Ever start hating a character?

[FallingToFly]

I'm trying really hard not to kill off a character that I have come to absolutely hate. Normally, killing off a character or removing them from the storyline is not a problem for me- it's like dominoes. Set up XYZ, and push.

Unfortunately this is the "Main" female character of this piece. There's no story without her. And I've kept her completely in character- and now I want to kill her, because she's such an obnoxious pain in the ass to work with. The demon- he's easy! And he agrees that we should kill the bitch. The elf just wants to fuck her and introduce a plot twist, and the vampire is sulking in the corner because she can't get play. I already killed the witch off.

*headdesk*

How do I do this? I can't kill her off, but she is fucking up the whole end of the book.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Is she still the same character that she was in the beginning? As readers we want to see growth and change, or we come to hate characters too.

 

[FallingToFly]

Oh, she's growing and changing, she's just... Gah. She's like that annoying GF of your best friend. The one that messes with his head- going from supportive and cool to screaming and flaky, demands impossible things from him, and cries about life isn't fair is she doesn't get her way. But somehow, for some reason, your BFF loves this crazy neurotic bitch and is trying to build a life with her.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Is she the protag? she doesn't sound like a woman I would want to read about!

 

[mynameisben]

I burnt out the motors on three different industrial shredders stuffing my autobiography through them. Does that count?

 

[TxRad]

What is even worse is having characters you like and having to kill them off. Otherwise the story ain't going anywhere.

Been there, Done that.

Powers

 

[FallingToFly]

She's the protag, or one of them. She doesn't come across that way in the actual story, but in my head? Everytime I figure out the lay of line for the next part of this story- and it's SO CLOSE to the end, she starts kicking up a fuss in my head. Everyone else is on board, have their lines down pat, and are ready to roll. She, on the other hand, doesn't like anything.

It's so damn tempting to write the last part of this story as a mad lib, and let the reader fill in her words and actions. This story is FINISHED, except that she is bitching about her part.

 

[FallingToFly]

Ben, you made me gigle so hard my son came to check on me.

Tx- yeah, I've had to do that a time or two myself.

 

[mynameisben]

She's the protag, or one of them. She doesn't come across that way in the actual story, but in my head? Everytime I figure out the lay of line for the next part of this story- and it's SO CLOSE to the end, she starts kicking up a fuss in my head. Everyone else is on board, have their lines down pat, and are ready to roll. She, on the other hand, doesn't like anything.

It's so damn tempting to write the last part of this story as a mad lib, and let the reader fill in her words and actions. This story is FINISHED, except that she is bitching about her part.

You should let her live, and really let her play out her bitchy best. That'll give your readers something to stew over, and to look forward to a grisly death in the sequel.

 

[FallingToFly]

No sequel, this is strictly a one-shot go. It's fanfic, which is usually about the first 20,000 words that flood out after a long writer's block. I want to finish it, but I'm not planning on continuing it (realistically, most of this is going to end up cannibalized into original works later) beyond this one story.

I think I'm just going to have to steamroll over her. I won't be as happy with the end result as I would if she died or ended up horribly destroyed as a person, but the readers will be happy, it will stay in canon, and I can finish these last 10,000 words and move back to my original stuff that this is cock-blocking.

But dammit, I REALLY hate this character!!

 

[Stella_Omega]

She's the protag, or one of them. She doesn't come across that way in the actual story, but in my head? Everytime I figure out the lay of line for the next part of this story- and it's SO CLOSE to the end, she starts kicking up a fuss in my head. Everyone else is on board, have their lines down pat, and are ready to roll. She, on the other hand, doesn't like anything.

It's so damn tempting to write the last part of this story as a mad lib, and let the reader fill in her words and actions. This story is FINISHED, except that she is bitching about her part.

yep-- and if you rewrote her part you would throw the balance off...
I guess sometimes you can't do right by every single one of your characters... You gotta grit your teeth and throw her to the wolves!

 

[bashfullyshameless]

Could somebody call her on her bullshit and make her see the error of her ways? Does that seem too simple?

 

[TxRad]

Could somebody call her on her bullshit and make her see the error of her ways? Does that seem too simple?

hard to make realistic for one thing and it might screw up what she has planned for the ending.

 

[TE999]

Knock her off and have her come back as a ghost or something. That way she can say her lines and disappear.

 

[FallingToFly]

I just said fuck it and started writing. She'll get on board or get assraped by all involved- my muse just got a new strap-on for Christmas.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I just said fuck it and started writing. She'll get on board or get assraped by all involved- my muse just got a new strap-on for Christmas.

it's a tough and thankless job...

 

[3113]

If there's a character I hate--and I mean, I hate them because I'm not having any fun writing them and, worse, they're making my story a bad read and a bad story, then I erase them and replace them with someone I love writing and who will be fun to read and does the story good.

