Have you ever been writing and realized that you didn’t like a character?
I started a character that wasn’t at all like me. I thought it would be good to stretch myself and write a girl who is very shy and introverted and I don’t like her. The story is supposed to be her story, but I don't care enough about her to finish what I started. Right now I want to write it all from the boy because he’s an awesome character. I’m just curious if any else has written something and then realized that they just don’t like their person?
I’ve actually scrapped this project and used some of her stuff for another character instead.
But the boy? He’s SO going to be my next story.
It will never cease to amaze me at how alive my characters are.
Have you had similar experiences? Or used parts of one project for another?
I usually find my characters evolve over time and that helps the likability factor. Frankly shy is too "real life" if you know what I mean. So go with the boy.
ReplyDeleteMy characters change, too. I kept waiting for me to fall in love with her, and I just never did. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteI had a brilliant idea for a play, a comedy about a woman who needed to "find" herself (I SO hate that phrase) and her husband was pretty much a milquetoast so the project went nowhere. I put it away thinking I'd get back to it later. So later...TWENTY YEARS later... I got back to the story. Rereading it I saw some little sparkles that I could work with, but until I made the husband a real person instead of a buffoon, the story didn't take off. When I began to respect him, he began to talk to me and tell me how he felt about what his wife was doing. THEN the story took off, and I won't say the story wrote itself, but it became a novel instead of a play and one book became a trilogy. A publisher is now reading the manuscript and I am hopeful.
ReplyDeleteI am trying to combine two stories. I like both characters but each story had weaknesses where the other had strengths. I hope it works.
ReplyDelete