Writing Meme Day 24

[erastes]

24. How willing are you to kill your characters if the plot so demands it? What's the most interesting way you've killed someone?

I started this post thinking: “Oh I have no problem killing people off.”And then I realised that I haven’t done a lot of it though, and I had to think about that today and realise that it’s a bit wussie of me.  I always say “oh readers’ expectations don’t influence me” but I think in this instance I’ve probably been more influenced than I realise. Readers don’t like deaths. Not of the main characters anyway, not in Romance. Even if you give the left-behind character someone else to love.

I can only think of one gay romance book which takes a very brave stand of mercilessly killing one of the main protagonists half way through the book, and I won’t name it but it’s one of my favourites.

I (as you know) chickened out of killing Fleury AND Rafe’s son, so perhaps I am big chicken…

OH!  Yes! I did kill someone off in Transgressions! Oh Phew! I was getting all despondent and thinking I’d never killed off anyone!  I wouldn’t say that death was particularly interesting, although slightly gruesome, as his partner woke up next to him and found him being cuddled by a CORPSE. Mwahahahaha.

Doctor Who now!  *runs to make tea*

 

Comments

[tiggothy.livejournal.com]

I was about to say "What about Transgressions?" Also, I think Jonathan's revenge on the one who dupes him (trying not to give spoilers!) in that qualifies as "interesting" :-) And, of course, given the fact there's the English Civil War happening in that book, there's rather a lot of death about! You're definitely *not* any kind of chicken (or vampire)!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

That's true - there's the bloke who gets blown to smithereens too - when his ammunition "apostles" catch fire.

Of course you never see the guy you refer to being killed. I like to think he got away from his captors...

mwaahahahah

[tiggothy.livejournal.com]

Damn you, I like seeing justice being served!

[belluthien.livejournal.com]

Heh. I like that. ;)
y

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

I don't know what it says about me that I am notorious for killing people off in particularly awful ways. That being said, my primary fandom these days is Shakespeare, so I blame him. ;)

[belluthien.livejournal.com]

I can only think of one gay romance book which takes a very brave stand of mercilessly killing one of the main protagonists half way through the book, and I won’t name it but it’s one of my favourites.

Tease! I would be very curious to see how that worked.

And I thought your death in Transgressions was interesting. And gruesome. And sad. Yes.
y

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

Well good for you for being a chicken. By Chris Smith's standards, that means you are a vampire and we all know how much ppl love them. So...you is loved even more!

Death...I am fascinated..which is why nobody wants SC...

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

I don't give anybody points for killing off characters, but when it works for the story it's right. You will use up ALL your dead-character points for Gen X, so don't worry!

I do tend to kill off my villains because they're usually the sort of people who deserve it--and nobody's sorry. The WIP has corpses left and right, but not the heroes--somebody's got to clean up the mess.