Low Stakes are not the same as Poor Stakes

Why the term 'high stakes' doesn't work for cosy or comedy fiction

I saw a really good thread about Stakes by author Alyssa Matessic, which is worth reading in full. She made some really good points about stakes in general, but it got me thinking that perhaps we need to stop talking about high stakes and low stakes as if they are good and bad.

High vs Low Stakes

To my mind, high stakes means escalating challenges, each outdoing the first until it becomes impossible. Things are life and death, which is great if you are writing about a megalomaniacal dragon lord taking over a world (very fitting in the current climate too, I might add), but what about quieter/cosy stories, where does that leave them?

I’ve read a few light academia and cosy/cozy novels in the last couple of years where the stakes for the characters were not so much life and death, but no less gripping or engaging. I think this also might apply to more humorous books generally, but also romance novels or that sticky group of books we sometimes refer to as ‘women’s fiction’.

Examples I can think of include with the stakes:

Sorcery & Small Magics by Maiga Doocy - a silly magic spell goes wrong and the MC can’t fix it

The Dangerous Damsels series by India Holton - piratic ladies attempt to steal things whilst drinking tea

The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong - a fortune teller tries to escape a troubled past

The Lonely Hearts Quiz League by Lauren Farnsworth - five troubled strangers enter a pub quiz tournament in London

Winter’s Wishfall by Ceri Houlbrook - a woman accepts a lucrative but mysterious research job on a remote island in the Hebrides

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams - a twenty something woman tries to keep her job and get over a long term break-up.

In all of these books, the characters face challenges and struggles that build, they might be small world problems, with little risk of death or a dragon-overlord swooping in, but it’s about how the stakes affect the characters and crucially how well they are framed.

High stakes are big, world-changing or life-changing problems. Low stakes might be small problems, easily overcome, but they mean the world to the characters.

Character Stakes

It’s well known that if you come to care about the characters, you will come to care about what happens to them. On the surface, their character stakes might be small or low risk, but over the course of the book it’s how these stakes are framed and delivered that ensures they are good stakes.

If we look at TV and films, particularly comedies or feel-good films, it’s easier to see how this works.

A great example is the romantic comedy film While You Were Sleeping, starring Sandra Bullock and Bill Pullman. Character Lucy’s stakes are small; she’s working a dead-end job, facing Christmas alone, wants to go to Italy and for the handsome Peter to ask her out on a date. As the film progresses, she saves his life and gets mistaken for narcissistic Peter’s fiance, whilst he is in a coma in hospital, and his eccentric family takes her under their wing. Lucy is lonely and the family are so welcoming. She know how to correct the misunderstanding without upsetting Peter’s family. Meanwhile, Peter’s boy-next-door brother Jack suspects all is not as it seems. Lucy is far too nice for Peter, not really his type, more Jack’s type in fact…

It’s such a great film, but you wouldn’t describe the stakes as ‘high’. She’s not going to lose her job, she’s still going to carry on with her life whether things work out or not. However, the stakes are really important to Lucy, and because she’s a lovely, relatable character, we come to care about her and can’t help but be engaged as this simple misunderstanding reaches it’s climax. These are good, small-world stakes. Dare I say ‘low’ stakes? Maybe, but not bad ones.

While You Were Sleeping | Heartstopper

In Heartstopper, by Alice Oseman, we care about Charlie and Nick, want them to pass their school exams, find acceptance among their peers and fall in love. Everyone does exams and struggles to find their place at school, and because everyone has been through this difficult time, we already know what to expect, but because of how the books and show portray the characters we become endeared to them, invested in the outcome of the story, so that these low stakes matter, as much to us as to them.

So instead of talking about stakes that are high and low, big or small, perhaps we should talk about whether they are good stakes or bad, or more importantly about how well they are framed.