Monetary restrictions have been a driving force of creativity in many artistic fields. In film especially the limitation summed up in the expression, “If you want ten explosions, you have to make ten explosions.” The infinite imagination pulled down to earth by the finite resources at hand. Scenes are rewritten. Cinematography techniques modified or invented whole cloth. The artist is forced to rethink, reevaluate, and recreate. Novels don’t have that issue. As George R.R. Martin said of one iron throne concept art, “To build this monstrosity would blow the budget of an entire episode and it wouldn’t fit in the set. […] This is the difference between books and television. I can say, ‘Well The Wall is seven hundred feet high.’ I don’t actually have to build a seven hundred foot high wall.”
A few keystrokes and anything the writer thinks up goes in. It’s the simplest conversion from idea to art. But there’s a cost, a crutch for the inexperienced or self-indulgent. A thousand people fight on a battlefield, then with minimal effort: ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a million. But how does that change affect your story? One character stands out easier amongst a thousand rather than a million. Can all those men and their supplies cross the same rickety bridge? How are they being fed? What geography could support that many people? Revising a word or two is easy. The only problem is the thousands of other words it impacts.
On an in-universe practicality level you should reign in indulgences but likewise, protect your brain. Have a scene where two armies fight. Brainstorm what they know of the other, their plans, how they’ll execute those plans, which one makes the first move, how does the other react, how does the first react to that reaction, etc. If it were five armies? How does the first army react to the reaction of the second army reacting to the reaction of the third army to the fourth army’s reaction to the fifth army’s advance? You’re the writer. The audience is asking you. If it hurts your brain thinking about it, it’s tenfold for the audience. Imagine the time spent outlining that battle and ask yourself if it’s worth including the real thing.
One crutch I fell for time and time again as a new writer was seemingly infinite wealth. I always took otherwise drab, plodding scenes and grafted incalculable wealth to every object. There can’t be just shrimp with cocktail sauce but rather gold leafed shrimp circling a crystal glass with a black truffle cocktail sauce. We all have our shortcuts to attention be it an excess display of money or loud noises or physical appeal. When I finally, painful at the delay, awoke to the habit it felt like dangling keys in front of an infant. What’s the point of all that money? It’s not even real. Do I need to reiterate it?
Restrictions are a great way for new writers to hone their skills. It forces utilization of the fundamentals and brings them out their comfort zone. Thus my recommendation is to write a story involving regular people of modest means. Root it in reality and make it interesting. It can be difficult. There are far fewer crutches besides showing the poorest of the poor that has ever poored. But the point isn’t negativity as the characters wallow in poverty. The characters (passable in their actions as real people) will attempt to better their lives.
You should match that headspace, scraping together the story’s meager elements and making the most of them. How much does it mean to a fresh glass of water, without asking, for someone whose beater car just broke down? It’s deceiving to call these low stakes because the characters’ precarious financial states means they’re always at risk of losing what little they have. Every action has immense consequences. A shovel slips off a garage wall: the character can’t risk it hitting them in the foot as even a couple broken toes could prevent them from getting to work or working at all. It’s the same affliction that gives wild animals lower the life expectancies than their domesticated counterparts. There’s a constant, elevated level of anxiety due to an increased perception of threats (that’d make a good psychological thriller). There’s tension in every scene as nothing can afford to go wrong. Each decision, especially around money (making and spending), has increased weight. A careful balancing act over the choice to spend an extra two dollars to get meat with pasta to satiate the wailing stomach as the brain cries over the opportunity cost. Will the character lose it if they don’t order the meatballs or chicken breast then and there?
When everything rests on an edge the smallest details have incredible power. What’s the exact sound the car makes as it gasses up the onramp? How far off is the next holiday to avail work exhaustion and let off steam? How close behind is the police cruiser as a flurry of traffic laws cloud the mind and degrade driving ability? Was the last customer’s smile polite or smug? All these things can break someone on the edge.
Since poverty is a common theme in literary subgenres, go full povertypunk if it works for the story. The everyday degradation and stress of being broke fitted into a consistent ascetic as it colors everything from clothes to drywall. It’s also a critique of those subgenres in the way they ask the reader to imagine a world with a drastic discrepancy between the rich and poor. As if to say, “I don’t have to imagine at all. What’s the buy-in here? Rocket boots?”
You don’t have to invest years crafting an epic. I’d recommend, at first, a low budget short story. Once you’ve internalized restraint, then go ahead with a low budget novel if you wish. If not then take the lessons and apply them to your next story. Keep the stakes high but accessible. Consequences that foster constant, elevated tension. Then at the story’s climax levy the full scale upon the reader whom you’ve guided along with relative crumbs. Go for broke.
An aside — the simplicity of writing compared to other arts: “Representing the rejection of an idea? Hmm… Strikethrough.” *Keystroke* *Keystroke* “Moving on.”
Colin Klawans 