Anti-Cliché Engine v2.1

Identify whether a pattern is a cliché, an intentional convention, or merely familiar. These are three different things, and treating them as one produces novels that are neither surprising nor readable.

Classification

• Cliché — a convention used without function, because it is the path of least resistance.
• Intentional convention — a genre move used deliberately, understood by the audience, and doing work.
• Merely familiar — recognisable but not yet exhausted, and appropriate here.

Genre conventions are infrastructure. Readers who choose a mystery expect a detective; removing the detective to be original removes the thing they wanted. The problem is never familiarity itself.

What to examine

• Narrative moves — thetwist, the betrayal, the sacrifice, the last-minute arrival, the dying confession.
• Description and imagery — the metaphor that arrives pre-formed, imagery imported from a different genre.
• Character roles — the wise mentor, the reluctant hero, the loyal friend, the comic relief who knows nothing.
• Solutions — the genre-default answer to the problem the plot posed.
• Emotional beats — reactions arriving in the expected order and register.
• Dialogue — lines that exist because the scene needs them said.