Day 48: Busting Conventions

I'm in a very wild place in my book. I'm working towards an October 31st deadline for the first draft – did I tell you that already? Anyhow, we're coming down to the crunch and things are getting interesting.

I'm moving into territory that I haven't seen covered much before. I'm turning my screenplay characters into memoir characters – letting the people I made up come to life as much as Dana the Artist or Curly the Harmonica guy. Which is fun and exciting, but how the hell do I do that when these people are basically my imaginary friends? "Okay Reader, now that I've got you believing I'm absolutely sane and credible, I'm gonna go ahead and listen to the voices in my head."

It's been a challenge.

So far, I've been relying on Heroes. The most exciting aspect of this TV series is watching regular people discover they have extraordinary powers. The discovery happens in fits and starts and their mastery over their abilities unfolds over time. This stuff does not fall into the realm of Normal Everyday Occurrences, but it is completely believable in the context of the show. I'm trying to achieve the same effect with my book.

The process of learning about your characters is a gradual one. But, I believe anyway, the character exists fully formed in your imagination. So, I've got fully formed characters lurking around in my imagination, only I can't see them clearly.

How I get to see them clearly is a process beginning with arbitrary decisions and assumptions based on superficial characteristics – I arbitrarily give Charlie tattoos therefore she is this kind of person. And then Tattoed Charlie runs around acting out lame tattooed-person cliches, which blows and I start hating her a little.

Then, in order to create something deeper than a superficial cliche, I give her thoughts and feelings. Only they are my thoughts and feelings, not hers. I start imposing my worldview on her, telling her what to think and how to react. People don't tend to enjoy this, so she tells me to suck it, and those aren't tattoos, actually, they're scars.

Then, out of nowhere, she goes and does something wild that I would never have thought of in a million years. She becomes this fascinating, self-sufficient creature who blows my fricking mind every time she speaks. And all I want to do is hang out with her and see what she does next. I have a crush on her now. I'm smitten.

And then eventually I realize I can't control her and why would I want to anyhow. I finally allow her to be exactly who and how she is. And somehow that's the key to understanding and loving her.

It's like any other relationship, really.