while their love interests (Augustus and Edward) are the agents of change. Sure, Augustus and Edward have small arcs of their own, but it’s nothing compared to the drastic way in which Hazel and Bella both change. After all, Augustus dies at the All Is Lost, leaving Hazel to finish her arc alone. And Edward has had several lifetimes as a vampire to do most of his changing. This particular novel is about Bella.
There are exceptions, however, where both buddies are equally changed by each other and therefore we end up with two heroes. These are called two-handers. In these situations, the author usually gives us two perspectives to match. Like in It Had to Be You, which features third-person narration from both Phoebe and Coach Calebow. Or in Eleanor and Park, another popular young adult novel. Rainbow Rowell chose to tell this tale of unlikely love from both Eleanor’s and Park’s points of view, which means she had to give them both equally compelling transformations. They even both got title credit!
Regardless of how many narrators or heroes you have, in all of these examples, our incomplete hero (or heroes) is in desperate need of some change in their life, and that change is going to come from our second Buddy Love element: the counterpart. This is the one person (or being) in the world who will (eventually) make our hero’s life complete—or who will bring about the change our hero is so desperately needing.
Often the counterpart or buddy is a little quirky, a little unique. There has to be something about this exciting new person that’s going to shake things up for our hero, which means they can’t be dull or ordinary. They have to be worth an entire Catalyst! The introduction of this other has got to rip our hero right out of their stasis = death slump and into the second act!
Think about Augustus Waters, who shakes things up for Hazel Grace in The Fault in Our Stars with his witty dialogue and quirky views on life. Without him, Hazel would have never known love. She would have just continued to go on in her depressed state, essentially waiting to die.
Or think about the dog, Winn-Dixie, in Because of Winn-Dixie. This isn’t a normal dog. Kate DiCamillo made sure of that. This dog has spunk. Character. He smiles at people. And without him, who knows if Opal and her preacher father would have ever found what they both needed in each other?
And finally, the third ingredient in every great Buddy Love story is a complication. This is what keeps the two buddies apart (at least for now!). The complication might involve another person, creating a love triangle, sometimes called a three-hander. The complication might be physical or emotional, like Will’s condition in Me Before You. Or the complication could be a misunderstanding or a clash of character, which can often lead to the two buddies hating each other at the beginning (like in Pride and Prejudice or It Had to Be You). Other complication options include clashing personal or ethical viewpoints, an epic historical event, or even the general disapproval of society (like the star-crossed lovers of The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks). Or the complication could be that your counterpart isn’t even human! Like in Twilight. Nothing complicates a good romance like finding out your one true love might kill you and drink your blood.
Regardless of what complication you choose to throw at your buddies, the element is crucial because it provides the primary conflict of the story. Without it, really, what’s keeping the lovers from running off into the sunset together on page 10? That would be a pretty short novel.
Something must be keeping your lovers or buddies apart; otherwise, there’d be no story. The conflict in a Buddy Love story is what will make or break your novel. If you don’t have enough of it, your reader will give up because the story is “too easy” and the love (or friendship) won’t feel earned. The longer you can keep your “lovers” apart, the more gaps you can wedge between them, the better the story and the more engaged the reader. Even if your buddies get together early in the story, there has to be something precarious about their relationship. Why aren’t they living happily ever after yet? The complication serves as a tiny bomb between the two counterparts, just waiting to go off and fling them apart.
Ironically, though, often the complication is also keeping the two buddies together. Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters in The Fault in Our Stars are bonded because they’ve both been through one of the worst things a person can go through: cancer. But that’s also the thing that causes Hazel Grace to keep her distance at first. In The Notebook, Allie and Noah are kept apart by the prejudices of society and her family. And yet, that’s the very thing that makes them fight to stay together. In Me Before You, Will’s condition is the very reason Louisa met him in the first place (she was hired as his caretaker), yet it’s also creating the main source of conflict between them (both physically and emotionally), right until the very end.
&n
bsp; That complication can be a tricky thing. It can pull buddies together and drive them apart. And often the complication leads to an All Is Lost beat in which the two lovers or friends actually do break up, separate, or have some kind of huge fight. Since the All Is Lost is defined as the lowest point of the story, this separation beat is often found in Buddy Love novels, because what’s lower than losing the one you’ve grown to love? Buddies need this beat so that they can realize what they truly have and figure out how to fix their flaws (that is, learn the theme!) in order to save the relationship (or themselves!).
In the end, almost all Buddy Love stories contain a similar message: My life changed for having known another. That’s the hook of these stories, and that’s how love stories (romantic or not) teach us about life. Funny how we keep turning to the same lesson over and over again.
I guess it must ring true.
To recap: If you’re thinking of writing a Buddy Love novel, make sure your story includes these three essential ingredients:
AN INCOMPLETE HERO: who is missing something physical, ethical, or spiritual. They need another to be whole.
A COUNTERPART: who makes that completion come about or has qualities the hero(es) needs.
A COMPLICATION: be it a misunderstanding, personal or ethical viewpoint, physical or emotional challenge, epic historical event, the prudish disapproval of society, or an other. This is the primary source of conflict in the novel, working to keep the buddies apart, but also to pull them together.
Save the Cat! Writes a Novel Page 21