On characters winning the lottery
One of the things that annoys me in series characters is when they start off like the rest of us, living paycheck to paycheck, worried about the bills and how to pay for the car repairs and then halfway through the series they win the lottery and don’t have work anymore.
I don’t mind when “wealthy” is an already established characteristic, such as with John Sandford’s Lucas Davenport. That’s just part of the deal. It gives Davenport options he wouldn’t otherwise have, and that’s fair.
But otherwise it’s just implausible. Most of us are hoping we’ll win the lottery but we won’t. And I think authors fail readers when they give characters an easy way out like this. Most of us aren’t going to win the lottery. We are going to continue to live paycheck to paycheck, worrying about money and doing our best to have a good life despite its constraints.
Maybe winning the lottery is basically what happened with the author but for most of us, while our material conditions may sometimes improve over time, rarely is to the extent that we can rest easy now. Even the people I know who have retired with defined pensions worry their pensions won’t be enough.
I don’t want to see characters win the lottery. That’s not interesting or inspirational to me. I want characters who use their grit, intelligence, courage, and relationships to make the world a better place. I’m not interested in seeing them join the oppressor class.
If they do, then I want it to be because the author is interested in exploring the implications of that, the way Terry Pratchett does when Sam Vimes gets married. The marriage, while ensuring Sam is materially well provided for, complicates his life rather than simplifying it (though he is also happier, which I’ll allow).