The Art of Writing, Theme

When you google Theme you will see the following sentence.  “In contemporary literary studies, a theme is the central topic, subject, or concept the author is trying to point out.”  This is an excellent explanation and now let's put this to work.

In 'The Regulators,' the premise is, 'no one escapes justice.'  How you show this in the course of the novel is the central theme and how your protagonist deals with the central theme makes compelling story telling.  My protagonist was not happy how justice was dispensed and this created a conflict in her.  She had one idea of justice and the writer, me, had another point of view.  However, at the end of the novel, the character reconciled with the way justice was dispensed. 

Some literary people often call the theme 'leitmotiv' when referring to the story and the development of the thematic meaning, yet in the end the writing stands by itself.

One of the first things I learned years ago in my writing class was something that our writing group  always told a new writer wanting to join our group.  "Your writing must stand by itself.  You will not be in the room to explain the meaning of what you have written."  This sound easy but holds so true.