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I've been working on my "quest" story, and I had to kill off one of the characters, and I found myself actually tearing up as I wrote it, as if she was a real friend that was dying. Has this happened to anybody else?
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certainly
I tear up easily though. But I even teared up when I killed off the pedophile in Finding Jenny. I think it makes you a better writer if you are emotionally concerned and connected with your characters.
Katie Leone (Katie-Leone.com)
Writing is what you do when you put pen to paper, being an author is what you do when you bring words to life
Er...yes.
My Sussex Border stories have a number of characters killed off. While Mel features as a linking thread in them, my tears were actually flowing harder when writing about Annie recovering what was left of her body. There were also, particularly, the deaths of Becky and Jo in Cold Feet, which were so necessary to the plot, but meant losing two very dear imaginary friends.
On the other hand, I based Joey Harber and some of the Castle Keep workers on real people I have known, and the only things that came to me when writing of their deaths were hard memories and hatred.
Yes I do the same.
If it is not real to you how can it be real to your readers. If it is not hard to for you it comes to easy and the loss is cheapened. We all put a lot of work in these paper people so they can live in our minds it is natural to feel the loss it showes what a great big heart you have darling and why we love you so much.
Huggles
Michele
With those with open eyes the world reads like a book
oh yes!
While I'm writing I usually react the way characters in my story do, and I make them do what I see myself doing.
But yes, I cry my eyes out and laugh my head off while I'm writing.
Kaleigh
Killing characters comes with
Killing characters comes with the business. While I have not killed as many characters as say Joss Whedon, I have done my fair share in some of the stories I have written. It isn't easy but when it fits the stories you have to do what you have to do. Character death is important sometimes as it can move the plot forward and add a certain emotional tone. That is just another tool in an author's toolbox, but when you get to know a character, yeah it can still hurt.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
Wrote out a few plot ideas
Wrote out a few plot ideas once and scrapped one becuase I couldn't make it work, but each time I wrote on it, I couldn't stop crying
It happens to the good writers
It's just one of those things, when you write a believable character. While trying to prod my muse back into life, I took some bits from several different "books" of my main story and killed off a prime character. It was an exercise in frustration as much as anything and didn't spur me in any way. But I cry every time I read it, none the less.
Sometimes you have to do dirty to one of your characters, it sucks but you have to be true to your story. Crying is natural.
"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin
Absolutely
I cried for Musetta, Jo, Mike and Esmeralda. Some may think it strange, but Esmeralda was a cat.
Portia
Of course!
I tend to not kill off too many characters. I'm a wimp that way. In one case, I felt so bad that I brought her back. That turned out to be a really powerful scene.
i killed a gatorade bottle and cried
It was in God Bless the Child and the same scene caused Erin to call me a son of a bitch. I never been more proud.
Katie Leone (Katie-Leone.com)
Writing is what you do when you put pen to paper, being an author is what you do when you bring words to life
I think sometimes it's a
I think sometimes it's a necessary evil, in order to move the story forward and to develop the main character. Sometimes its the pain that people go through that causes them to be willing to change and maybe take a path that they wouldn't have normally taking.
Cain129
The killing doesn,t bother me that much
Part of my Assassin story was about killing, but I never had much of an emotional thread with the unlucky targets. There was no death in "I'll be home for Christmas" but tears flowed when I wrote that one. Same for "The Window". I have to have some kind of attachment to the subject person for death to bother me. I try to not forget that this is fiction and not real life. Funny thing is that I haven't cried at many funerals either, my Mom's and Dad's, my Grandmother's and one close friend's, yet I'll cry watching or reading something happy. Screwed up what? Arecee
Not yet, but eventually.
...And it won't be limited to the spectacular demise of a villian. Victory without sacrifice isn't always possible. = (
It depends on the story. Does NEED it? IE context is everything
A death *out of the blue* may be just a device or it may be critical to the story.
Just as an expected death or death that is averted can make or break a tale.
Some stories don't need one. Others need many deaths, IE say a war story.
A long winded --- am I ever any different --- way to say the context of a death in a story is what matters.
Otherwise it is just dark *eye candy*.... gratuitous?
Whatever.
I have toyed with deaths in several of my tales but mostly off camera or as background info for the tale.
When I post -- and I do intend to post more of Timeout as several people have put considerable effort into proofing and test reading for me -- later chapters of my series some deaths will occur.
Big gory Technicolor deaths on camera.
-- snicker --
No, really. My heroine is confronted by death. Not hers but of innocents and of guilty. The *art* is in balancing *need to know* with the readers' imaginations. Too detailed it is overwhelming and, well, sick. A bit like overly graphic depictions of anything, shopping, sex, etc. It comes of clinical, dry, dull. Too little and it could seem rushed.
Death is part of life. It is true in RL so it is true in fiction.
When the context is right, when done well it adds to a story. Done poorly or just to *stir things up* it comes off as a cheat... at least for me as a reader.
I know not about others but many of the aspects of my characters are things I remember about real people suitably tweaked and twisted to fit the story. That may well be true for other who write. We all have our own way of creating/story telling.
Killing a character thus is like killing off bits of those you knew.
Both myself and my heroine cry thinking back on the death of my mother. And of others we loved.
If my mother and I could cry for almost 20 minutes as we held our cat when he had to be put down all those years ago , why not cry over a character you have invested time and effort into as a writer or reader?
Hell, my eyes are wet now writing this. Poor mom. poor Charlie.
Poor Ann my dear older sister.
Got to go.
John in Wauwatosa
John in Wauwatosa
Tears
"No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader." Robert Frost
Nancy Cole
"You may be what you resolve to be."
T.J. Jackson