Today's guest author is...me

[charlie_cochrane]

Am being hosted by the lovely Charley Descoteaux. We thought it might be fun for me to answer the questions I make other authors answer. So, if you want to know how Ernie Wise comes into my story planning or what book I'd write had I infinite time, come on over!

Comments

[spiced-wine.livejournal.com]

I love that you are character-driven. Sometimes these days it seems as if authors want to rush through an action story with the plot dragging the characters along by their hair, giving them no time to develop into 'people' (I have seen that especially in action stories (i.e. soldiers undercover etc). And I think: 'How can I care about the world blowing up if I don't care about the characters in that world?'

To me books are about people, how they influence events, endure them, live through them, and basically what they do. I can no longer read stories where the plot makes them into 'posable action figures'.

Lovely interview, and very interesting (:

[charliecochrane.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, yes! I've given up on reading several books recently because I just didn't care a jot what happened to the characters. Cardboard cut outs.

[spiced-wine.livejournal.com]

I've given up on reading several books recently because I just didn't care a jot what happened to the characters. Cardboard cut outs.

Yes. This. I kind of look up from the pages and think: 'Surely this is not what people want to read?'
Of course plot is important, but I could read a novella of two people talking in a room for an afternoon if their characters were developed enough.

Kev used to work at WH Smith distribution, and they would get authors sometimes who come in to sign books for the staff. He used to sometimes buy them, and would bring back these books of all plot, no character. I will read anything, but it was all tell, tell, blow up stuff, and zero character development. I could feel a twitch coming on, so I had to stop reading.

[charliecochrane.livejournal.com]

Sounds just like the one I got from Waterstones (look, real book!) by the grandson of a famous author, the book being described as a sort of thinking man's Dan Brown. No characterisation, a 1950's court scene which sounded far too modern and pages of backstory and tell, tell, tell. Straight to the Oxfam shop.

[spiced-wine.livejournal.com]

I just saw this, which I felt said it all:

“Think of the novels you have loved most. Do you remember a character you lived with page after page, perhaps hoping the book would never end? What do you remember most clearly, the characters or the plot? Now think of the movies you’ve seen that affected you the most. Do you remember the actors or the plot? There’s a book called Characters Make Your Story that you don’t have to read because the title says it all: Characters make your story. If the people come alive, what they do becomes the story.” Sol Stein.

[charliecochrane.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes, yes!