This month our Round Robin Blog Hop asks us to describe a flawed character we might use as a heroine or hero in a story. How did they become so flawed? How might their flaws affect the story and what will happen to them?
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A few years back, when I was writing book 5 in my Tide’s Way series I was about two thirds of the way through the book when a character I’d never planned on walked onto the scene, sat down, introduced himself and captured my interest. Not just because he filled a vital role I’d not anticipated when I began writing that book, but because he personally was interesting. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a seat of your pants kind of writer. I usually don’t have a well-drawn plot, but I do have all my characters well defined with detailed backstories and clear goals, understandable motivation and frustrating conflicts. But this time I’d come to realize I’d missed someone. I just didn’t know who that someone was.
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One of my secondary characters was running for Mayor of Tide’s Way and part of her platform included a plan for an old run-down plantation property left to the town in the will of the last family member. She wanted to turn it into a halfway house for young men who’d gotten on the wrong side of the law, done their time and wanted to put their lives back on track but had no resources to do so. My heroine was a reporter with a “not in my neighborhood” mentality about this project. My hero was a town cop who thought the idea was excellent and he’d thrown his support behind it.
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Since this was a romance, I knew I needed something to happen to change my heroine’s mind, so one afternoon, the mayoral candidate invited my heroine to her home to meet someone. That someone was the man she proposed to put in charge of this new halfway house project.
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And just like that, Lucas Trevlyn was born.
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Barely thinking about it, I sat down and started writing Lucas’ back-story. Turns out, he’d been standing on the wrong side of the railing on a bridge over a highway trying to screw up the courage to jump and put an end to the life he felt he’d totally screwed up when an off-duty cop saw him and stopped to suggest there might be another answer to his problems. As if he had all afternoon and nowhere to go, the cop leaned back against the railing and invited Lucas to share his story.
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Lucas had been a good kid growing up, an average student, and a decent athlete, who, on graduating high school, put up his right hand and swore an oath to defend his country. He’d been a good soldier, too. Rising to the rank of Sergeant, put in charge of other men and excelling at it. He soldiered valiantly until his hitch was up, but by then he’d seen enough of war and just wanted to go back to being the carefree young man he’d been before he became a soldier.
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Except there was no going back. Lucas had seen too much, experienced nightmares he couldn’t live with, felt despair he couldn’t overcome, and he turned to alcohol. He got into brawls, and eventually got tossed into jail where he should have sobered up, but instead was introduced to drugs by fellow inmates and corrupt wardens. He ended up stealing to support his new habit when he got out and it wasn’t long before he was back behind bars. During that second stint, his parents were killed in a car accident and their home, mortgaged to pay for his lawyer’s fees was sold. He didn’t get to go to their funeral or say goodbye and when he got out the second time he’d hit bottom, which is how he ended up standing on that bridge ready to end it once and for all. Until Officer Montgomery showed up.
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With Sam Montgomery’s support and encouragement, Lucas stayed clean, went to college, got his degree and turned his life around. Now he devoted his energy to counseling teens on the verge of trouble. That, and the reputation he’d made for dealing with men, sometimes belligerent men, while he was in the Army and as a bouncer at a night club while he was in college was what recommended him to this woman running for mayor as the perfect candidate to manage her halfway house project. This was the young man who walked into her well-appointed parlor, dressed in neatly creased slacks and a jacket, with a fashionable haircut, impeccable manners and engaging smile.
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I knew, even as I was finishing that book, my heroine completely won over by Lucas, that I wanted Lucas to be the hero of a future book in that series. I wanted him to have his happy-ever-after, to excel at this new opportunity and find his soul mate while I was at it. That story is currently in the brainstorming phase, and it’s next up when I finish the 
two I’m working on currently.
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Lucas is or was a very flawed character with a solid and very current back-story to support his downfall and a valiant struggle to overcome. He can still be tempted, but rather than fail as he once did, he’ll overcome and his past failings will provide him with understanding and wisdom as he helps these new young men to find their way back to successful, productive lives. I look forward to writing Lucas’ story and I hope my readers will find him as compelling as I do.
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But in the meantime, perhaps you can hop on over to see what these other authors have done with flawed characters, what kind of men and women are they and how are going to fare.
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Dr. Bob Rich
Marci Baun
Connie Vines
Anne Stenhouse
Diane Bator
Rhobin L Courtright
Fiona McGier
One of my secondary characters was running for Mayor of Tide’s Way and part of her platform included a plan for an old run-down plantation property left to the town in the will of the last family member. She wanted to turn it into a halfway house for young men who’d gotten on the wrong side of the law, done their time and wanted to put their lives back on track but had no resources to do so. My heroine was a reporter with a “not in my neighborhood” mentality about this project. My hero was a town cop who thought the idea was excellent and he’d thrown his support behind it.
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Lucas had been a good kid growing up, an average student, and a decent athlete, who, on graduating high school, put up his right hand and swore an oath to defend his country. He’d been a good soldier, too. Rising to the rank of Sergeant, put in charge of other men and excelling at it. He soldiered valiantly until his hitch was up, but by then he’d seen enough of war and just wanted to go back to being the carefree young man he’d been before he became a soldier. 
Except there was no going back. Lucas had seen too much, experienced nightmares he couldn’t live with, felt despair he couldn’t overcome, and he turned to alcohol. He got into brawls, and eventually got tossed into jail where he should have sobered up, but instead was introduced to drugs by fellow inmates and corrupt wardens. He ended up stealing to support his new habit when he got out and it wasn’t long before he was back behind bars. During that second stint, his parents were killed in a car accident and their home, mortgaged to pay for his lawyer’s fees was sold. He didn’t get to go to their funeral or say goodbye and when he got out the second time he’d hit bottom, which is how he ended up standing on that bridge ready to end it once and for all. Until Officer Montgomery showed up.
With Sam Montgomery’s support and encouragement, Lucas stayed clean, went to college, got his degree and turned his life around. Now he devoted his energy to counseling teens on the verge of trouble. That, and the reputation he’d made for dealing with men, sometimes belligerent men, while he was in the Army and as a bouncer at a night club while he was in college was what recommended him to this woman running for mayor as the perfect candidate to manage her halfway house project. This was the young man who walked into her well-appointed parlor, dressed in neatly creased slacks and a jacket, with a fashionable haircut, impeccable manners and engaging smile.
two I’m working on currently. 
But in the meantime, perhaps you can hop on over to see what these other authors have done with flawed characters, what kind of men and women are they and how are going to fare. 
