Deus ex Machina

Or, God from the Machine, is defined as an unsolvable situation or plot point resolved by the introduction of a previously-unknown character. It is a common feature in movies and (less so) in books. For those who’ve seen the movie, “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” there is a fantastic example: where did NSA computer tech Ed Needham get that rifle? You know, the one he used to… I’ll leave it there. (If you haven’t seen the movie, don’t worry. There are many (way too many) other DeM’s in the film.)

Well, I happily discovered this week that sometimes a DeM happens in real life. Writing about how a person died from an unusual, and quite frankly impossible, injury, I pulled ideas from guesstimates offered up by some other people. The situation was, I had a character who died from an injury that would be impossible to happen. Wow, it’s hard not to just give this plot point away. Anyway, most everyone looked at the injury and decided that the injury would cause a specific type of death. Oh, crap, that explanation sucks, but trust me. It’s cool. Trust me.

So, I begin writing with the crowdsourced cause of death. The day before, I reached out to a doctor and author who offers his medical advice to writers puzzled about causes of death, autopsies, injuries, etc. His name is D.P. Lyle, MD. I have two of his books on murder and autopsy but neither covered my particular situation. So, I wrote an email to ask about my way of killing people. (Dear NSA, I’m talking about killing characters in a book. Love, Stephen) To my surprise, the very next day I had an answer. This was my personal DeM, as I was only three or four paragraphs in on my cause of death. Not only was the crowdsourced cause of death completely wrong, but Lyle offered up such a complete description that I was able to easily rewrite what I had already done. Additionally, the description set up so much to come in the story that I now have quite a bit of the plot surrounding causes of death sketched out.

So. Beautiful Deus ex Machina swoops in and saves my story and adds credibility and realism to a supernatural story. In short, D.P. Lyle rescued my novel.