Who else falls in love with their characters?

[MrPixel]

Like most of you, I write in first-person style, projecting myself and my personality into the story. I've discovered as my fiction style blooms that I - the real me - am becoming emotionally involved with my female lead. Or, in this case, female leads, as my genre at the moment is polyamory.

Sure, I'm building the characters, but somehow the words flow on their own without a lot of conscious direction on my part. It's weird.

Anybody else fall into this trap? Is it bad, or good? Or even desirable?

So far it's been really good for me personally, as I redirect my affections to my real-world spouse, who happens to be the model for the secondary female lead.

 

[Djmac1031]

Absolutely happened to me with Jenna, my female lead in my series, The Jenna Arrangement.

The story is told 1st person from the male leads perspective, and like you, there are many parts of myself in him.

But Jenna has taken on a life of her own, and I see, and write her, like she's a real person.

And I totally have a crush on her.

 

[jehoram]

Not surprising, considering that we invest our characters with all the traits we find desirable. They're pretty, sexually uninhibited, and as smart or as dumb as we like them to be. How can we not fall in love with them?

 

[Djmac1031]

I can't speak for the women writers, or even all male writers of course.

But in general, if we're writing a character based on ourself, they're going to be a better version of ourself, what we want to be, wished we were.

And our love / sex interest characters are going to reflect what we'd want, or at least fantasize about wanting, in real life.

Unless we're writing an antagonist character of course.

Besides, if YOU don't love your characters, how do you expect your readers to love them?

 

[rescatooor]

Can't say I love any of my characters. But I wish them well.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

Happened with me with a bunch of characters- Karen, Alexa, Jenny, Becky, Nanu... especially Karen, I think.

 

[NotWise]

I pretty much fell in love with Claudia, the female protagonist in "A Valentine's Day Mess." I was over her by the end of the series. I also fell in love with Hannah and Gabby in "Love is Enough," but some of the female characters in my early stories are people I wouldn't want to meet on the street.

My male protagonists always share some of my traits, but they also have traits that are not mine. In some cases, that includes traits I don't really like. Aaron in "Quarter to Midnight" had problems.

As I've gained writing experience, maybe I've built more varied characters who've drifted away from myself and/or people I could love.

 

[MrPixel]

... Besides, if YOU don't love your characters, how do you expect your readers to love them?

Thank you for that. Makes sense. I knew I was hitting the right notes when my wife was reading a manuscript and came to a particularly poignant scene and started to cry. I had tears, too, when it was writing itself, using my fingers.

 

[TadOverdon]

I identify with more of my female characters than I'd expect, as I don't see myself as having anything in common with most of them other than a tendency to mild sarcasm.

I think that when I get a feeling of them as emotionally vulnerable or damaged in some sense then I feel protective of them.

Which is very strange because of the sorts of stories that I write. They're pretty determinedly stroke stories where motivations are convenient and the emphasis is on explicit action. All of these people would be screwed up beyond the point of being functional, not to mention perpetually exhausted.

 

[SimonDoom]

Not exactly. My female characters often are projections of people or qualities I fantasize about or am attracted to, but they inhabit a fantasy space in my head that is separate from the world in which I feel love. I am in total control of my characters, and real love, for me, requires some element over which I have no control.

 

[yukonnights]

First, I think most authors project some … to a lot, of themselves into their stories. Erotic stories are more intimate, and writing those emotions reach deeper into a more hidden and vulnerable place inside. But, I wouldn't say I'm emotionally involved with a character — I would say that in First POV; It's more like I am the character — but only when I am writing. Once the story is finished and on it's way into the world, I don't think about it much. But this emotional connection is why I have been singing praises for that point of view for quite awhile.

If the words are are flowing out on their own, I'd say you're in the groove you want to be in. You're writing real emotions, not dry words that describe emotions.

Is this a trap? IMO, no.
Is it bad? Just the opposite.
Is it desirable? I think it is. Put up a few stories and see what the response is. This intimate style has rewarded me with a positive reception on many stories.

 

[shakna]

Mostly, no.

I identify with most of my characters. I like Rin, and Katie. When they go through pain, I do feel it, but it isn't anything that deep-seated.

However, there is one exception to that rule, a character most of my readers probably know I have a huge soft spot for, by now.

My lead catgirl, Toofy, sort of takes up space in my head now. It's hers. She's arrogant, she can be an utter bitch, but she can also be kind, and whilst she can be manipulative or conniving, she is a huge sweetheart to the people she cares about. And generally tells you if she's screwing with you.

Yeah... She couldn't exist in this world (she'd be in prison or an asylum), but I love her.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I don't fall in love with characters. I do fall in love with writing certain characters.

When I think about it, they are usually the smart assy female supporting characters. I wonder if that's the kind of projection people have mentioned...

 

[Quinn_McMullen]

I have fallen in love with three of my characters - Christine and Zoe from my "Regaining My Life" series and Gabby from my collaboration with Erin Page. Interestingly, I modeled all three from composites of women I know. Zoe was supposed to be a sidebar in the story and she elbowed her way into a position as a main character and into my heart.

