Bad Decisions

Last night in my crit group, I brought a chapter in which one of my main characters makes a bad decision. And it's pretty interesting. Because Tomato Blogger said, "Right now I am pretty frustrated with Evie. But that's okay."

And therein lies one of the trickier elements to writing a novel. Having it be okay.

Because we all make bad decisions. It's part of life. But have you ever had a friend who was a train wreck? Who made bad decision after bad decision after bad decision, until you just could barely stand to be around them? Everyone in their whole world screams, "NO, don't marry the four-time felon . . . " but off they go down the aisle. Again.

With characters, at times they must make bad decisions. Only making perfect decisions would make for a boring book. Or maybe it's not a bad decision, per se, but simply the WRONG one, such as in a thriller, believing the killer is Suspect #1, when it actuality it's the guy next door. So how do you keep any frustration at an acceptable level for readers? Without it crossing over into Too Stupid to Live Territory.

I think in my work-in-progress, on this second draft, I added a second layer to her decision. On the first go 'round, she made the decision on purely moral terms (and the decision, in a nutshell, is whether or not to, as a pregnant woman in a dystopic future, to enter into a walled area where she would be safe, versus living in serious danger and darkness in a city gone to ruin). Morally, she is against (naively) the idea that her doctor-husband would work for the company on the other side of the Wall. As Tomato Blogger said, "BUT SHE'S PREGNANT!" So this time around, though she is still morally naive, in a sense, she has added a more sinister FEELING about the other side of the Wall. The people there are kind of like her. [No offense if you are a fan, she just scares the crap out of me.] The Wall is Halliburton. Dark deals done by ruthless people.

So back story helps, more depth helps, . . . motivation helps . . . and knowing there is a LIMIT helps, I think. Stubborn refusal that becomes insanely foolhardy just makes people toss their books against the wall. Or delete them off their Kindle.

So thoughts? How do you balance elements like this? Ever read a novel when the bad decisions were just so frustrating you were totally turned off?

Allowances

When my perfect little Dynamo Boy was a perfect little Demon Baby . . . actually, before that, when he was a perfect little infant, when he was born, he had fluid in his lungs and was in the NICU for ten days . . . on a ventilator for over half of those days. They were the worst days of my life, I think. Parents in NICUs do all kinds of bargaining with God. Make me suffer, not my child is pretty much the lament. After he came off the respirators and was in an incubator, I taped pictures of our family in there, and I sat a little Buddha statue near his head. I prayed with a pastor. I prayed constantly and unceasingly, and eventually my baby came home.

But this is actually a story about a doctor there. On the first day I was allowed to see him (c-section, I had been confined to bed for a day) . . . I was wheeled in. And a doctor stood next to him. I saw my baby unable to cry because of the breathing tubes, and I started crying, equally silently, with him, FOR him. And I asked the doctor, "How is he?" And the doctor yelled at me. This is not the way I tell the story, something I somehow embellish. It happened. He YELLED. He yelled, "HOW DOES HE LOOK TO YOU?! WHY ARE YOU ASKING ME? I JUST GOT HERE! I HAVE NO IDEA HOW HE IS! LOOK AT HIM!" He went on--an on--but by that time, I was a quivering sobbing mass of mommy. And I decided then and there this was the most awful-behaving human being I had ever met. He's held that distinction until recent events make him tie. Nonetheless, he was awful. And the nurses all gathered around me, and one said, "That's just how he is. Don't pay attention to him. He's the most brilliant doctor here." And I was told stories of lives he saved that other doctors had missed the boat on.

It did not redeem him in my eyes.

Now, there is an entire TV show with rabid followers, one I have enjoyed . . . House. He's pretty much like that doctor. And sometimes I have cringed watching him, but more often, I have laughed. I have chuckled. I have cried. I like Dr. House.

Now, Dr. House is a lot cuter than the doctor in the NICU, but that's not it.

So I thought about it. What makes a reader, or a watcher somehow love the broken, awful anti-hero protagonist in a fictional world, versus the real one? Why do we make allowances, and then where is the line in the sand when we toss a book against the wall, roll our eyes and think, "I can't stick with this one"?

