busyI have a few characters who aren't closely connected to anyone. But most of my characters exist within a fairly strong network of relationships, some larger and some smaller. Fiorenza the Wisewoman has a whole village around her, and Hart's Farm is similarly a meshed community. Monster House is a family that includes female members. The Adventures of Aldornia and Zenobia, The Origami Mage, and Path of the Paladins all feature female dyads. The Steamsmith has a single female lead, but one who clearly maintains ties of friendship, family, and professional camaraderie with a bunch of different people. Any individual character might get stuck having to solve a specific problem alone, but most of the time, they have people to call on if they need help. They don't have to do everything. There's opportunity to compensate for each other's strengths and weaknesses.
As a writer, it is a great deal harder to run characters with few or no ties. Seriously. Ever see this problem in a gaming party where there's one character who's a loner and keeps wandering off, even if others are in danger? Now compare that to any of the buddy or romantic pairs in a party, who are very easy to involve. Our connections provide resources, challenges, and motivations.
If none of the other characters in the story are connected with the hera, why should the readers care about her? Chances are, they won't. If she has parents, siblings, children, friends, coworkers, or even enemies who care what happens to her (in various ways and directions) then she matters more. What happens to her, the decisions she makes, those things ripple outward. What happens to other people affect the hera too. So it's a lot easier to move the plot -- and the readers.
Yes, I notice this when I'm looking at my work en masse. I write hundreds of poems a year. But new series start comparatively rarely. You're picking those poems and asking what happens next, for good reasons. It's not just a story seed, although that's a common thread too. Almost all of them feature strong characters, connected characters. That matters to you and the story, based on the total sample mass. Very few series are based on a setting or idea. I'm thinking maybe half of them even have an obvious plot course to start with, although they do tend to have action that suggests more to come. It's the characters that hook you.
That's cool, because characters are what hook me most often too. Sometimes it is setting or plot or idea or theme. But the vast majority of time, it's people.
January 30 2013, 17:39:27 UTC 8 years ago
I have one who lives in her office, with a pull-down murphy bed, a hot-plate, and her only relative is her cousin, who brings her coffee and aspirin every Friday morning because she's always hung over. (Jinx loves DJ and shows it with coffee. DJ barely tolerates Jinx) The point of the story is how this situation changes. The man she falls for saves the world by being magically connected to hundreds of people.
I have one man who has a ship so tiny it's basically a chair and console on an engine. If he wants a bed or real food, he has to land. The only person he talks to is his brother, and they're half a galaxy apart. Again, the point of the whole novel is him discovering that attachment isn't bad and learning to depend on someone else.
There is a place for the loner. I like Anita Blake in the first books when she is not entangled with anyone, but rather working with a lot of people. But she still goes home alone and sleeps with a stuffed penguin. I love that.
Thoughts
January 30 2013, 19:48:34 UTC 8 years ago
Point, that's a good reliable plot too.
January 30 2013, 20:13:51 UTC 8 years ago
Not being able to handle their characters and the characters' inter-relationships well is what ruins many a beginning writer's short stories, novels or poems.
"Our connections provide resources, challenges, and motivations."
Solid gold writing advice!
"It's the characters that hook you."
ALWAYS!
:)
Thank you!
January 30 2013, 20:25:31 UTC 8 years ago
I'm glad you found this so useful.
>>Not being able to handle their characters and the characters' inter-relationships well is what ruins many a beginning writer's short stories, novels or poems.<<
Agreed, and that problem can also occur later in people's careers.
>>"Our connections provide resources, challenges, and motivations."
Solid gold writing advice!
"It's the characters that hook you."
ALWAYS!<<
I will add that those observations apply to my writing and my audience. They are widely applicable, but not universal. Some people really do prefer writing and reading stories of plot or idea, and consider characters a distraction: that's a very broad trend in hard science fiction.
As is often true of what I say, these things work, but they are not necessarily the only things that work.