Pick Me!
I was never picked for kickball. Or dodgeball. But when basketball season rolled around, my height (almost 5'10" or so--I don't know, it's been ages since I checked--but I was this tall by 8th grade) meant . . . very often I was picked first.
Then the age of school dances started rolling around. Can't say I was picked often to dance. (Taller than all the boys.) But THEN . . . I stopped caring about being picked. And I started being the first person on the dance floor at weddings--often dragging some poor guy with me . . . but not always. I just stopped caring and did things by myself--went to movies and to restaurants and to bars and to museums. I would go to parties I was invited to alone, without a date, and leave with half a dozen new friends and acquaintances.
So I started thinking about characters. WHY do I pick a certain character to tell a story? Sometimes, right at the beginning, if it's first person, for example, I know that I will GAIN something when I tell the story (often a distinct voice) and LOSE something (not having other POVs to help out my storytelling).
But that makes it sound like a kickball game. Like I am lining everyone up against the schoolyard fence and PICKING.
And it's not like that. NOW they pick ME.
I can argue with them. BELIEVE ME, I've tried. "Well, now, Jules, the fact that you are in a coma makes your narrative a little teensy-weensy bit inconvenient."
But generally, they ignore me. I suppose they are rather like me, after all. They are fine marching in all by themselves, they are comfortable with their flaws . . . they don't care if they are inconvenient.
Recently, after 11 years of disowning them, my mother-in-law saw my children. She asked them how old they were and I suppose (I wasn't there) asked what their hobbies were and whether they were good students. She filled them with thoughts that she might actually see them again. And it's been well over a month and they never heard from her again. I imagine that the pain of being dropped again, of not being "picked" really, frankly, sucks. And I suppose that was why at other times, I have rather resisted them seeing her, since I know her true colors. But I hope I have raised them to not care if they are picked or not. To be inconvenient. To hold fast to their own beliefs. To not be afraid in a room full of people of ONE opinion, to have another opinion, if that is what their conscience tells them is truth.
In fact, I tend to think my children picked me as a mother. I can't say why . . . though it's generally a Buddhist belief. But I feel we were destined for each other.
So it is with my characters.
My characters pick me. I don't know why. I am not sure what the process is exactly. They seem to have their own consciences . . . their own truths. They don't wait to be picked. They come and march into my head and take up space.
Speaking of being picked . . . here are the five winners. Here's the deal . . . first come, first served on book choice (as in email me first and you have dibs). Email me at erica@ericaorloff.com with your book choice (1st, 2nd, 3rd choice as outlined in 1,000!!! below) and mailing address. JLC (the little chick was a fave), Richmond Writer (the blonde thing), Kath Calarco (sexy pose), KathArine (cute kid making a face--wise move!), and BeingBeth (he thought you looked "nice"). Lurker Monkey was first choice (come on! his icon is a monkey at a typewriter!!) but he bowed out--he's in my crit group and has my books already.
All right then . . . tell me WHY you picked your main character . . . and what the process was? Or were YOU picked instead?
26 comments:
My characters definitely pick themselves, and sometimes they introduce me to their friends.
Annoying as it is to not have supreme control over my writing, my characters have better instincts than I do, evidently.
Maybe if I were a lucid dreamer, I would be a lucid writer, too.
Heather:
You know, every time I have tried to "force" myself to take on a character . . . I end up abandoning it until the character takes possession.
E
I'm not sure I pick them, actually. I still feel like there's a lot I don't know about Derek Stillwater, and I had ideas of what I thought he would be like and there was some rational thinking going on in terms of his characteristics, and then ... this slightly crazy guy shows up.
I've written one manuscript featuring a political consultant named Austin Davis and although I had some clues to who he was, his voice shocked me in a lot of ways, because he was soooooo different than my other characters. Very smart, very funny, a clothes horse, rather vain and arrogant, but passionate about what he does, fairly manipulative, but I think in a good way ... and that's just not the kind of character I usually write about. But there he was, perfect for the story.
Mark:
Like I said . . . sometimes the ones who show up and pick me are terribly inconvenient.
It's funny . . . I adored Jules in Freudian Slip and was so used to him after working on the book for well over a year--and pitching it two years before that!--that I kind of forgot what a jerk he was, how atypical for a romance. Then a few reviews cited that as a pleasant surpise but a surprise/shock nonetheless, and I realized my whole barometer of romantic hero is completely off. They just pick me.
E
Congrats to the winners!
I can't really say if I pick my characters or if they pick me. They just arrive in my head and I help get them on paper. Since I don't try to come up with them and they just appear as is, they must pick me. When I need a sibling or friend, they just materialize and I don't have much influence over how they look.
