Showing posts with label characters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label characters. Show all posts

Monday, January 14, 2013

Embarassing moments keep readers engaged


How many of you have had embarassing moments? I've had my share and more.

In my estimation, they fall into a couple of categories:

Verbal gaffes - for example, calling someone the wrong name, letting a secret slip to the wrong person, or saying something uncomplimentary about someone who overhears the remark.

Ditzy mistakes - putting the cereal box in the refrigerator, forgetting to seal the envelopes of your bills, dialing the wrong phone number twice in a row, tucking your skirt in your underpants in a public place after using the restroom, gapping button or zipper, or searching for an item that's in plain sight on your body.

Messes involving body fluids or body noises - getting dog pooh on the shoe and tracking it all over someone's house/rug/floor, not making it to the bathroom on time for an urgent matter, or talking fast and spit flying out of your mouth onto someone else.

Everyone has a reaction to embarassing moments. The culprit is embarassed, naturally, but onlookers might be horrified, amused, sympathetic, annoyed, or somewhere in between.

Characters that display oddities are memorable and add zest. In my Cleopatra Jones series, Mama is known for her culinary disasters, such as spicklefish lasagne (lasagne made with spinach, pickles and sardines). Mama's a secondary character in that series, but don't tell her.

In Death, Island Style, my main character has several crafting disasters. MaryBeth's craft class turns into a free-for-all and she ends up with glue globs in her hair. Later, she collects seashells that have hermit crabs in them and thinks, because of the bad odor, that there's a body in her shop.

In Murder in the Buff, ultra-conservative reporter Molly must go to a nudist colony to pick something up for her boss. She darn near has heart palpitations, giving readers chuckles about her dilemma and mortification.

Want to share your embarassing moment? I'd love to hear from you!

Maggie Toussaint
Coming this year: Hot Water and Dime If I Know
www.maggietoussaint.com

Monday, June 25, 2012

A matter of point of view

How many times have you been in a situation where something happened and everyone who witnessed the event told a slightly different version of events?

Ground zero, or the incident itself, is at a physical location. Witnesses range from nearby to further away. They also may or may not have a personal relationship with one of the individuals involved.

Both proximity and "insider knowledge" greatly affect how someone sees an event. For instance, if you observe a person running through the grocery store that knocks displays over and makes a mess of the store, you're upset with that person. But if you know his dog jumped out of the car and is dying in the parking lot, you're less likely to  paint his action in the grocery store in such a negative light.

That point of view, or how you see the world, is greatly influenced by what you know and what you see. One problem with this is that what we know may not be the entire truth. In most cases, knowing something new about a person changes our opinion of that person, shading it anywhere from less favorable to more favorable.

And let's not forget perspective. If you stand on a deserted road, the margins of the road at the horizon will converge to a vanishing point, making the road wider looking where you're standing and narrower the further away you look. The road doesn't change shape, but your point of view does.

In the same way, different characters in a book will rarely have the same perspective. The issue of what's at stake will be different for each person. Each person will have goals, dreams, agendas, flaws, and personal vendettas. That's the nature of humanity.

Pouring all of this into a character infuses life into a story. Point of view is a craft element that's more than one entity narrating the story. POV brings us into the mindset of the character on center stage. It grants us access to his/her knowledge, physical location, and personal history with the other characters in the scene.

Take the instance of two sisters. Molly has the family that Clarice wants. Molly has a handsome, successful husband who adores her. When Clarice can't obtain those things for herself, she goes after what Molly has.

Not such a nice sister, is she? But these situations happen in real life. This particular rivalry of Molly and Clarice is played out in my murder mystery, Murder in the Buff.

By making the stakes matter, readers empathize with Molly and despise Clarice for her interference. I write mysteries in first person POV, which makes Molly my only POV character, but through actions and dialogue, the perspective of the other characters come through.

This marriage-wrecking scheme of Clarice's affects more than the three people involved; it includes the whole family - from Molly and Hadley's son, to their parents and grandparents, to Molly's workplace. A ripple in the pond is more than a ripple when the stakes are high.

Point of view.
It makes us care.
It makes us want to know what happens next.
It makes us demand justice.

Maggie Toussaint
www.maggietoussaint.com

Murder in the Buff is available now.
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