Men in Tights
Batman had Robin. A sidekick. A got-your-back-though-I'm-wearing-tights guy.
Secondary characters, for a lot of writers, are the most fun aspect of a novel. The sidekicks get to be quirky. Odd. Funny. Weird. They're too strange to be center stage in their own novel, perhaps, but they're great for the main character to play off of.
Billie Quinn has Lewis. He collects brains. He is impossibly brilliant and loves discussing maggots on bodies. (The two of them work in forensic science.) Lewis could, conceivably, spin off into his own book, but then I think his oddities would overwhelm. A dash of Lewis is great--like adding some nutmeg to your oatmeal. But you don't want a whole BOWL of nutmeg.
Which brings me to secondary characters who seem to take over a book. It's a very bad thing if readers care more about the secondaries than the main character--somehow the balance the writer should be striving for has been thrown off-kilter. So, the way I look at it is this . . .
Your main character is the sun, and all these secondary characters orbit around the main character. The sun has to shine brightest. AND, every single secondary character should fill a specific role--they should demonstrate something about the main character by their very interaction. Lewis exists to show how brilliant Billie is. He is a genius--I tell you that (or rather Billie does). He cannot stand most people because they cannot keep up with his intelligence. She can. She is his best friend. By proxy, she is a genius as well.
In Double Down, Skye McNalley has George "Touchdown" Russell as her sponsor in Gamblers Anonymous, and her best friend. Right at the start of the book, Touchdown, or T.D. as she calls him, berates her for breaking the rules--she chose a MALE sponsor in her Twelve Step group, not a female. He was only supposed to be her sponsor "until you could find one with a skirt." But she never looked for a female sponsor, preferring to be with T.D. What does this show about Skye? She grew up motherless and prefers the company of bookies and gamblers--men. And she doesn't obey the rules. She was raised to break them.
What about you? What secondaries are there in your current wip? Or what secondaries in a book or series of books have been your faves? And why?
Secondary characters, for a lot of writers, are the most fun aspect of a novel. The sidekicks get to be quirky. Odd. Funny. Weird. They're too strange to be center stage in their own novel, perhaps, but they're great for the main character to play off of.
Billie Quinn has Lewis. He collects brains. He is impossibly brilliant and loves discussing maggots on bodies. (The two of them work in forensic science.) Lewis could, conceivably, spin off into his own book, but then I think his oddities would overwhelm. A dash of Lewis is great--like adding some nutmeg to your oatmeal. But you don't want a whole BOWL of nutmeg.
Which brings me to secondary characters who seem to take over a book. It's a very bad thing if readers care more about the secondaries than the main character--somehow the balance the writer should be striving for has been thrown off-kilter. So, the way I look at it is this . . .
Your main character is the sun, and all these secondary characters orbit around the main character. The sun has to shine brightest. AND, every single secondary character should fill a specific role--they should demonstrate something about the main character by their very interaction. Lewis exists to show how brilliant Billie is. He is a genius--I tell you that (or rather Billie does). He cannot stand most people because they cannot keep up with his intelligence. She can. She is his best friend. By proxy, she is a genius as well.
In Double Down, Skye McNalley has George "Touchdown" Russell as her sponsor in Gamblers Anonymous, and her best friend. Right at the start of the book, Touchdown, or T.D. as she calls him, berates her for breaking the rules--she chose a MALE sponsor in her Twelve Step group, not a female. He was only supposed to be her sponsor "until you could find one with a skirt." But she never looked for a female sponsor, preferring to be with T.D. What does this show about Skye? She grew up motherless and prefers the company of bookies and gamblers--men. And she doesn't obey the rules. She was raised to break them.
What about you? What secondaries are there in your current wip? Or what secondaries in a book or series of books have been your faves? And why?
posted by Erica Orloff at 6:46 AM
10 Comments:
I've not written anything where a secondary character tries to take over. I think it's because I start writing with just the protag or h/h, and the rest come along as and when I need them. In a sense, they are part of the plot and my protag or h/h is What The Plot's About.
My favorite secondary is undoubtedly the Unnamed Son of Doric. I know, I know, I should be ashamed, because he's been the Unnamed Son for more than a year. He can be a little bratty (he's young by the standards of his people), he's rather suave and knows how to kill. He's very much the perfect foil to his father.
Hi May:
Unnamed Son--I love it. I can't work if I don't have a name. It's this really neurotic thing about me.
And your writing technique . . . definitely keeps you focused. That's really great. Preserves a kind of purity about the story.
Erica, it very much does. And to a newbie like me, it's a huge huge relief to have one less possible issue to deal with.
I did read the first Trace book, and I think Lewis might be, especially as the protagonist, the type of character a reader will either love or hate.
I love "Unnamed Son" too, and I think that's why he's still nameless. LOL.
I like Meyer from the Travis Magee novels...Hawk from the Spenser books...Alex Cross's partner Sampson...
I guess what these guys have in common is that they would take a bullet for the MC. That's how deep the friendship goes.
My guy, Nicholas Colt, pretty much works alone, more like Estleman's Amos Walker or, to a certain extent, Vacchs's Burke. He has a family of helpers, but no sidekick per se.
Secondaries are really fun, though, and I love your solar system analogy, Erica. Great post!
may:
Exactly. Lewis is an acquired taste. Billie adores him, though, so it works for them. And with secondaries, you can play with more of that acquired taste, or really fringe characters who would be tough to have as the protagonist. In Diary of a Blues Goddess, the main secondary is a trannie. Not too many books anywhere out there with transvestite main characters.
E
Jude:
I like the idea of "helpers."
E
Paris, Raiden, Caleb and Conner are secondary characters that I love. They all have very different qualities to help the story along.
la:
And that's a great way to think of them--helping along the story. I think what got so boring about a lot of chick lit, for instance, was cluttering up the story with sidekicks who really didn't DO anything to advance the story.
E
The book I just turned in--the hero's brother and sister were a complete hoot and completely oposite ends of the spectrum.
Amie:
Billie Quinn had a thief for a brother. Lately I've been writing about twins.
E
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