Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Guest blog: Secondary characters
“I confess right now that I have a secondary character fetish,” J. R. Patrick said here.
Why is that? I wondered. Something along the same lines had happened to me with my editor, who told me she found a secondary character in my debut novel “fascinating”. She said she hoped to see more of him in the sequel.
So I wrote a blog post on why secondary characters might upstage the protagonists, and J. R. Patrick was kind enough to host it here. Click and read!
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Also, my online friend and fellow blogger Hazardgal is holding a contest for her book The Holler. Two words that made me want to read more: "Raw Head". I'd enter but I'm on the wrong side of the border... so I hope lots of other people do!
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2 comments:
With secondary characters a writer tends to display only what is necessary for the scene. It may tantalize the reader into wanting to know more about them.
Marian, you've done an excellent job to stir the interests of an editor. You may have spawned another potential book.
What I love about secondary characters is often the role they play in inserting humor. When my heroine in the historical mystery, Maids of Misfortune, I just published is getting all serious in pursuit of the villain, a secondary character can lighten the mood, provide a little counter-point that keeps my mystery in the cozy category where it belongs. I have also started writing some short stories that feature secondary characters that I am offering for free-while I write my sequel. In the first one, Dandy Detects, I got to establish back story for some of the secondary characters that would have just slowed the plot down in the full length book.
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