I thought of a few reasons with House. One, his friends. Despite his awful behavior, he has an obsession with his best friend in which he is actually JEALOUS of others in his friend's life. That goes for the co-workers he tolerates. It's somehow endearing even in is dysfunction, as if you sense that he really would LIKE to be human but he doesn't know how. He's also vulnerable . . . a drug addict . . . and has legit pain issues. As someone in chronic pain, man, I had a day this week I felt homicidal. So I relate to someone in pain.

I thought of the character of Lisbeth in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. [MILD spoilers.] She is brilliant but violent. She is asocial in the extreme. But a genius. Yet . . . we know she has been abused and brutalized. We know she somehow survived, and so readers (at least this one) are filled with an admiration. You need only read the paper to know about children and women who are raped, tortured . . . we can't fathom what Lisbeth went through and however she SURVIVED . . . well, then whatever way that occurred it somehow means we must allow her the way she is. And then, of course, there is her first guardian. We see her care for him.

I think in fictional worlds, we weave the threads of empathy. But there are definitely cautions. Readers are not always patient. And there are SOME character flaws (racism, abuse of others, etc.) where, frankly, I'd be hard-pressed to think an author could pull it off--at least for me as reader.

Thoughts? What makes us give a fictional character allowances for their brilliance or specialness?

Bugs Under Glass

People fascinate me. Which is a good thing since I write about them for a living. I'm always observing them. And I have to say, there are certain kinds of people who are are particularly fascinating. Part of me wants to avert my eyes when I watch their behavior . . . but part of me wants to study them.

And that's part of fiction, because we generally don't write about people whose lives are perfectly ordered. That would be ho-hum. We don't often write about "nice" people with perfect lives. Or we might write about those people . . . when their lives get upended by the bug-types.

Lately, I've had two "types" that are as fascinating as watching a bug under glass. One is the Troublemaker. This is the person, whether a busybody, or just a manipulator, who never (ever, ever) simply "is." They are always in conflict--with someone, with an institution, with the world at large. A simple trip to the drug store could result in their anger over a shopping cart left in the parking lot--and by God, someone is going to hear about it! They create drama wherever they go and don't mind who they pull into that drama. I watch these people with mouth agape sometimes. Life is hard enough without having to create this stuff.

The other I've watched under glass is the Assassin. This kind of person is the one who will be in the company of ten people and everything is lovely . . . and they will find a way to slip in the most vicious of put-downs--but it's so subtle, you almost miss it (unless it was intended for you). How do they do that? I saw this happen two weeks ago, and it was breathtaking in its brilliance. It was character assassination . . . but done with a Southern smile. It wasn't directed at me . . . but as a Bug Observer . . . I saw it for what it was. And I almost (almost) had to applaud the woman. She's going in a book. She did it with a smile. Fascinating Bug.

So we all have the "types" who fascinate us. What type do you study? And more importantly, do you slip them into your novels?

Namaste, Bug Watchers!

Vulnerable

So I watched The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke on Saturday night. I can understand why it got good reviews, though to me it felt more like a character sketch (albeit an excellent one) than a complete story. It lacked depth on some level. However, Rourke's performance was heartbreaking (and I see why he won awards for it). Heartbreaking in more ways than one.

I used to love Mickey Rourke--before the steroids, the boxing, the destroyed face, the drugs. He was explosive and interesting to watch. Now he's fascinating for a whole other reason. And the movie was no vanity piece. It was like watching an up-close view of a train wreck. Here was a character who was falling apart in every way, struggling to self-tan out of a can and hold on to the remnants of a career when he was long past his prime.

I think it takes a brave actor to be THAT vulnerable and THAT much of a mess on film. It was difficult to watch, it was so vulnerable. I felt the same way watching Ryan Gosling in one of my favorite films, Half-Nelson. While Ryan is a LOT easier on the eyes, his performance was no less wrenching and hard to watch. Same holds for all the actors in Requiem for a Dream, a slit-your-wrists film if ever there was one. (Incredible . . . and by the same director as The Wrestler.)

