Response to deuteragonist and tritagonist characters

[BiscuitHammer]

Two support characters in one of my stories became popular enough with readers that I ended up writing an ongoing series about them. While I enjoyed the characters, and hoped other people would like them, I hadn't anticipated the kind of response that would lead to a spin-off.

Granted, they're mostly comic relief, but that's no doubt their appeal. Everyone needs to laugh, even on a sex story site.

Has anyone else had this happen as a result of reader response? Have you started a new story about secondary characters? I'm curious...

 

[BrokenSpokes]

Two support characters in one of my stories became popular enough with readers that I ended up writing an ongoing series about them. While I enjoyed the characters, and hoped other people would like them, I hadn't anticipated the kind of response that would lead to a spin-off.

Granted, they're mostly comic relief, but that's no doubt their appeal. Everyone needs to laugh, even on a sex story site.

Has anyone else had this happen as a result of reader response? Have you started a new story about secondary characters? I'm curious...

I haven’t had that exact thing happen to me, but I have introduced a character in my main series, Hard Landing who may get a series of their own when I’m done with my current story line.

 

[Vix_Giovanni]

I’ve been writing a long serial that begins in media res and from a secondary character’s perspective. Initially, that character’s story was only very short romance antithetical to the protagonists’, but the reader response was so strong (and luckily, I already had drafted such a tightly detailed outline of the secondary characters’ story arc) that that I decided to stall the introduction of the real protagonists from the first to the third novel to focus entirely on the secondary characters’ romance and drama (I suppose now, parallel protagonists in their own right).

Inversely, I wrote a stand alone story for jezzazz’s 750-word competition and a surprising number of readers (surprising to me) asked for more with the two characters; one is now recurring tertiary character in the secondary characters’ story and his sister will appear later.

 

[Voboy]

All of mine. Every story.

One story’s throwaway barista or uber driver is another story’s main character. They’re all linked like that.

 

[whowrotethisshit]

Good job on the characters, congrats on the response.

Meanwhile, I've learned two new words today.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

Meanwhile, I've learned two new words today.

Me, too.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

The original series involved was meant to be five to six chapters long, but the characters decided otherwise, and it morphed into seventeen. Alex and Alexa, the protagonists, became the deuteragonists in the continuation, while Mike and Karen swapped out their deuteragonist roles to become the protagonists.

Freja and Jeanie, tritagonists in both 'Alex & Alexa', and 'Mike & Karen', now have their own spin-off series, (imaginatively named) 'Freja & Jeanie'.

In terms of the character development, once Alex & Alexa got away from me in terms of story length, I realised I'd need to come up with detailed backgrounds for all characters, so that they couldn't surprise me again.

I've been playing D&D since the mid-to-late 70's, so fleshing out character backgrounds was a breeze, once I knew I needed to do it...

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Good job on the characters, congrats on the response.

Meanwhile, I've learned two new words today.

Fun, isn’t it? FWIW, here’s one going into my next story: Zelatrix.

 

[Vix_Giovanni]

I've been playing D&D since the mid-to-late 70's, so fleshing out character backgrounds was a breeze, once I knew I needed to do it...

That's interesting. A couple of other writers have mentioned that D&D helps them to now create extensive story universes too.

For me, I started first with rough plot outlines and then Venn diagramming to see what stock characters would ever interact. From there, if characters overlapped, I gave them names and backstory.

 

[whowrotethisshit]

I've been playing D&D since the mid-to-late 70's, so fleshing out character backgrounds was a breeze, once I knew I needed to do it...

It's helpful! And plus it gives you little side stories and funny situations. I always give every character one like and one hate even if I never have to use it. But if I don't use it, I gotta start wondering why that character is in my story and if they're serving a big enough purpose to be their own character. Sometimes it means making another character take on their purpose and nixing them completely. But, I mean, sometimes you need a waitress to bring your characters coffee and the fact that she loves Jeopardy and hates Wheel of Fortune never comes up. Sometimes. I'm wordy, it'll probably come up.


I was taught the S.P.E.R.M. principal for D&D and games of the like by Monarchsfactory on youtube (https://youtu.be/sJd6g--Ok_A) It's helpful when world building.

Social
Politcal
Economic
Religious
Military

Fun, isn’t it? FWIW, here’s one going into my next story: Zelatrix.

I can't wait to read this story. After watching Little Sister on Netflix.. I might have nose dived down a research hole of nuns and their history and what their purpose is today and if it's anything like their old purpose and.. then I remembered I am Jewish and my eyes hurt.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

.....

 

[MelissaBaby]

Two support characters in one of my stories became popular enough with readers that I ended up writing an ongoing series about them. While I enjoyed the characters, and hoped other people would like them, I hadn't anticipated the kind of response that would lead to a spin-off.

Granted, they're mostly comic relief, but that's no doubt their appeal. Everyone needs to laugh, even on a sex story site.

Has anyone else had this happen as a result of reader response? Have you started a new story about secondary characters? I'm curious...

I had a number of requests for a spinoff with two supporting characters in my series, Mary and Alvin, because, well, people love lesbians, I guess. I did not, and don't, plan a separate spinoff, but I did write a chapter centered on them.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

And at this rate, I have ANOTHER spin-off planned, one in which all six of the aforementioned characters are support characters to people who up til now had at best been distant background figures.

It never ends. The Alexaverse will never let me go...

 

[Hypoxia]

Readers have successfully lobbied me for a walk-on player to return in later chapters, but they never became a lead. Without lobbying, I've gone the other way, with a main player from one arc becoming a support elsewhere. If I do evolve a supporter to a lead role, it'll be of my own volition -- unless y'all BEG me, and BRIBE me, and use your tongues well, oh yeah...
:caning:
Of course ya never can tell what my petulant voices might make me do. Spinoffs without precedents. Major and minor players whirled into new unlikelihoods. Inanimate observer-narrators in crossover arcs. Symbolism.

(Oh no, not symbolism!)

 

[BiscuitHammer]

Fun, isn’t it? FWIW, here’s one going into my next story: Zelatrix.

Lol, I've had some of the younger women in the Alexaverse use that term when Karen (the oldest) makes them behave in public.

Alexa: "Did I get real blacked-out drunk and become a nun? Since when do I need a zelatrix?"

Freja: "I am thinking since maybe the club in Rome, ja? You got up on the table naked between those two boys, and-"

Alexa: "Shut... UP!!!"

Karen: "And that's why I'm your zelatrix, Pollyanna."

Jeanie: *snickers* "I dunno what a zelawhatever is, but it sounds kinky."

Alexa: "..."

 

[OmnislashXX]

Hm. Well, there are two side characters in The Princess's Reward - a story about a princess who gets "rescued" by a less than honorable knight - that I was thinking on giving a side story to. Basically one of the Princess's personal maids who actually has a thing for the palace cook. He is a rather portly man who is kind but is passed up on by women. "He works his hands like a baker kneading his dough".

Actually, I have thought about many other side stories from my novels ( the ones I have yet to write!)

 

[ElectricBlue]

Not because of reader requests, but because I occasionally get interested in a side character, and give them something of their own. I'm more likely to give characters cameos in later stories.