Flawed Characters

One of the biggest mistakes novice writers make is to produce flawless characters. Handsome or beautiful, they have perfect marriages, lots of money, fine cars and homes, good educations and the best of everything. The problem is that few readers can identify with them.

Characters, aside from villains, should be lovable, or at least likable. Never perfect. Your characters must have flaws for readers to be able to empathize with them. Remember Emma Bovary in Flaubert's Madame Bovary, Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade and Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones?

The most important thing to remember is to focus on your character's vulnerabilities, according to writing instructor Bret Anthony Johnston."Your focus can be on physical or emotional vulnerability, but it has to be intimately tied to the character. What makes her sad, embarrasses her? What frightens her, what does she regret? What minor or major trespasses has she committed?"

In the case of Emma Bovary, we can sympathize with her mistakes and how they affect her life.

What does your character need or want? And what does he stand to gain or lose by the conclusion of the plot? Whether or not the character achieves his goal isn't as important as how badly he wants it. Your reader will hang in there with your protagonist once she understands his goals and desires. Make that desire as compelling as possible. A character who wants to achieve world peace is far less desirable, according to Johnston, than someone who craves a gourmet dinner, because the goal is attainable.

Once you decide what it is your protagonist wants, emphasize it throughout the story. From the first paragraph, your reader should understand the character's goal and it should color everything he does. And the more he wants something, the more the reader likes him.

Dialogue is a great way to portray a character's weakness. If he talks about someone else, the reader picks up information about the character himself by his description. The type of food he eats or the genre of music he listens to gives us some insight into his character. Does he stop by a fast food place for a burger instead of a restaurant for a good meal? Does he smoke a pack of cigarettes while on stakeout?

In The Great Gatsby when Nick Caraway tries to describe how Daisy Buchannan speaks, he says, "Her voice is full of money." Fitzgerald's few words tells us a lot about both Caraway and Buchannan.

A writer's job is should be more like a method actor than a news reporter. Striving to see the world through your protagonist's eyes is most important. Focus on the details and events happening in his or her life. But that doesn't mean that your fictional characters should like the same things you do or share the same views. Nor should they become your parrot. Each character should have his own distinct speech pattern and outlook on life.

Keep your protagonist in proverbial hot water as much as possible. Allow the water to cool periodically to avoid melodrama, but keep turning up the heat until events come to a boil. When your character has achieved his goal or solved his dilemma, remove him from the pot and dry him off for a satisfying ending.

The Mystery We Write Virtual Book Tour is over but the articles written by the authors who took part in the tour are still available. If you haven't read them, please scroll down the page at Mysterious Writers blog site. You'll be glad you did.

Books are great Christmas gifts, not only for kids but their parents and grandparents as well, especially during the winter months for those of us who live in the northern states. There's nothing like a good book to escape inclement weather or problems that come knocking at our doors.Whether print or electronic versions, we hope you'll consider the novels featured here and that you will buy books for Christmas for those on your gift list.

Studies have shown that reading to young children increases their desire to learn and to excel in school and graduate. What more can we ask of Christmas gifts that will last from one generation to the next?

Wishing everyone a warm and happy holiday season and productive New Year!

Mystery We Write Holiday Virtual Tour

You won't want to miss the holiday "Mystery We Write" Virtual Tour. Visitors to the various blog sites who leave comments will be eligible to win mystery novels on December 11, at the conclusion of the tour. A list of the authors and their sites are listed below:

Collin Kelley
Earl Staggs
Evelyn Cullet
Jean Lauzier
Joyce Lavene  
Larissa Reinhart 
M. M. Gornell 
Madison Johns
Marilyn Meredith
Patricia Gligor
Rionna Morgan
SR Claridge 
Wendy Gager
Anne K Albert
And yours truly.
A list of appearances and the dates are available at: http://jeansblogtour.blogspot.com/

Jacqueline King loves books, words, and writing tall tales. She especially enjoys murdering the people she dislikes on paper. King is a full time writer who sometimes teaches writing at Tulsa Community College. Her latest novel, The Inconvenient Corpse is a traditional mystery. King has also written five novellas as co-author of the Foxy Hens Series. Warm Love on Cold Streets is her latest novella and is included in the anthology The Foxy Hens Meet an Adventurer. Her only nonfiction book is Devoted to Cooking. She's a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, Romance Writers of America, Oklahoma Writers Federation, and Tulsa Night Writers.

Jackie, how did you conceive your novel, The Inconvenient Corpse?

Oddly enough, The Inconvenient Corpse was birthed in its setting, a charming Bed and Breakfast Inn. I plotted the book by playing every writer’s favorite game: ‘What if?’

What if I’d found a dead man in this bed? What if he were naked? What if his clothes were nowhere to be found? What if the police thought I was the killer and told me that I couldn’t leave town? And then, what if I then learned that I had no money, no available credit, and no resources at all? What if I’d been born with a silver spoon in my mouth and had previously spent my days as a Junior League member? Could I survive on just my own moxie? I felt impelled to answer these questions.

What in your background prepared you to write?

My mother was a natural born storyteller. One night (at the end of the great depression) there was nothing for supper. Mother never told us this grim fact. She smiled (bravely) and said, “Let’s have stories for supper!” My brother, sister and I clapped our hands with joy. Stories for supper? What could be more wonderful? I must have been close to three at the time. After that, I think stories (and later books) became a part of my DNA.

What’s your writing work space like?

Shabby, overflowing with papers and magazines and books, and writing supplies. Probably sounds awful, but for me it’s heaven on earth. I’m living my life’s dream and am happy beyond belief.

Do you have a regular writing schedule and do you outline your work?

