Mental health being part of the central plot?

[Lumens]

Mental heath issues can take a backstage role when the action ramps up, or drive the action itself.

Depression that totally incapacitates a person is hard to write, for reasons mentioned above. But, depression does not equate to loss of will, always. Bipolar behaviour can possibly drive a plot easier, as there are more dynamics to play with. Psychotic incidences are ripe material for writing, in my opinion.

I think that mental health issues can make a character richer. Also, since a lot of people have, or know someone who has had these kind of problems, it makes them relatable. If done right.

 

[Overread]

Few other things to keep in mind

1) Mental conditions often have simple names and classifications, but will often cover a vast array of actual levels and specific types of condition. So even if you describe it accurately it can still have significant real world variation; so there is wriggle room for your character. This is without considering if they might suffer from more than one condition.

2) Most people know little of mental conditions which can both work in a writers favour and not in their favour.
a) IT works in the writers favour in the same way most people know little of many fantasy or sci-fi topics. Ergo you can get things wrong or stretch reality and even make stuff up and you can get away with it. Some of this will even come from the practicalities of research (you can only research so far) and of writing a character and creating your own thing.

b) It works against the writer because you cannot assume empathy. If a character loses a loved one or see their home burned down most people can easily empathise with that. However a depressed character is a lot harder to empathise with (as an example). Indeed it might even make your audience hate a character.

3) You don't have to name it. In fact because of the points raised above, not naming a mental condition can work greatly in the writers favour. Indeed many heroes and characters likely have character traits that might well be what we'd consider today as borderline or even straight out mental illness. By not giving it a name in your book you can do what you want with it as you don't shackle yourself to a single condition

4) I would argue that if you are writing fantasy you might even find that naming things can start to make your fantasy world not feel as real. One has to be careful not to casually throw too many modern concepts (or perceived modern concepts) without adequate world building back up (ideally world building established earlier in the book so that it doesn't feel convenient). Otherwise you can run the risk that your story feels like modern characters in a fantasy setting. Sci-fi can often get away with this far more as people often perceive futuristic people as an evolution of today's culture.

 

[CTRandall]

It works against the writer because you cannot assume empathy. If a character loses a loved one or see their home burned down most people can easily empathise with that. However a depressed character is a lot harder to empathise with (as an example). Indeed it might even make your audience hate a character.

This can be one of the most difficult aspects. Characters with MH issues may do things that seem cold, callous, mean and/or stupid. Or they may not react at all (probably what readers hate the most). And it will be difficult to explicitly state to the reader that this is part of the MH problem. There is a careful balancing act of letting the character be the character and trying to show the reader that there are good reasons for absurd/frustrating actions and responses. Really, this is one of the reasons that mental health often carries a stigma in the real world. People can't understand why the sufferer doesn't take logical steps to help him/herself.

 

[Amelia Faulkner]

So I specifically include mental health issues within my Inheritance series. Both main characters have reacted differently to past abuse - one has normalised it so that he doesn't have to think about it too hard, and the other has developed a plethora of comorbid illnesses (comorbidity itself is vastly overlooked in fiction).

It takes research. It takes beta readers who have endured these things themselves. It takes beta readers who have the same mental health issues. But most of all it takes sensitivity and compassion. Your goal in writing truthfully about mental health is to educate, not to do harm, and even the slightest whiff of "depression made me evil now I kill all the Younglings" is incredibly harmful.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

... But most of all it takes sensitivity and compassion. Your goal in writing truthfully about mental health is to educate, not to do harm, and even the slightest whiff of "depression made me evil now I kill all the Younglings" is incredibly harmful.

As somebody with bitter experience of mental health issues (not my own), can I endorse this, which puts things very well.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

3) You don't have to name it. In fact because of the points raised above, not naming a mental condition can work greatly in the writers favour. Indeed many heroes and characters likely have character traits that might well be what we'd consider today as borderline or even straight out mental illness. By not giving it a name in your book you can do what you want with it as you don't shackle yourself to a single condition

This is an excellent point. Authors in my opinion should let the reader do as much of the "work" of a book as possible.

 

[Amelia Faulkner]

I very much liked the way Logen Ninefingers was explained to the reader: We were given more than enough information to know what his problem was, but nobody in his world understood mental illness and to them he was either a berserker or mad and that was it.

 

[Toby Frost]

Well there goes my younglings-slaughter subplot. Damn.

The not knowing the exact words is potentially very useful. With Logan, I wondered if he had a real-world condition or some kind of magical equivalent, rather than just a poorly-understood interpretation of some real condition (I suspect it doesn’t much matter, as he’s really an examination/parody of the “berserker” stereotype). The vagueness is handy: I’ve been trying to work out what’s different about a robot character, and I keep running up against the word “empathy”, which seems to mean an awful lot. It’s very difficult to pin down, and so I’m just going to avoid any technical terms and just try to explain the practical effects.