Main Character and Resolution?

by Arianna
(MD)

Question My main character is a seven-year-old girl. Throughout the story she solves most of her problems unaided, although at times someone helps her out, because she IS just a kid after all. The climax of my story comes very close to the end, during a huge, violent gunfight in which she is involved. After the huge fight scene is a chapter that takes place a week afterwards, when the main character finally achieves her goal. My problem is this:

Is that a cheesy, cheap way of solving a goal?
and
She fights through the whole book to achieve this goal, and then at the end after the fight, all she has to do is ask for it and she achieves it. Is that bad? I kind of feel like the reader might feel cheated or that my MC needs to work harder for it at the end than she actually does.
Thanks :)

Answer: The last scene, where she gets her goal, may simply be your illustration of the Judgement. The Judgement shows whether the main character is better off at the end of the story, as a result of the decision she makes at her personal climax.

For example... if you've ever seen the film The Incredibles, one of the arcs concerns a superpowered girl named Violet who, in the beginning, is too shy to talk to the boy she likes at school. During the film, she goes on an adventure with her family, gains confidence in herself and her powers, and is able to help defeat the villain.

At the end, we see Violet back at school. The boy comes up to her, wanting to ask her out. But he is so nervous he gets tongue-tied. However, because of her new-found confidence, the girl is able to finish his sentence for him and essentially asks him out.

Assuming the right decision for your character is to change, the trick is to show her in a tough situation (her personal crisis) where she must decide whether or not to change. Then, her decision to change must be the decisive factor that allows the story goal (defeating the villain) to be achieved. You don't want her to just hide while the adults do the fighting. You want her to do something that decides the outcome of the fight, and it should be something she could never have done before she decided to change.

Then, when she gets what she wants in the last scene, it won't seem cheesy. The reader will see that she deserves to get what she wants because she has become a different person, one more worthy of the reward.

Also, bear in mind that the thing she gets in the end may be her personal goal, but the overall story goal is the goal that involves most of the characters - including all the characters in the big battle.

The end of the story should show that the Outcome (success) has made things better for everyone, for the story world. The Judgement shows that the main character is personally better off.