Book Club discussion

Tell us about your characters in your books.

Who's your favorite and why?

I really think I have too many...

Kat O'Leary in Mangroves and Monsters, the second installment of my Hoodoo Money series, is my favorite character - so far. She's a bit of a cliché, but I love Kat anyway. She's a strong woman with the whisper of an Irish brogue and a hint of something in her past that leaves her vulnerable, a bush pilot who can be tender and tough, mysterious and gutsy. I "wrote her" for my girls.

Sharon Cupp Pennington

While I have to say that I love the main character in my cyberpunk series, Artemis Bridge, my favorite character is really a fringe character. Paulie, the British ex-soccer player turned corporate thug, he's the guy I love to write, especially when playing his dialog off with Bridge. From their adversarial relationship in the first novel to the understanding they reach in the short story included in the second novel, they play off of each other so well. Paulie is really an homage to the great characters played by Vinnie Jones in Guy Ritchie's gangster movies. Maybe one day I'll have a story I can center around him and only him.

Gary Ballard

John wrote: "Tell us about your characters in your books.

Who's your favorite and why?"

You know, I thought it would be easy to answer this question by citing my protagonists, Erik and Claire.

Except that I had one character, originally intended to be minor, who turned out to be far more important than I anticipated. His name is Gilbert Rochambeau, and he starts out as the villain's valet. There is more to Gilbert than meets the eye, as we find out through the course of the story, and he features heavily in the sequel that I'm currently writing.

One of my readers wrote to tell me that she had developed an enormous crush on Gilbert over the course of the story, which made me smile.

My two MCs, without a doubt. They're both very flawed individuals but so likeable that you really just want the best for them. But it ain't necessarily so...!

Lola in Below Sunlight is my favorite. She's young and lost but to the outside world she is confident and drips with sex appeal. I love her self destructive attitude and witty remarks. She completely understands what it means to live on the edge.

For me, it has to be Will Collins in my Rainbows Shadow Trilogy.

Although he is just thirteen, he has been the main character in all three of my books and his youthful determination as well as his yearning to find his real purpose is what makes him so fun to create.

His relationship with his grandfather is also central to what drives him to do what he does. He knows deep down he is special but the incredible journey he has to endure to figure all of this out is what make him so fun.

John wrote: "Tell us about your characters in your books.

Who's your favorite and why?"

Thank you, John, for starting this thread! This is a wonderful opportunity for us Goodreads authors to shed some light on our books.

One of my favorite characters in the Morrigan's Brood Series, which I co-write with Heather Poinsett Dunbar, happens to be the protagonist villain, Mandubratius. He is a historical figure from the 1st century BCE my co-author and I have fictionalized in our dark fantasy / historical fiction / adventure series. To read more about the historical figure and how we fictionalized him, please click here.

Mandubratius is a man with a destiny, but unforeseen events change him and re-shape his destiny. He was not evil originally, but circumstances warped him, and he became a power-hungry, devious person bent on vengeance and dominance. But that is only what the reader sees in the first two books.

Something happens to him at the end of the second book, and yet again, circumstances change him, perhaps for the better, but can 600 years of performing evil deeds be washed away over night? Perhaps not over night, but maybe over another 200 years? Is it true that time heals all wounds?


I like Mandubratius because he is a challenging character to get into from a writing perspective. He has been betrayed, beaten, tortured, crucified, brought to the edge of death, and transformed into a blood-thirsty being... how could these circumstances not produce someone with an evil bent? Even though he is evil, there is still a pain, a longing for something, beneath his haughty veneer.

Mandubratius may not be one of the most popular characters in the first two books, but he completes the plot. Without him, there would be no story.

Cheers!

Christopher Dunbar

Wow I read this wrong, I thought it was for books we read, I feel dumb. I only have one book published and in maybe the male main character Aaron. I had fun writing his diminions and quirks. I loved writing his growth of a character. He isn't too much like me so I had some fun getting in his head. I loved writing his saracsitic remarks, and working out how he tries to think of plans to keep his group alive. I really loved writing his character!

For me to write a story and enjoy it enough to keep writing I have to get into a character. I'm currently writing a pirate story and really enjoying the two main characters.

I have to say my favorite characters are the Guardians in my YA fantasy. Although powerful immortals, I give them unique personalities, not stuff know-it-alls who can solve any and all mortals troubles.

Through them I take an observer's view of the mortals they interact with - of faults, virtues and sometimes confounding contradictions in our decisions, behavior and actions.

http://www.allonbooks.com

My favorite characters are Archie Sheridan and Gretchen Lowell from the HEARTSICK series. They fit together like a hand to a glove. A tight, suffocating, tortureous, mitten!

I love Slade, the MC in the Witchcraft Wars but more because I'm enjoying finding out about his history and reasons for his actions. But my two favourite characters are Nikolai, an evil necromancer who worships Bhaal, chief of the evil deities and Trunk, a former Knight/Paladin of Ilmater, chief of the good deities. They're forced to work together and the genuine friendship that springs up between them has been a joy to write, especially as it changes both their characters so much.

Heck, all my fans feel the need to choose between Trevor and Mitchell. It doesn't help that Trevor's Song is, essentially, Trevor's story (although an action on Mitchell's part is the catalyst for what follows).

But me? I can't choose between the two dudes. Trevor's the in-your-face bad boy and Mitchell's the dashing romantic hero.

I'm having a blast writing about my character Cop from my story Trespassing.

Arch wrote: "I'm having a blast writing about my character Cop from my story Trespassing."

Tell us about your cop character.

Cop is a dangerous bad boy, who is out for revenge for the murder of his father. The murder took place in the front of him and the man that killed his father was a friend of his father.

My story is not a book. I'm writing it as a challenge story on another group that I am on.

I just thought that I should share my favorite character from a story that I am writing.

I've really enjoyed writing about Varthikes. When I first started creating Draconia nearly 10 years ago, he was the first character to come to mind--a dragon who was curious about what lay beyond his world. This curiosity lead him to befriend a young Space Fleet officer from Earth, Audwin McClance. Their friendship has really been fun to explore in the three books I have so far, as well as dozen-or-so short stories I've written/plan to write for them. I also have a fourth novel planned.