McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Attachment to characters.

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Spectacular Sameth:
I just realized part of my disgust with myself. Part of what made it hard for me to hurt my character was that I wrote about her hatching in the first chapter. In a sense I feel like I gave birth to her. I watched through the eyes of her parents as she hatched, squeaking innocently inside her egg. I also watched her grow up, oblivious to the fact that she was going to do great harm to her throat to save a loved one.


Maaan...I feel like even more of a bastard since I remembered the hatching scene.

skaoi:
are you a parent in the real world, sameth? 

be at peace. 

part of the process...the joy...and the pain...is letting go and allowing them to choose their path.  she made the decision that lead to the damage to her throat.  that she made the decision based on the idea it would benefit someone else shows that you have been a good parent and raised her to know compassion.

ultimately, everything will work out.  perhaps not as you expect...but it will work out just the same.

Spectacular Sameth:
Yeah, I guess you're right. I mean, it DID work out right in the end, so I shouldn't feel too bad. (Though her comic version...who has broken the fourth wall by now...isn't too happy with me about what happens to her book counterpart.)

But no, I'm not a parent in real life. My characters are my only creations.

Dom:
...I love putting my characters through hell.  Although I do like to give them appropriate triumphs to balance it, that's my consolidation for the hell they go through.  But as was mentioned earlier, characters won't grow and become interesting unless you put them through the wringer sometimes, and you wouldn't have a story.

For example, take my character Dominick.  He starts out as an insecure, although mouthy, teenaged geek.  He ends up as a highly dangerous demon lord.  The path wasn't all sunshine and roses--there were a lot of severe bumps and setbacks along the way.  If I did any less, he would simply be unbelievable (or a psychopath).  The harm that was done to him was necessary to make the correct changes in his personality for the story to work.

I guess it helps that I'm a surviver-type myself; I'm patient enough to know that "all things must pass" with time.  So my characters stick it out with me, knowing I plan some pretty awesome things for them in the future.

Hope:
Readers HATE it when a good character is killed. Read a mystery series by a Brit & was about a male detective and the author killed him off & had his wife take over.  Since then I read the end of a book. >:(

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