Saturday, September 02, 2006

Fictional parents

When authors form their fictional characters, they tend to take the whole picture into consideration. Siblings. Pets. Character.
And PARENTS.
Ayuh.

I'll admit it. I kill a lot of mine off. Or I'll make them absent. Or they'll be uncaring buttheads. My first book I wrote (living in several notebooks) gave the hero a wonderful pair of parents. Married forever. Deeply in love.
I also gifted Sheridan (What He Wants) with similar parents. Isadora is a wonderous woman who fairly rules the roost. Even though her husband is the ruler of a supernatural race.
The first heroine that I gave both parents (still alive and deeply in love) is Kelly of Fire Goddess.

Parents form our worlds. Shape our opinions. Touch or lives in ways that even we don't fully understand. Scribbling about fictional parents is a work in psychology. That's why many heroes and heroines don't have them in books.
Nothing like a lesson in fictional genealogy to form the hero/heroine that reflects a fictional ancestry.

If a parent is uncaring and selfish...a character might be. Or he/she may choose to go in the opposite direction. A character orphaned young might not have the social skills a parent could teach. The character arc could reflect that.

I love my heroes and heroines. Love them. And I come to love their fictional parents as extensions of my story.
Or I simply kill them off.
Grins*

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I frequently kill off one or both parents of my characters. I'm not sure what that says about me.... However, in the current MIP both hero & heroine have living, happily married parents. Wow! What a concept. *g*

Rene said...

I kill off most of the parents in my stories. At least the good ones. The ones who are miserable get to stick around and make their kids miserable.