Period.

I don't care if I've written a hundred pages. If a character is not working, and especially if they're ruining my story, out they go. And I have done it. I had a main character who completely failed at his job. Some hundred pages in, I faced the fact that he wasn't working. I replaced him with his barely-there brother and suddenly the whole story woke up and started writing itself.

It's the bane of writing that we authors sometimes go in the wrong direction--and like someone driving we may fight against having to drive all the way back and get on the right road. But sometimes that's the only answer. IMHO, Life is too short, and writing too important to waste any more time than I have on something that is hurting rather than elevating the story.

I'd bet money that you could go back to the beginning, switch this bitch out for the vampire, and it'd probably work out just fine. In fact, why not put the bitch in the vampire's role? Your vamp seems to be in a second fiddle position. If she was the bitch, then you could kill her off with a clean conscience and no hurt to the story.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

it's a tough and thankless job...

Oh, I don't know about the 'thankless' part . . .

 

[FallingToFly]

If anyone here is familiar with Kim Harrison's The Hollows series- it's Rachel. I've kept her exactly as she should be per canon. but she is just pissing me off now that I have the endgame sketched out.

I almost wish I could throw it up on Lit and see what pops up, but I've been keeping it to fanfiction.net for the feedback aspect.

 

[Stella_Omega]

If anyone here is familiar with Kim Harrison's The Hollows series- it's Rachel. I've kept her exactly as she should be per canon. but she is just pissing me off now that I have the endgame sketched out.

I almost wish I could throw it up on Lit and see what pops up, but I've been keeping it to fanfiction.net for the feedback aspect.

Ah well-- you are imputing prime-creator-type superpowers to Kim Harrison then. If his character doesn't work, it's your prerogative, as a fanfic writer, to make her a better character. If her plots leave the women behind-- you said the vamp is also a woman and has nothing to do? (hard to tell if you're talking about the story or inside your brain LOL) then you can make the women more influential-- because YOU're writing this one, not Kim.

 

[sr71plt]

I hated the protagonist in a novel I was editing for the mainstream--and I ALMOST told the author I did and why. The character was a user and a whiner and extreme self-centered--and has put me off of Chick Lit, because I so often see those traits in the protagonists in that genre. I didn't say anything, though, because I thought I could see that the author was just channeling herself into the character. And it's probably a good thing I didn't, because she sold 300,000 copies of that book and went on to a national best-seller with her next book (which had a more agreeable protagonist).

I haven't hated any of my characters beyond what I intentionally put in them that is hatable. I haven't shied away from given them negative or vulnerable traits (lots of vulnerable traits). What I often try to do is to change the reader's mind about them--in one direction or the other--over the course of the storyline.

 

[Darkniciad]

The only one I can think of offhand was my first as Les. It's been so long that I'm not even sure I remember his name without looking... Think it was Ken.

He frustrated the hell out of me because of an overbearing sense of propriety that just refused to let me get them together, no matter that Karen was sending out signals like a lighthouse on power overload.

I've had others that were annoying, but he was the only one that absolutely refused to go along with the program in any way, shape, or form. I ended up having to throw her at him stark naked before he saw the light.

 

[FallingToFly]

Stella:

Yeah, I try to keep to the basic realities of the character as the creator wrote them. Apparently I've done a good job of that, but at the same time- as this story unfolds, I need the character to bed a bit more than what the canon so far has allowed. I've actually eliminated most of the non-main characters from this piece, as it focuses very much on Al (the demon) and his very twisted relationship with Rachel. The vampire could have been a plot point, but because of Al being Al (in my head) she's pretty much been relegated to being bitchy and broody around the edges.

I hate negotiating with characters. In my head, they have so much personality of their own, it almost feels more like channeling than creating. >.< I've got two gay male characters in another story that are so much easier to work with, but I only get so long before this stupid fanfic piece starts demanding to be finished.

I suppose this is a progession as a writer. Instead of just abandoning a difficult story (as I have in the past) I'm driven to complete it. It's like literay OCD- I have to have everything in one folder all tidy and alphabetized before I can go on to the next folder.

I still hate this character, lol.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I just took a gander at the author's website.

I looked at the last book, and the first one, and they are written first person, in Rachels' voice. That's the character you hate? The really-truly actual main character? No wonder you're having problems!

 

[FallingToFly]

Uh-huh. She's a twitchy little bitch. My piece is written back and forth between first person and Al's POV. I finally negotiated a deal with Al- in which he doesn't lose anything, but may not win much either- fr a couple of marks on my soul, but Rachel is balking.

*kicks the litle witch right in her little red head*

She's about to have to stfu. I just screwed up her world royally- there's an elf in her bedroom and she's not wearing any clothes.