I bring these movies up as a lesson for myself. Sometimes, in creating the most riveting characters, it's good to remember to make them vulnerable, to see them hurt, abused, down on their luck, between a rock and a hard place, destroyed, before lifting them out of that place again. This is different from character flaws. I think it's too easy to fall on easy flaws (drinks too much, smokes too much) and never take a character to the really scary, wrenching, want-to-turn-away vulnerable places that expose them. Maybe it's because we don't want to travel there ourselves. Maybe we're too invested in creating a "hero" or "heroine."

But vulnerability adds depth.

Thoughts?

Blind Spots

The other night, I was watching TV when a commercial came on for a new blind spot mirroring system on Ford cars. The system in question is electronic, and actually a little light comes on to let a driver know there is something in his or her blind spot. I consider myself a very good driver, but I can recall a handful of times when I pulled over to switch lanes and suddenly heard a horn because I had somehow missed spotting the car in my blind spot.

This got me thinking about blind spots in general. The person who wears an outfit two or three decades younger than perhaps might be best for them. There is a woman on the main street around here who is in her 70s and always (!!!) mows her lawn in a bikini. I don't know whether to admire her gumption, laugh, applaud her sense of self, or wonder about her sanity since her bikini body days were clearly many decades ago. I can't tell you how many near-miss accidents there have been from people distracted by the sight of her. She also comes out to get her mail in the same brown bikini. I often wonder if she owns any other outfits.

We have blind spots about relationships. (Is the wife always the last to know?) Blind spots regarding our own faults. And blind spots in writing.

One of the most nauseating things I have to do when I edit a novelist is to point out x or y. I will send the pages back and cringe. Have I hurt their feelings? Were they aware that this didn't work? Did they know this scene--or character, or chapter--could easily be cut?

Sometimes the writer gets defensive. But most times, it is as if I have leaned on the horn, and they suddenly see the car in the next lane. "NOW, I get it. NOW I see what the rejection letters have been telling me."

Some of us have blind spots we're aware of and don't know how to fix them ("I'm constantly told I need more emotion, but don't know how to add it," or "My character has been called unsympathetic, but . . . I like her. How do I fix that?"). Sometimes writers have blind spots and don't even know they're there. Sometimes defensiveness BLINDS a writer to their blind spots.

For me, the most fortunate gift in my writing career has been my writers' group. Fifteen years and still ticking. Every other week, I never fail but to at least pause and go, "Hmmm . . . I hadn't thought of that." I have blind spots. Others in the group have DIFFERENT blind spots. Somehow we all work to lean on the horn.

So how about you? What are your blind spots? And how are you fixing them?

Moral Ambiguity

Confession. If a cop pulls in back of me on the road, even if I am five miles under the speed limit, I will make the FIRST turn-off I can into a parking lot and then wait until the cop has driven past and then get back on the road (happen yesterday). If I am at a party, and I am introduced to someone who is an officer of the law, the first thing I will do is move three rooms away. When the FBI showed up at my door in the middle of the day for routine questioning of neighbors for someone's security clearance, I was unable to work the rest of the day I was so rattled. No, I don't have a dead body buried in my backyard, but I guess I know enough morally ambiguous people amonsgt my family and friends that . . . well, the law and all those associated with it freak me out. I am cop-phobic.

A friend has finished a rewrite on his novel, and I think there is less moral ambiguity in the novel now, which is neither a good thing nor a bad thing. It's just where the novel traveled on this rewrite. I love the book (and you know who you are). And I love the character. But it definitely got me thinking about people's threshholds for moral ambiguity.

You want to see WRATH amongst Amazon reviews, pull up a romance that has infidelity as part of the plot line. It's insane how people get. Reviews will get NASTY. Flame wars will erupt on discussion boards. it gets personal.

I have a Shiny New Idea I think I am going to pursue and the hero is a thief. I like him. And I started thinking about the guys in The Roofer. Were they Boy Scouts? No. But they had a sense of morality, even if it was from their own code.