I write every day that it’s humanly possible, but not on any particular schedule. I’d love to write first thing in the morning, but this goal seldom happens. I do outline my work, sort of. I start a spiral notebook for each novel and jot down anything I can think of that comes to mind about my new project. I play a lot of “what if?” as I described earlier. I’m envious of outliners who stick to their exact outline, but I seem to be totally incapable of such a plan. I’m a “panster.” (As in flying by the seat of your pants.) It requires a huge amount of rewriting, but luckily I love what I fondly call, word-smithing.

Who taught you the language of fiction?

Although I’ve had many excellent teachers of fiction (mainly Peggy Fielding) I think I absorbed the language of fiction by reading and reading and reading. Mentally inhaling other writers wonderful novels, also helps improve my own writing.

Have any of your children followed in your keystrokes?

My youngest daughter, Jennifer Sohl, coauthored my only nonfiction book, Devoted to Cooking. This is a collection of family stories and their very own special recipe. My two granddaughters Lauren Keithley and Morgan Sohl are also writers. (prepublished.)

How do you feel about the ebook revolution?

Guess I’m a book rebel, (I’m American, after all) because I love e-readers and e-books. I also love paper books. If you wrote good prose on the sidewalk in front of my house, I’d read that, too.

What’s the best way you’ve found to promote and market your work?

I love promoting my books in the CyberWorld! What a joy it is to become acquainted with readers who live all over the world. Readers are extremely smart, witty, and interesting folk and I can ‘talk’ to any of them who own a computer. Lucky me, I can promote worldwide, day and night (if I choose) in my jammies.

Advice for aspiring writers?

Don’t let anyone discourage you. I hate to go to a writer’s conference where a well-known writer tells how hard it is to get published at this time, thus intimating that those poor souls who have not yet found a publisher will probably be left out in the cold. THIS IS A LIE! You can do it if you follow the tried and true recipe of success: (1)Write every day. (2) Submit what you write. (3) Never give up.

Your social media links and bio.

I’d be thrilled to hear from readers about this post, or about what you’re thinking about today, or even your supper menu. Let’s all get acquainted so we can talk about books and writing. This has been fun, Jean. Thanks a million.

It's been great having you here, Jackie.

You can visit Jackie at her website: Website: www.jacqking.com
and her blog site: http://bnbmysteries.blogspot.com

She would like to have readers ‘friend’ on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1290204781#!/Jacqking
and her book is available at: http://amzn.to/gMv7CH and http://bit.ly/fovbLR

Senior Sleuths Facebook Group

I've started a new Senior Sleuths Facebook Group page as an extension of the Senior Sleuths Forum. Since Monday evening, we  have forty charter members who are sharing their their lives, writing successes, blog articles and thoughts about growing older.

You don't have to be a senior (over 55) to join or even write senior sleuth mysteries. If you love reading mysteries, romantaic suspense or thriller novels, or would like to communicate with some of your favorite authors, sign up at: http://www.facebook.com/groups/186718304795878/ and join in the fun. :)

Finding Time to Write

Because I began my writing career as a news reporter, I could probably write in the middle of a traffic jam, but there are distractions that bring me to an exasperating halt. Phones ringing when you have a help wanted ad in the paper is a major distraction here. Good help is hard to find, and you can’t trust your luck to answering machines because so many messages are garbled, or callers forget to leave a phone number.

According to Carl Honore, who wrote In Praise of Slowness, it takes our brains eight minutes to return to our creativity mode whenever we’re distracted. Telephone interruptions require a fifteen minute recovery time. With email, one message delays your creative train of thought for more than a minute, according to Lois J. Peterson in her article, “May I Put You on Hold?”

Peterson says, “High tech interruptions come with built-in controls, if only we would use them.” We have answering machines, caller I.D. and email programs that alert us to messages if we leave the program open. Shutting down the Internet while we write is one solution as well as unplugging the phones, especially if you're fortunate to have broadband service.

What if? would always be on my mind if I shut off all forms of communication. What if there’s an accident at the job site, what if one of our adult children needs our help? What if my husband has an accident or breaks down on a long drive home?

We have a large home office which I share with my husband and our business. Although background music helps, I’m often interrupted by not only the phones but my husband wanting to share something with me. Many husbands don't understand that writing isn’t just a hobby or an excuse to avoid housework. Bestseller status would undoubtedly cure the problem.

My husband reads more than I do, including my own books. I’ve talked to other writers whose spouses don’t read their work, and resent the time they spend writing instead of with the family. Countless women writers have said their husbands’ resent their creativity. Writers, artists and entertainers comprise only 5% of the population, so that places us in a special category, of which I cannot think of anything comparable, with the possible exception of rocket science and brain surgery. I’m not advocating that writers be placed on a pedestal, but regardless of how much money we earn, or how little, our talents should be respected by family members.

Few of us have our own private office or cubby hole where our writing time is sacred. I've gotten out of bed in the middle of the night to write something that was rattling around in my brain, without phones ringing or people barging in. I was tired next morning and probably more than a little cranky, but as every writer knows, if it's not written down or typed into the computer, we're going to lose that "brilliant" passage.

Writing isn’t just an avocation, for me it’s a source of joy and feeling of accomplishment, like nothing else. I’d rather write than attend a party, sell books at a signing, or stay in bed all day to read.

Although most women writers have said, “I need a wife to do the chores so I can write,” the obvious solution is to marry another writer who cooks, cleans and edits. And while we’re at it, make sure he looks like George Clooney. :)

Congratulations to Arletta Dawdy!

Artetta, you've won a copy of Gray Wolf Mountain. I hope you enjoy the book. Please send your mailing address to JeanHenryMead@aol.com.

Thanks to everyone who left comments.. They're greatly appreciated. I hope you'll get a chance to read the book in print, on Kindle or Nook. I also hope you'll become a regular visitor to this site.

My best wishes to everyone.