Reasons for Rejection: Unlikable Main Character

When I say unlikable main character, I'm not talking about an anti-hero. I can always get behind an Elphaba going bad or an Ebeneezer Scrooge going good. I'm actually quite fond of an anti hero. But in their case, I know I'm supposed to have doubts about their morality. Since the book is trying to make them a little unlikable, I can role with it.

A character becomes unlikable when we're SUPPOSED to like them, and then we don't. When we are TOLD something about a character but not SHOWN, that character might start to annoy us. If you tell me that your character is 'really a good person' but all I see them doing for the first pages is being nasty, that turns me against them. And when I turn against the main character, its all over for the pages. Because how can I stay with this person for 50,000+ words if I hate them?

I think one of the best examples for me is of Tris from Divergent. I know a lot of people like this book, which is great. I'm glad you'll get a joy out of it that I never will. The problem with the test at the beginning is that we are told that Tris, in addition to being brave, is divergent for selflessness and intelligence. The book does not put its money where its mouth is because she is only selfless and smart when the plot calls for it and other times becomes borderline sociopathic and stupid. I also disliked the character because the books always wanted me to side with her and I often found myself going against her. Obviously a lot of people like Tris because they didn't see this contradiction so they were perfectly fine with liking her.

There's a simple solution to this: show don't tell. Show who your character is. That way there is no question of whether or not I'm supposed to like them. It will make for a smoother journey through your pages and, perhaps, even an exciting one.

But like with Tris, everyone reacts to characters differently. Though I dislike her, a lot of people love her. In the same way, your character may hit home with an agent but fall flat with another. That's the old subjectivity coming into play. You can't make a MC who appeals to everyone. But you can 'show' and not 'tell', to make it a little easier.

Another Unexpected Writing Lesson from Real Life

Forgive me if this thought is a bit random and babbling, but it just sort of hit me as I was reading a post this morning. Bear with me, I promise I have a point :)

Late last week, a very good friend of mine from high school unexpectedly passed away. I hadn't spoken to her much in the last few years, other than some Facebook updates, but her death hit me very hard. She had been, at one point in my life, one of my best friends. And though I moved to the other side of the country after graduation, we did keep in contact for several years fairly frequently, and in more recent years, we kept in touch through places like MySpace and Facebook.

Friends and family members have been posting lovely comments about her on her Facebook page. Things about how she will be missed and how wonderful she was, how funny and loving and kind she was, those sorts of things.

Then this morning, someone posted something different. Instead of posting the lovely but pretty vague usual sentiment, this person posted a long list of specific things that she thought of when she thought of Kendra.

Things like how Kendra loved fuzzy socks and hot chocolate. How she made the best bread in the world and liked to dress her girls in striped leggings. How she preferred to sit on the floor, unless you were talking picnic tables - she liked to sit on top of those. How she let her kids play in the mud when other mothers chased their kids away from it. How she liked to play games on her cell phone and reuse things like turning an empty laundry detergent box into scrapbook supplies storage.

I absolutely loved reading this list. The other posts were wonderful, but this one...this one really SHOWED who Kendra was. This one painted a picture for me like none of the others did. It was wonderful being able to see the type of person she had grown into. I could picture the high school girl I'd known as this wonderful and quirky woman that was being described. It made me laugh and smile, even while I was choking back tears.

In fact, I think I will print the post out because through it I can truly SEE my friend.

And because all things in my life eventually get related to writing, it struck me that this is what I need to do with my characters. Yes, having a character who is beautiful and funny and just all around amazing is cool. But what really brings that character to life are the little things, the little eccentricities and quirks that make that character different from all the others out there. I need to make my characters truly SEEN.

For me, these types of things aren't something I can sit down and plan out ahead of time. I know many writers who write out character descriptions in the planning stage of their novels. I just don't know my characters well enough until I've gone through at least a draft or two of the story.

But it's something I will keep in mind more as I write now. And I'll probably think of Kendra every time :)