The Hard Ones
"I went from wanting to knock John down and kicking him…repeatedly, to whimpering for Lanie to give him another chance." -- Melissa, Joyfully Reviewed
Wednesday, Joan posted about pushing the boundaries. My favorite place to do this has always been in my characters. John, the hero from What Mattered Most, isn't the nicest guy at the beginning of the book. He's lost, misguided, somewhat of a jerk.
Tom, from my unpublished romantic suspense Memories of Us, takes the concept of "alpha jerk" to the next level.
So, I've usually pushed the envelope with my male characters. In my WIP, tentatively entitled Afterburn, my heroine is anything but the nice girl-next-door. In fact, she goes beyond the idea of the town bad girl. She's been the town's whore, has supported herself by stripping, and even though she's attempting to change her life, no one -- not the town, not even herself -- believes she can pull it off. I think she's the reason I'm having difficulty really making progress on the manuscript. She scares me somewhat because I know she is not only deserving of a HEA but will fight tooth and nail against reaching it because opening herself up to believe will be so difficult for her . . . and me. I'm looking forward to this book at the same time because I know this will be a character and a story that really pushes the boundaries . . . and mine.
If I could just write more than eleven lines of it!
So, to me, the most memorable characters are those outside the norm, those who push the limits in some way. Do you agree?
Wednesday, Joan posted about pushing the boundaries. My favorite place to do this has always been in my characters. John, the hero from What Mattered Most, isn't the nicest guy at the beginning of the book. He's lost, misguided, somewhat of a jerk.
Tom, from my unpublished romantic suspense Memories of Us, takes the concept of "alpha jerk" to the next level.
So, I've usually pushed the envelope with my male characters. In my WIP, tentatively entitled Afterburn, my heroine is anything but the nice girl-next-door. In fact, she goes beyond the idea of the town bad girl. She's been the town's whore, has supported herself by stripping, and even though she's attempting to change her life, no one -- not the town, not even herself -- believes she can pull it off. I think she's the reason I'm having difficulty really making progress on the manuscript. She scares me somewhat because I know she is not only deserving of a HEA but will fight tooth and nail against reaching it because opening herself up to believe will be so difficult for her . . . and me. I'm looking forward to this book at the same time because I know this will be a character and a story that really pushes the boundaries . . . and mine.
If I could just write more than eleven lines of it!
So, to me, the most memorable characters are those outside the norm, those who push the limits in some way. Do you agree?
Labels: Linda's Posts
posted by Linda Winfree at 6:30 AM
2Comments:
I do agree. I blogged about this myself about a week ago, because a post of Theresa's reminded me of Liza Cody's character Eva Wylie. A character that pushes the boundaries if ever I saw one, and very successful because of it. Good luck getting to line 12 on the WIP :).
I agree with Michelle. I had a twisted character in a story that was published in an anthology in 2004, and I've always thought I should write a book about her. She was definitely one of my best characters. It's hard to make your characters "more" than those you've written already, but worth the effort!
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