Like most of you, for me the characters take on a life of their own. It is a very interesting phenomenon.

 

[Djmac1031]

I don't fall in love with characters. I do fall in love with writing certain characters.

When I think about it, they are usually the smart assy female supporting characters. I wonder if that's the kind of projection people have mentioned...

I certainly didn't mean "love" in the literal sense. As you said, I love WRITING my Jenna character, and I love how real she feels to me, because hopefully that resonates with my readers.

But I can still separate fantasy from reality

 

[Djmac1031]

Like most of you, for me the characters take on a life of their own. It is a very interesting phenomenon.

It is indeed. Depending on the story I'm writing, I usually have complete control of the characters: what I want them to do, say and feel.

But yeah, some of them, one in particular for me anyway, truly just seem to take over and suddenly it feels like they're directing me, not the other way around.

 

[Lifestyle66]

Like most of you, I write in first-person style, projecting myself and my personality into the story. I've discovered as my fiction style blooms that I - the real me - am becoming emotionally involved with my female lead. Or, in this case, female leads, as my genre at the moment is polyamory.

Sure, I'm building the characters, but somehow the words flow on their own without a lot of conscious direction on my part. It's weird.

Anybody else fall into this trap? Is it bad, or good? Or even desirable?

So far it's been really good for me personally, as I redirect my affections to my real-world spouse, who happens to be the model for the secondary female lead.

I noticed the same, and attribute it to not a love affair with my characters, but more of a focus involving a desire to BE the character, and hear and feel those reactions.

I find it easier to write the first-person dialog if I can BE the narrator and hear the responses I think I want to hear.

 

[Quinn_McMullen]

I noticed the same, and attribute it to not a love affair with my characters, but more of a focus involving a desire to BE the character, and hear and feel those reactions.

I find it easier to write the first-person dialog if I can BE the narrator and hear the responses I think I want to hear.

I think you're spot on here. If you take on the character, it is much easier to hear the dialog. Perhaps that's why we love them - we are being them.

 

[Lifestyle66]

I think you're spot on here. If you take on the character, it is much easier to hear the dialog. Perhaps that's why we love them - we are being them.

Exactly!

I hear my wife and others around me. And I can better envision what I want/expect/hope to hear.

Now to write other stories and other characters, I need to immerse myself in their character to hear the same things from a different perspective to write different dialog.

Other authors will disagree and insist on "just write something". But, that first person perspective makes it more personal and believable.

 

[DanDraper]

I think many of us do it, we can't help ourselves. We tend to put in traits that of a character that are desirable to us, and we invest a lot of time investing ourselves into the development of those characters. Therefore we end up developing feelings towards them.



....

 

[TadOverdon]

The best way to say it, for me, is that I get attached to them. A few stay in the corners of my mind after I'm pretty sure I'm done with them. They feel a little like people I know, which makes psychological, if not strictly logical, sense.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I like rather than love most of my characters. Many are derived from myself and my friends and anyone I've ever lived or worked with, taking a few traits and experiences from various people and mixing them up.

Probably the only ones I could say I loved are Matthew in Chaperoning Matthew, who is basically an ex (tl;dr - the evening preventing him from shagging his ex didn't go quite as well as in my story), and Adrian from my Smoking Hot series, where two guys contributed much of the character, both who fell into the category of "I'd sleep with you if you weren't so fucked up' and 25 years on have sorted themselves out.

I also really like Ali from Wheelchair Bound?, and am enjoying getting to get to know her better in a new series (not posted yet). Love? Maybe, in the future.

 

[Comshaw]

Who else falls in love with their characters? (snip)

Some of my male characters I admire. Some of my female characters I lust after. Both for the same reason. The qualities displayed by those characters are pulled from me, from my mind and the way I see things. So it stands to reason that those things I admire about a man, or seek in a woman would be the best qualities I can imagine. At least for some of my characters.

Some, on the other hand, are written from the exact opposite, from those things I find despicable. Again, it comes from me, my imagination and what I see and have seen in the world. The scary thought is displaying who I really am though my writing. Hmmmm...I'm a gunna have to think on this.

Comshaw

 

[TadOverdon]

I think that the only character I remember basing directly on someone I knew was Sharon Thompson, and then only to the extent that the old friend's appearance and voice somehow assigned themselves to Sharon in my imagination. The real woman wasn't at all like my porn character in her personality or behavior, certainly a very good thing for her.

 

[labeltornoff]

The best way to say it, for me, is that I get attached to them. A few stay in the corners of my mind after I'm pretty sure I'm done with them. They feel a little like people I know, which makes psychological, if not strictly logical, sense.

Yes.

Most of my characters, I'd meet in a bar for drinks, but I'd never invite them to my home. They have too much of the me I try never to show anyone else. The two I have the most problems with are Dakota Grange and Maura Kenneworth. (The first part of this extended story will be published as soon as I fix all the egregious stylistic, plot, and [Cthulhu help me] grammar errors.) Those two are the most unlike me, yet I think of them often and smile. They are the black sheep uncle everyone says is no good but secretly want to be.