Elzbieta Tibai
asked
Josh Lanyon:
I have a two part question for you: Since you write from the perspective of Christopher Holmes, does that mean that you see yourself as more like him, and if so, how does that effect your own personal relationships?
Josh Lanyon
What a great question.
I usually decide on the POV based on who is going to have the most amusing perspective and voice for the narrative. In some pairings, an equal voice is going to be most effective -- the Dangerous Ground books, for example. Will and Taylor are both similar and dissimilar enough to each have an interesting perspective on what's happening between them. What fascinates me there is how genuinely confused by each other they often are--although they are so much alike in some ways.
But in first person, I'm usually thinking about voice, and the funny quirky voice is usually going to make the most entertaining "guide" through the story. (Or that's my take anyway.) So it's usually going to be the character with the strongest sense of humor--but also the character with the most tics and quirks. So Adrien in the case of the AE books and Kit in the case of the H&M books. I'm generally looking at the "foil" for the manly man heroic character. :-)
I do have a great deal of sympathy for Kit--although he would drive even me crazy.
To be perfectly honest, I was a relationship bulldozer in my twenties and thirties. I went through a lot of relationships leaving death and destruction in my wake. Okay, I'm kind of kidding, but kind of not. ;-) The good part about this is I learned quite a bit from those early disasters and I'm actually very good at grown up relationships. I'm still on speaking terms with everyone in my family and most of my friends are people I've known for eons. I think I've been married for about 13 years-ish? And given the trouble I had settling in, that is no mean feat.
Anyway, my early relationship catastrophes have provided a lot of useful material for fiction. I enjoy exploring those dynamics, but I would never want to live through those years and those relationships again.
That's why I like to write characters who learn from their mistakes.
I usually decide on the POV based on who is going to have the most amusing perspective and voice for the narrative. In some pairings, an equal voice is going to be most effective -- the Dangerous Ground books, for example. Will and Taylor are both similar and dissimilar enough to each have an interesting perspective on what's happening between them. What fascinates me there is how genuinely confused by each other they often are--although they are so much alike in some ways.
But in first person, I'm usually thinking about voice, and the funny quirky voice is usually going to make the most entertaining "guide" through the story. (Or that's my take anyway.) So it's usually going to be the character with the strongest sense of humor--but also the character with the most tics and quirks. So Adrien in the case of the AE books and Kit in the case of the H&M books. I'm generally looking at the "foil" for the manly man heroic character. :-)
I do have a great deal of sympathy for Kit--although he would drive even me crazy.
To be perfectly honest, I was a relationship bulldozer in my twenties and thirties. I went through a lot of relationships leaving death and destruction in my wake. Okay, I'm kind of kidding, but kind of not. ;-) The good part about this is I learned quite a bit from those early disasters and I'm actually very good at grown up relationships. I'm still on speaking terms with everyone in my family and most of my friends are people I've known for eons. I think I've been married for about 13 years-ish? And given the trouble I had settling in, that is no mean feat.
Anyway, my early relationship catastrophes have provided a lot of useful material for fiction. I enjoy exploring those dynamics, but I would never want to live through those years and those relationships again.
That's why I like to write characters who learn from their mistakes.
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