Friday, January 4, 2013

Tortured!

I'm waiting to receive my manuscript back from my new editor at Crescent Moon Press. First Dragon is the first book in my latest epic fantasy series. The book has three main characters sharing the danger, battles and ... well ... difficulties of epic proportions. I know I have a good plot but I'm a little worried if I've made things difficult enough for those three people. Have I tortured my protagonists enough?

I think of all the books I love, the movies I enjoy, and I know the best ones are the ones where the main characters suffer greatly and then overcome it all. 2012's offering of hero movies certainly followed the formula from Dark Night Rising and The Avengers.

Besides my epic fantasy novels, I also write fantasy romance under the pen name, Susan Kelley. I have a contract for another novel with my publisher coming out later this year. Romance usually requires a 'happily ever after,' but that doesn't mean the characters shouldn't be tortured before they get there.  I know I've done a pretty good job of it in some of my previous novels. One Good Woman might be the one with my most tortured characters who finally find happiness. I love those characters because they react to the adversary in their lives in complete opposite ways yet somehow both come to the same point of healing and redemption.

Have I tortured my characters in First Dragon enough? I guess my new editor will let me know. Do you torture your characters? Do you ever worry you're too nice to your protagonists?

10 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I piled on a lot of problems in my third book. The characters solve them within a chapter or two, but I keep piling on more, so hopefully that is enough torture.

shelly said...

I love causing problems in my novels. But not in real life.

Hugs and chocolate,
Shelly

Yolanda Renée said...

Through fire we are formed, why not the characters we create!

Congrat's on all the success!

L. Diane Wolfe said...

I've gotten better at torturing characters, but it's been a process.

David P. King said...

My character never knew what hit them sometimes. I've even killed characters and brought them back to life only to have them sent right back to the brink of death again. How's that for torture? :)

Tonja said...

Good luck on the edits. And congratulations on publishing so many books. Obviously, you're doing it right! :)

Misha Gerrick said...

My answer might sound odd, but not really.

I write almost as if my characters tell me what happened to them. Not all the time, but most of the time. So when it comes down to it, they wouldn't be telling me if the story was boring.

Which probably explains why I've yet to suffer from the saggy middle.

Raquel Byrnes said...

I always feel so mean when I ruin their lives. :)

Unknown said...

Good luck with the torturing :) I think it's a necessity in good fiction - only through struggle and hardship do we hope to grow as people, so they need to be tortured to become to people you want them to be by the end of the books :)

Golden Eagle said...

Er, not that much--not when there's literal torture sometimes, frozen near-death experiences, and suchlike. I worry more about my twisted brain. :P