Maybe Henry David Thoreau was on to something

Every now and then I become obsessed with a name. I'll use it for original characters, video games with character creation.

Jacelyn. Sorin. Asher. Gideon. Evangeline. Cadence. Tamsyn.

Tamsyn is the latest of my obsessions, but I recently replayed Dragon Age: Inquisition and gave my Inquisitor Lavellan the name "Vesper". I'm hook, ha ha!

I have to write a short story for a midterm, and my process has always been to start with a character then build the world around them. In my first published work I started with the heroin Roshan, then her partner Emilian, then their jobs as monster hunters.

I wonder if other writers prefer using characters or world's they've created before over creating something new each time. Look at how James Patterson brought Alex Cross to the center of a multilayered mystery time and time again, or Stephen King exploring another dark corner of his Castle Rock. Was it because of numbers; because those characters and place sell books? Or was it because Alex is an old friend and Castle Rock is home?

I rarely bring anyone back, rarely revisit old created worlds.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The bones aren't scary; it's the meat

What is " Authentic self "? Humans are impressionable beings. We absorb our surroundings, mimic others in our environments. For safety, comfort, acceptance. Do we push our true selves away? Down in the mass of meat that puts our skeletal husks into motion, for the mere sake of acceptance of lemmings? I shared a high-five with a woman in my Social and Emotional Foundations class for having chronic anxiety in common. I am authentically anxious but do I define myself by it? Finding camaraderie among fellow anxiety riddled individuals helps with the struggle. It encourages continuing the conversation on mental health, and tearing down the stigma of shame. Lady Gaga wrote "I am obsessively opposed to the typical", and I feel that this describes me perfectly. My authentic self was found beneath the rubble of castles torn down. Dishonest keeps of identities I desperately wanted for the sole acceptance of trash.
Read more

One of those strange happenings sort of days

Assignment: write a scene (a double-spaced page) that shows your character in a situation that forces them to act "out of character." Write a scene that shows your character committing a slightly immoral act. This is done to add dimension to your character. Think small, quiet actions. Maybe your character tells a lie, gossips, confesses a secret. What propels your character into this action? Place your character in a specific setting and go from there. o0o A news clipping of an article titled “Three-week-old corpse doing better, family tells coroner” sat abandoned on a table at Starbucks. Maeve frowned at it from where she stood at the counter waiting for her fair-trade coffee. It lay open on one of the uncomfortable-by-design wooden chairs. The clipping looked old and was parched and yellowed along the edges, and in the creases from where it had once been folded into quarters.             From where she stood Maeve could no...
Read more