Who here isn't all that impressed with their main characters?

Har du prøvet at bruge teknikken i "flashbacks" for at give mere dybde og liv i karakter? Ville det gøre ham eller hende nogen mere interessant? // Have you tried using the technique of "flashbacks" to give more depth and life the the character? Would that help make him or her someone more interesting?

ELSKEDE

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ML for Denmark
Lover of good wine, chocolate truffles and NaNoWriMo

My bad guy is really elusive, he refuses to tip his hand and show his face. I know he is supposed to work in secret, but this is ridiculous. How can there be foreshadowing if he stays in the shadows. So I'm gonna have words with him this weekend :-)

My main character tends to talk too much and explain things, he needs more action and dialogue instead. It's just that he's one of those Chandleresque investigators that prefer to have an inner monologue all the time. I sent him on a dinner date with a hot female vampire, and that seems to have loosened him up a bit :-)

Not yet, no, though I may descend to that. =P Either that, or just let him be boring for the book, then write those 'flashbacks' as separate vignettes later to help me understand how to really write him, and then try my hand at that weird little exercise known as 'editing.' It's weird how some characters immediately spring to life, and others just don't click. I tell you, my MC is so vibrant and fun when he's running around in my head! I just fail at writing him so far. I haven't found the right combinations yet. You're a writer, have you ever had that problem? The character in your head is just not what's coming out on the page?

All I can tell you is that you are not the only one in that boat. I have resorted to my MC writing the first couple of lines in a story she is writing in (bad) danish "One apon a time there was a hallway. Please tell me how she could know danish can she have been an exchange student in a previous life?

Oooh, hot female vampire, why didn't I think of this? You, good sir or madam, are brilliant. ;) Good luck with your villain this weekend, I hope he spills for you.

Oh, man. O.o That's harsh, Starlet. Uh, is she a ghost? You can always say that it's a side effect of being dead. *cough* There are lots of instances of ghosts speaking other languages than what they originally would have spoken in fiction. True, usually its wraiths that would have spoken only long-dead dialects, but who says it can't work in other ways? There's also a pagan concept of 'the collective unconscious' which is supposedly where our instincts, gut feelings, and '6th-sense' spring from. All the knowledge of the world collected in the thoughts of everyone who has ever lived, and when you die you automatically tap into it, or something. Bah, it's been a long time since I've read about it. =D A writer doesn't need facts, they need ideas! That's totally an idea.

That your supporting characters are more interesting doesn't have to be a bad thing. I mean it works pretty well in the Sherlock Holmes books when we're told the story from the perspective of dr. Watson.

Good luck figuring it out and please do tell of your progress :-)
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At dine bikaraterer er mere interessante er ikke nødvendigvis en dårlig ting. Det virker jo ret godt i Sherlock Holmes bøgerne at historien bliver fortalt af Dr. Watson.

Held og lykke med at få puslespillet til at gå op og ser frem til at høre hvad du finder ud af :-)

/Calije

Ha, funny you should mention Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, that was totally my intention going into this! I was going to try to write it all from the POV of a character that was second to my lead. Unfortunately, it felt so boring while I was writing it that I went ahead and started allowing myself to dip into other characters' heads as needed. I usually plot my Nanos out pretty thoroughly, but this one I decided to try winging it. Now, I'm regretting it. Had I better planning, I could have pulled off the Sherlock Holmes idea a little better.

Thanks for the well-wishes. =)

(and sorry that I don't translate to Danish like most people. I'm not being modest when I say that Babblefish would do a better job of writing Danish that I would. xP)

Becca started speaking Danish because I was a hole and writing in Danish is not this writer's strong point. You gave me a great idea. the 110-year-old lady who lived in the center of town just died. I think she may be communicating with my main character from beyond the grave :-) I was just trying to come up with an idea that didn't involve the classic "I fell in love" scenario. Too easy.

Thank you. I'm sure he will spill - "ve haff vays to ensure that he will kooperate" :-)

I think having the movie poster for "Underworld" and two Vampirella posters on the wall might have influenced my decision on the female vampire :-)

I started out this year with only a loose idea as I know myself ful well to get lost on associative thinking. A deadline invaribaly has my characters chasing wild geese and riding monstrously long trains of thought (and that´s trains without windows for keeping som track of where you´re going), forcing me to build up a certain expertise in doubling back. The loose idea was two main characters modeled on some relatives of my husband´s. One of them is a bloody nuisance, but true to the NaNo spirit he has gotten independent and comes out nicer than in real life. The somewhat innovative and hyper-active sex life I´ve given him doesn´t exactly worsen my impression of him. My problem could be said to be the reverse of yours, though it boils down to the same: Our MC refuses to comply with our ideas. Is that nescessarily so wrong? Yours might take up the great tradition of anti-heroes, couldn´t he? You may have to let him. A very good friend of mine has said that true noveling is marked by characters taking on independent lives and taking you for rides. Characters that stay firmly in a pre-planned mold are the mark of journalism ... she strongly dislikes novels wriiten by journalists and calls their characters "flat as paper dolls." Does that hold any consolation?

got November blues - keep tappin´ away

My MC is a former special ops soldier from america, now involved with a different special ops unit. Now, it sounds impressive so far, but he is utterly useless and he has been close to getting him self and everyone else killed because he tends to think about himself before anyone else, or because he is too busy imagining how the FMC would look like naked to fight off all the zombies trying to eat both of them. In a way he thinks a lot like me which scares me.

But if he is a dissapointment? Surely he is a bad choice of soldier, but he makes some interesting stuff happen around him making good entertaintment.

Characters killed: around 10
Main characters killed: 0
Explosions: 2
Romances: 0
Sanity left: 80%
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07: All about me! - FAIL
08: Steel of Pandora - WIN
09: HARD - Pending