Narrative on this post (002)
The house needed more introduction. Did it have a dark aspect? Was there another house close by? I chose a lake because it made sense from the point of view of Marcy - her focus, at this time, is the sound and general feel of the house. A lake provides a relatively complex source of potential memories as well as being as a prime move in its own right. In addition, the lake is not natural ... so the aspect of it being man-made adds to the layering.
I also am using the lake for character development. There are only two ways to develop character of which I am aware - response and recollection. You might have a character that *appears* two-dimensional that eventually develops a great deal of depth ... not because they change who they are or their perspective, but because their real nature is revealed. This depth might be established via general dialogue, dialogue in response to the established present, or behavior that reflects a response to the new, or newly acknowledged, introduction of some new event. The depth might also be established via retrospect - remembering the past can often shed light on the current motivations for a character's actions.
In fact, one might establish characters as believable based simply on whether the motivations are realistic and whether the motivations might realistically be the driving force for someone to act in the way that the character is painted. If the motivations, in addition to being emotionally valid, are complex enough to resemble a real person, but simple enough to resemble a single view-point, a character may often be identifiable - enough that the reader develops a relationship with them. The danger for character development, at that point, is consistency. It is quite easy to develop a character over time comprised of obvious and arcane events and some reasonable dialogue. Throw in a real time, place, or reference, and the character will "come alive".
But the very things that can define a person well early in the story can often destroy the relevance or validity of that same person in later chapters. If you have a vegetarian who became a lover of animals and respecter of all life in response to growing up in Southern California suddenly fall in love with a game hunter, you'd better have a really good reason. Perhaps a death in the family, chemical inducement, or a con artist might all be reliable motivators ... or perhaps it simply isn't possible for the vegetarian to undergo such a drastic change. The real rule of thumb is to act like the vegetarian is real person; if we assign the name "Nikki" to the vegetarian and then, within a few chapters of introducing Nikki, she's suddenly fallen in love with "George", the game hunter, why? Did George grow up in the same town as Nikki and so she's always harbored some fundamental attraction? Is Nikki secretly a hater of animals and has been trying to get back at the ones that killed her parents? Is it that George believes he should give up animal hunting because of some newly developed affection for Nikki?
Or is it an arbitrary plot twist you've included?
Narrative on this post (002)
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