I started wondering. Am I an ethical realist? I am the woman who traipses to the food bank and who knits baby caps for homeless women's children. I worked as a mentor, I taught ESL as a volunteer. I believe, in my very being, in trying to leave the world a better place. But . . . I once discovered that I hadn't paid for a 79-CENT (cents!) item in PetCo and I went back in to pay for it. I will correct a bill if the waiter or waitress failed to charge me for something. But if a family member told me that they had stolen a MILLION dollars from a bank, particularly if I felt the bank was corrupt, I would applaud them. People act shocked when you travel to other parts of the world and bribery is simply part of doing business. Because my father traveled on business to Vietnam, Laos, Nigeria, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, Hong Kong, Bangladesh and you name it . . . I tend to shrug. We have a "system" of bribery here. They are called LOBBYISTS. I see the world in shades of gray. I actually prefer the system in other parts of the world where it's overt and less hidden.

I was asked to change a few lines in Magickeepers II in which my hero sounded "whiny." I altered them. But I wonder if I give a wider berth to difficult characters if I think they are good deep down.

So this is an open-ended post today. What are your feelings about morally ambiguous characters and plots? What shades of gray can you tolerate? And why?

Flaws

I don't know how other writers go about creating characters. Mine tend to come to me whole, which I appreciate, because then they feel very three-dimensional. I do not, for example, methodically create a list of traits--brown hair, nonsmoker, speaks French. Instead, characters arrive as a package deal and seem to already HAVE their traits.

I also don't know how other writers assemble a list of qualities. A quality, to me, is something fuller than simply "speaks French"--instead it's something like, "Is devoted to her grandfather, who raised her." It's deeper.

Finally, in general, when my characters arrive, I tend to see their good points--loyal, kind to Grandpa, funny--and push all that stuff away and get to the REALLY good stuff. How are they flawed?

For those people who believe in an omnippotent God, I have always thought the whole machination of self-deception as to your flaws--or rather, the idea you could simply NOT confess them, say, and delude God, to be hilarious and a touch sad. If you happen to believe in an omnipotent God, wouldn't She or He already KNOW said flaws? So it is with my characters. There is no sense in their hiding the dark and icky stuff since over the course of 300 pages, I'm going to find out anyway.

Flaws, to me, have to work with your story. If a character is decisive--to a FAULT--then that nature of hurrying to make a big decision should backfire on them someday. If a character is a gambling addict, like Skye McNalley in Double Down, then the gambling addiction should of course lead to complications.

Flaws can also be a good trait taken to an extreme. Hence the very loyal daughter who will cover up a murder. I am different from some people, I think. If someone said about another person, "Oh, she's very loyal," I don't immediately think, "Wow, that is terrific." I think, "Hmm, that has possibility." There's loyal. And there's a-dead-body-buried-in-the-cement-to-your-house-foundation loyal.

There's a woman on the next block I've mentioned before in passing on this blog and Demon Baby's blog who people will wax poetic about being "loyal." "She'd do anything for you. Give you the shirt off her back." Sure. IF she likes you. If she doesn't . . . she is about the most vicious, snide person I've met as an acquaintance in the last ten years. And leave it to the novelist to notice.

I learn a lot about flaws from studying people. And from analyzing myself. That Orloff is creative. Sure. Terrific. But she is in her head so much she can seem rude or standoffish.

So what flaws do your characters have? And how do you intend to use them? REALLY use them in your story?

Character Traits: Why Bring It Up?

I love my father more than just about anyone in this world, but there's an unspoken rule of thumb when around him. You avoid certain topics. Don't bring up overcrowded schools, unless you want a ten-minute rant on the downfall of the U.S. educational system. Don't bring up a problem, unless you want to be asked about it for possibly the next decade ("So how IS that cyst you told me about five years ago?"). Just don't bring it up. It's not worth it. Even the most innocuous of subjects--pizza--comes with a long diatribe--don't even ask, it's not worth it. So when around my father, I have long list of "safe" topics, most of them sunny. They often involve bragging about my kids--ANYTHING positive about a grandkid is safe for discussion within reason. So Baby Girl's piano lessons are fair game for the next two years, at which point he will be asking why she hasn't moved on to the Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30 by Sergei Rachmaninoff ("And REALLY, just how good is this piano teacher anyway? What are her references?") Oldest Daughter adores my dad--and the fact that she's a musician? Well, many, many gold stars for that one in his book.

