How do those characters readers fall in love with look before they
finally come to life in a book? Before they're fleshed out, before they
make readers laugh or cry by almost marrying the wrong man, by spilling
soup all over their date right before the prom, by singlehandedly
keeping the bus from careening over a cliff? Were they always that
beautiful, that endearing, that comical, that needy? Yes - in the
author's heart, but no - in the author's first draft(s). Characters go
through their awkward years on a page - those miles of paragraphs where
they're gangly, dull, and sometimes with a mind of their own. With the
power of "Backspace" I have wrestled Paul, in "Mine to Tell," into the
role of being the most annoying brother a heroine could expect to have. I
have kept Martha, in upcoming "Love on a Train," heading into a
marriage she knows in her heart isn't right. I kept Cletus as the
villain throughout pages and pages in "Asked For" no matter how much my
heroine begged me to knock him off so she could be free. Characters -
great characters - begin with a vision, something only the writer sees.
But after months of hammering away on the keys and hammering out the
character's resistance, a hero worth crying over and a heroine worth
dying for are born.
Colleen L. Donnelly, Author of
Amazon #1 Bestseller "Mine to Tell"
"Asked For"
"Love on a Train"
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