Character deaths, and wherever that theme leads this blog to.

Last night, in one of my favourite TV shows, my favourite character died.

I am not the kind of person who cries at TV shows. I cry at books (A LOT!), and I even cry at the occasional movie, but hardly ever TV shows. I think maybe the reason I cried was not just because it was extremely sad, but because that character wouldn’t be coming back. Then, I started thinking about my own characters. I am sometimes a little ruthless when it comes to killing characters, and I don’t think about the consequences (yeah, ha-ha, irony alert!). There are two characters who die in CONSEQUENCE who I really liked, another who I liked, but was dispensable, and one who wasn’t very nice and was a minor character, so bye-bye characterwhosenamewhoIwon’tmention. The two characters who I really like, I did have a reason to kill. But as I set out to write the sequel, I really began to feel those characters’ absences. They were two of my favourite characters, and I killed them to make it dramatic. And then they were gone. Those two characters were nice people and good characters, they deserved a happily ever after. I didn’t give them one. Then, I started writing AMEND, and I realized that at least one of my main characters was seriously getting on my nerves. This character, whose name I also won’t mention, was really NOT a nice person. So there I was, stuck in a rut, all because of my brutality towards my nice characters.  It was only really towards the end of AMEND that I began to appreciate my main character for who she was. Yes, she was sadistic masochistic and a complete pain in the arse, but she was who she was, and I couldn’t change it. I don’t decide on my characters’ personalities, whenever I do, they always set me straight. My characters be themselves, and I have to put up with it (lucky me!). I don’t have much control over the content of my book, either. My characters stay true to themselves, so whatever situation I put them in; THEY find their way out of, even if it’s me who gives them the map. Though the consequence of cutting my favourite characters from CONSEQUENCE, and me being annoyed with the new characters in AMEND, is that I found myself gravitating towards the CONSEQUENCE characters that made it to the sequel. One of the characters who reached AMEND, is a character who at least four people have said I was like. In CONSEQUENCE, this character is a teenager, in AMEND she’s like thirty or something. So then, even though this is the character that is apparently most like me, I had to work with that fact that she was now double my age. There is an incident towards the end of AMEND where said character acts a little immature to get revenge on someone. I am actually considering removing said incident because most thirty-something year olds probably wouldn’t be that petty. But I enjoyed writing that chapter. Also, I tell myself that if this character is like me, that bit is staying in. I am NOT a revengeful person, but the thing that she does as revenge, is something that I put in because, well, it would be kind of amusing if it happened in real life. I also think that I, even when I’m in my thirties, will still have a weird warped crazy sense of humour, so if I was in that character’s position, I would do the same.

And, R.I.P lady Sybil, downton abbey won't be the same.