Oh, Erica! My mom read Freudian Slip and loved it. :)
Melanie:
Glad she liked it!
And yeah . . . not only do they arrive--they bring their friends and sidekicks.
E
I think in the past I've been an imperious god ... meaning that I often forced characters to do things because I needed them to do it. Lately, I've gotten better at asking them what they prefer to do.
And, by the way, I'm totally enamored of a character that came out of the writing prompt from over on my blog. I love this guy. He'll almost definitely appear somewhere, later on.
As for being a cute monkey, don't blame me. I was born this way.
"I hope I have raised them to not care if they are picked or not. To be inconvenient. To hold fast to their own beliefs. To not be afraid in a room full of people of ONE opinion, to have another opinion, if that is what their conscience tells them is truth."
There are other things too, but if you help them be what you describe above, you will have been a great mother!
Lurker:
You know, I have a zillion things on my plate--but that's why I am committing to doing the monthly prompt. Because it shakes things loose and you never know where it's gonna go.
And just what I need. A cute monkey with an ego. ;-)
E
Joe:
That is one of the things I hope more than anything--that I have helped them to be people of conscience. Their own, hopefully divinely and spiritually guided.
E
The characters I'm picking now include a homeless schizophrenic man whose one prized possession is a toy from the 60s called The Thing. Or did he pick me? Hmm...
BTW, my story Bob Johnson Being Pushed Out of a Helicopter is up over at Jon's today. Everyone is invited to come and rake me over the coals.
Congrats to the winners!
Sometimes a story line will come first, but lately, it's the character who walks into my head and then demands I come up with the bones of the story. And then that character runs away with the book somewhere around the middle. It's the battle between 'the story runs this way' and 'the character goes that way'.
I think they pick me.
And I was often picked last and not popular at all with the boys, etc.
Oh YAY! Congrats to the others as well!
My characters pick me. They just hop into my head without invitation and leave loads of dirty laundry for me to sort though.
I am in a similar boat with my children. They don't know who my MIL is. (Which is a good thing)
Sometimes I think it's too bad we can't pick our parents/grandparents (after the fact and we know more about them), but at least we do get to pick our inner circle of friends. Took me awhile to learn to be choosy in that regard though.
Oliver has been with me since the first book I tried to write 2nd semester of freshmen year. Then he had no motivation, no real goals, and was about as interesting as a stump.
In ESCAPADE, I'm finally able to understand who Oliver is. He's easy to write because, whether I like it or not, he's a lot like me. From his outgoing sense of style to his everchanging emotions, he reminds me of myself.
The other characters do get some spotlight in the story whenever Oliver isn't with them, but none of them have started speaking to me as clearly as Oliver...yet.
-J.T.
Trinidad is irresistible to me, and he has the furthest to go on his journey. Also the story centers on him and his actions. That he's smokin' hot doesn't hurt (though he's gay and wouldn't be interested in me at all.)
Where he came from, I've no idea. I just pictured him striding across my churchyard one day before service, checking imaginary walls topped with razor wire to make sure all was well. Now he won't go away.
I'm also not fond of bit character narration, though some writers make it work well.
Jude:
I've always thought it was an incredible challenge to choose characters with unusual narrative voices. Or . . . again, have them choose you.
E
sarah:
My height always went against me with boys. But I was also always intrigued by the ones who DIDN'T let it bother them and were self-confident in that way.
E
JLC:
I consider it a good thing, though very sad she made that choice.
E
JT:
Funny . . . but I have had some characters appear--with no real storyline. As you say, as interesting as a stump. But then they hang around for a while and pick a book to be in. ;-)
E
sex scenes:
I don't like bit character narration either . . . but . . . you know, I suppose it's a particular kind of narrative challenge.
E
I was never picked for dodgeball either. Teams usually felt stuck with me. Obviously sports wasn't my calling. I knew I found my place in the universe with writing because I got picked. I've always felt that my characters picked me, (and I always have felt my kids did too). I like being picked. It works for me.
And it's nice to know that Demon Baby picked me as well!
I don't think my characters came to me fully formed enough to say "pick me." The one I liked as a wise old woman just sort of slipped away and came back as a button pusher. Maybe wisdom was never a part of my life, button pushers though, sigh. Write what you know.
Being Beth:
Works for me too. I remember "being picked" by character at 17. He would not leave me alone. For YEARS until I put him in a short story. The story didn't work, but then I used the first line of it for The Roofer many years later. See? Even LINES pick me.
E
Richmond:
I don't know . . . sometimes if they hang around long enough, they become something else.
;-)
E
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