Ever meet one of those people who like to get their digs into conversation, so they "conveniently" bring up something from the past? We all know people like that. My main thought is always "WHY bring this up?" I actually once heard from a woman via Facebook who had perfect recall of a 6th grade lunchroom incident and felt the need to bring it up. Not only did I not recall the incident, I don't get bringing it up decades later.

But none of these "bring it up" scenarios apply to character development. If you bring it up . . . you better bring it.

What do I mean? It's NOT enough to make a cop an alcoholic as a character defect or flaw. Done to death, first of all. But WHY BRING IT UP unless his drinking causes him to blow a case. Causes him trouble in the very book. Real trouble, significant trouble.

In fact, better not to TELL us this flaw. Just show it anyway.

I have an alcoholic ex-priest in my work-in-progress. I show it. But, more so, when he falls completely into the bottle about a quarter of the way through the book, the female lead character faces an agonizing choice. Throw her lot in with an unreliable sometime-drunk who has demon experience (and really, how many of those are there in the world?) or . . . well, damn, she has no other choice. So she has a sense of anxiety over her once he sobers up--when is he going to crack again? And where will that leave her?

This is where I think editors talk about organic storytelling. About tacked-on traits. Quirks with no reason for being there other than to be quirky.

If the trait is there, it should serve the story. Everything serves the story.

Why else would you bring it up?

Oh . . . and one more thing I've lately come to feel very strongly about. Yes, my characters run my life. They present themselves fully formed. And it's all right for me to tell my fellow writers my characters' back story. It's all right for me to possess an encyclopedic knowledge about my characters. I have little control over that, it's just how I am. It's how they are.

What's not okay is to insert all that knowledge into the story. I CAN control that. And if story isn't running the show . . . if you aren't in control there . . . if you aren't writing to the higher purpose of story, but instead just to make characters interesting, then you can run the risk of ending up with a book of fascinating character sketches. And not much more. If you bring it to the book, it should be exploited.

Thoughts?

Defining Characters

Over at Anti-Wife's blog, she discussed her characters the other day and got me thinking. Really thinking. Which is dangerous.

And my thought is . . . that especially when you are making a pitch or writing a synopsis, the quirks and traits you choose to reveal are very important. In a larger work, you have more room to explore your characters--but to me, that doesn't give you any more leeway on how precise you must be. You just have to sustain that preciseness for more pages.

Think about it. Just because you have 350 pages to tell your story doesn't mean you can get sloppy. Every word counts. Every trait. Every quirk. Every action.

And what I decided, thinking about it, is that I boil my characters down to these words, "The kind of person who . . . "

I'll explain.

I could say that a grandmother is cruel. One word. One adjective. Tells me nothing.

Or I could say, "The kind of woman who would slap her 2-year-old grandson for sticking his finger in the icing of a birthday cake."

Which is clearer?

I could say, "She volunteers in the community."

Or . . . "The kind of woman who runs the PTA and Junior League."

Or . . . "The kind of woman who, pregnant, piles her three kids in the car and drives to the 'hood to deliver food to a family in need, occasionally wondering if she will accidentally stumble on a drive-by shooting."

Two different picture emerge from those "types." I have nothing but admiration for the Junior League. Those women raise a LOT of money that helps a LOT of people. Someone who RUNS one of those organizations has to be organized. Maybe even anal-retentive. I am neither. But then my desk has not one clear speck of bare desk once again. It's pathetic. I volunteer in the community, but I don't do fundraising work. I leave that for the people who do that well. I hate asking people for money. My volunteering is the second. It's personal and often dirty and dangerous. And that's both insane . . . and who I am.

I could say, "He was loved."

Or I could say, "My godfather was so loved, and so remembered for taking his nieces and nephews to the bakery for jelly donuts, that one of them had a flower arrangement made to look like a jelly donut sent to the funeral home."

Two different pictures.

And when I say "type," it's not that I mean a stereotype. I just mean that there are ways to embody a character in a sentence. Something vivid.

I decided to pull a paragraph from a synopsis for something being considered right now:

Gina Palermo, forty, elegantly beautiful and perfectly clothed in Chanel suits, is the proverbial fish-out-of-water. Make thatYankees fan out of the Bronx. A brutal opponent in the courtroom, she was a high-priced New York divorce attorney—the kind who handled cases with settlements in the tens of millions of dollars for the uber-rich who shed wives and husbands like last season’s fashions.

