Secondary Characters

 

I write in first person, which has its advantages, at least for me. The first time I tried it I was halfway into a novel and it was dragging. The plot was good. For once I knew where the story was heading. I had good twists in mind. That said, I couldn't ignore a nagging sense of lethargy. I'd read many aspiring authors' samples on a writing forum I frequented and everyone wrote in first person. At the time I thought, well, that's weird. I was so out of touch, I wondered if these people were writing fiction about themselves. I'd frankly never read a book written in first person. In my heavy reading days that wasn't a thing.

But as an experiment, I did a search and replace in my document, substituting "she" for "I" (yes, it required some work. Sometimes I was actually writing about a different "she") and it made a cosmic difference. Not just in the passages I'd already written, but it put "me" into the story ~ the me that wasn't really me but was writing as me).

A drawback to that, however, is that the main characters in each of my works could be interchangeable. I haven't mastered the art of bestowing flaws upon my MC, because she is experiencing life through her own eyes, and who tells themselves how flawed they are? To themselves, they're the normal ones. Too, I'm probably gun shy, after being told by someone I queried with a sub-par novel that my main character wasn't likeable (I liked her). Admittedly, my MC's sometimes act selfishly, but they always feel guilty after the fact and do their best to make up for it to prove they're really a good person. Who doesn't like to believe they're a good person? 

Writing secondary characters, though, is my favorite part of writing. Those people can be as weird as they want to be. They can have verbal tics, they can talk in a regional voice. They can blurt out things genteel folks would never utter. They have unusual passions. They can be an asshole one minute and a savior the next. 

Honestly, I remember my books mostly for those characters. From the red-permed subversive "friend" to the bartender who comforts a nervous waitress with tequila he tells her is agave, to the Chicken Lady, to a defense attorney who can barely commandeer a briefcase, much less a murder trial. I never had so much fun as when I was writing them. If I could figure out how to get a whole book out of these people, it would be a Coen Brothers movie.

If I have writing strengths (and I do), they're in writing dialog and writing supporting characters. Unfortunately, my MC's are rather bland in comparison. They're reactive, except when it counts the most, of course. 

Ahh, things to work on. Self-assessment is a good thing.