This week: Care About Your Characters Edited by: Kit  
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It is a wonderful feeling to get absorbed in a real page turner. However, if all the focus is on the action and adventure, characters can become bland and unmemorable.
This week's Action/Adventure newsletter is, therefore, all about the importance of multidimensional heroes and heroines.
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I like a novel that’s so fast-paced that I simply have to keep turning the pages, as I can’t wait to see what will happen next. The kind of story that you read in a single day, or a single night. I’ve taken a book to bed before with the intention of reading a few pages before I go to sleep, only to feel wide awake at 4 am, mesmerized by the fictional world I’m exploring.
I like such novels, but sometimes when I finish one, I feel that I don’t truly know the characters. There was so much action going on that the characters appeared to be a secondary consideration. I didn’t manage to grow attached to them along the way. And that’s not good. As much as I liked the read, I wouldn’t pick up the book again or recommend it to others.
A well-developed character is likely to be a memorable one. I will never forget Raistlin and Tasslehoff Burrfoot from the DragonLance novels. I admired the character of Auriane, the heroine of Donna Gillespie’s The Light Bearer. I’m truly fond of a variety of characters from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels. They may be fictional, but I have laughed and cried with them and throughout their journeys, I have grown to care about their fate.
When you care about a character, it’s as if you’re there with them, sharing their experiences. You want them to do well. You want them to have a happy ending. This is especially the case if you can identify with them, or with certain aspects of their personality or background.
That doesn’t mean that a character has to be a goody two-shoes. Whilst most of us probably like to see ourselves as good, I also think that most would agree with me when I say that we all have our flaws. Therefore, we can accept and understand when characters in novels are flawed. It tends to make them more interesting.
Going back to the DragonLance novels, Tanis never appealed to me. He was such a “good” character on the whole, that he came across as rather bland. I feel the same way about Cyclops from the X-Men comics. The strongest feeling I had about him was mild irritation.
Of course, character development throughout a story is important. Humans learn and grow with experience, and the same should be true for a fictional hero or heroine. It would be unnatural to remain completely unchanged when there is all that action and adventure going on, and you’re caught up in it. That development doesn’t have to be for the better, either. Different experiences have a different impact, and some scars can remain.
Unpredictability can be a bonus. When a character does something that I didn’t expect, it piques my interest. It’s like a twist in a story line, something that I didn’t see coming. It might even make me think and reevaluate what I thought about the character or the story as a whole. There has to be a balance, though. If a character gets too unpredictable, there is a risk that I’ll feel that the author doesn’t know them, so how could I be expected to…
I don’t claim to be an experienced novel writer, or short story writer, but when characters do come to life in my imagination there is a lot to explore about them. Personality traits, little quirks, the history that’s shaped them, their motives, hopes and dreams… I try to get these across to the reader, so that they can form their own opinion.
I do have a lot of experience as a reader, and I feel that it’s a shame when a character slips away without making an impression on me. For the duration of a novel, or series of novels, I want them to be my fictional friends.
Fast-paced action is good. Loads of adventure is good. Do keep me up all night, if you like – I will forgive you, as you will have made it worthwhile with your talent. Just please… let it not be all about the thrills, and give me some insight into your heroes and heroines. They have introduced themselves to you, so please let me know them, too.
Kit
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Action/Adventure: August 14, 2024 Issue [#12683]
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