Rather than "well-dressed" . . . Chanel tells you a certain look. Yet she owns a signed game ball from the 1964 Yankees . . . so she's diehard . . . if you are a New Yorker, then you know the love we have for our teams borders on obsession--and a woman in Chanel who loves the Yanks tells you something. "Divorce attorney" tells you one thing. But "the kind who handled . . ." is a whole 'nother league.

So . . . when every word counts, we have to choose our examples wisely. Even more so in the tricky synopsis.

Thoughts? Can you say ONE thing, one snapshot about your main character . . . "the type of person who . . . "

Peace,
E

Shadow Puppets

First, an admission. I was so exhausted this morning as to fall even further into my Blue Wiggle delusion (see yesterday's post). At 6:00 a.m., after Demon Baby awoke me, after yet ANOTHER mostly sleepless night, I actually took note of the fact that Blue Wiggle has a name--Anthony. And he is becoming cuter in direct proportion to how little REM sleep I am getting.

But on to writing. And shadow puppets

No, I am not making shadow puppets. I am talking about character development. More specifically, flaws.



I think of flaws as shadow puppets, made with a character's existing qualities and the way the light casts on them to create a bit of darkness, a shadow.

What do I mean? Well, no one is going to create a main character for us to root for who tortures animals. There's no light there, only sociopathy. Nothing for the light to play off of. I think the best flaws for main characters start as something light reflects off of. Take determination. Most of us admire it. But when creating a flaw, you can adjust the light and play with the shadows to take it further and further along until it's obstinancy. Now it's a flaw . . . take it further still and it can be infuriating pigheadedness. Take it too far into total darkness, and you've lost the shadows and disappeared into them entirely, and now it's a dangerous obsession. Whether your character follows that obsession and then returns to the gray world of shadows, changed but more connected to the light, is the journey you create.

Start with a sense of humor. Cast the shadows just so and now it's an inability to connect with people most of the time except through joking. Pull it into darkness, and it's a vicious biting humor that hurts all who come in contact with it.

The trick, is casting the shadows just right . . . start with the trait as a positive, and then carry it through to the darkness for a flaw. Keep going and the shadows overtake. Depends on how dark you want to go.

I think of Tom in The Roofer. Started with a loyalty to his sister, pulled it into a flaw of blindness to how far he would go to protect her . . . pull it into full shadows of obsession and addiction.

So how do your characters play with light and shadows?

Flaws

You know that job interview question: What's your greatest flaw? If you've been through job interviews before or read about how to sail through them, then you know the correct answer isn't always honesty. Your potential future boss does NOT want to hear: "I alienate everyone around me with my pigheadedness." Instead, you know to finesse the question. "I'm a perfectionist" (a flaw, but yet one that has positive aspects).

Not so in writing.

Sometimes, in the act of making characters well-rounded, it can seem convenient to tack on a few so-called flaws. "Oh, I'll make her butt into her friends' lives--but in a cute way." "I'll make him still so hung up on his ex-wife that he alienates everyone" (usually on the way to winning back said ex-wife). The flaws are designed to keep your character likable--yet relatable and charming.

And while this makes sense, I tend to think it just scratches the surface. When the chick lit market went through a glut, every editor I spoke with said she was sick of seeing the "same old, same old." The slightly frumpy heroine (as if frumpy is a fatal flaw), the insecure heroine, the heroine who is just dying to get married. Whatever. No, I think to stand out, you have to really be bold. Take a chance on some flaws that are very, very, very real.

In nearly every one of my books, I have had editors and readers alike tell me they "almost" gave up on my heroine. She was THAT difficult, THAT pigheaded, THAT independent-to-a-fault. Note . . . to a FAULT. Slightly independent is just another way of saying "spunky." So independent that someone is incapable of letting others in? That's flawed and ready for a shrink.

I tend to think if you cut deep like that, it can elevate your book. I also think it's more real. I know my flaws--and they're not small ones.

Thoughts? It's a risk . . . but I think the end result can be a character that isn't cookie cutter.