The Very British Art of Eccentricity by Connie Berry

 

The perfect sleuth?

Recently, there’ve been a bunch of British crime shows featuring eccentric, atypical, and/or neurodivergent sleuths. Professor T is one of the best in my opinion. The fabulous Ben Miller plays Professor Jasper Tempest, lecturer at the Cambridge Institute of Criminology. Thanks to his strictly regimented routines, his OCD and germaphobia are under semi-control—until he gets pulled into actual criminal investigations. My husband and I started watching the series when it first appeared on PBS in 2021. He wasn’t a fan then, but when we went back to the show this summer, we both got hooked, and binge-watched every episode.

The perfect setting?

If you want to watch, read about, or write about eccentrics, you couldn’t choose a better setting than the British Isles where eccentrics are not only tolerated but celebrated. The phrase “an embarrassment of riches” comes to mind. Think Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes. The image at the top of the page shows the nineteenth-century eccentric Mad Jack Mytton arriving at a dinner party riding his pet bear. He also once tried to cure his hiccups by setting his shirt on fire and dressed up as a highwayman to terrify the guests he’d invited to dine with him. As George Santayana, the philosopher, poet, and novelist, wrote, “England is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity, heresy, anomalies, hobbies and humors.” No wonder they show up on our small screens.

Where do I find them?

Here are a few other contemporary British series with eccentric or atypical protagonists:

·       Ludwig features a reclusive puzzle designer who impersonates his twin brother, a high-ranking police detective, after he mysteriously disappears.

·       Dept. Q follows an emotionally damaged detective who runs cold-case investigations from a basement.

·       McDonald & Dodd pairs a quiet, eccentric, detail-oriented detective sergeant with a super-charged Detective Chief Inspector.

·       Death Valley stars an eccentric actor who played a detective on TV and gets pulled into real-life murder investigations.

·       Patience presents an autistic police archivist who helps solve murder cases in York, England.

     With these quirky protagonists in mind, I’ve been thinking about how to create believable, interesting, and atypical characters that capture the reader’s imagination. This is a topic I’ve been considering for some time. My webinar, Fears, Flaw, Failings, and Foibles: Creating Characters Your Readers Will Love (Or Love to Hate) explores ways to use complexity and universal human frailty as we construct the characters who populate our novels. Lately, my thinking has taken a step further.

But is anyone actually typical? 

Come to think of it, no. Each person is unique. We all have gifts. We all have eccentricities—some evident to others, some private. Mine include buying way too many red lipsticks while searching for the equivalent of the holy grail that will be the perfect shade and will last all day while remaining comfortably hydrating. Does such a wonder exist? Probably not, but I keep searching. I also iron sheets; search eBay for a particular soap pad that was discontinued ten years ago (hope springs eternal); insist on using a bar of soap to its final sliver and then etching it on top of the new bar. And I line up silverware precisely.

Five questions to ask

Here are five questions you might ask your own quirky and memorable fictional characters:

    1. What do you buy too much of—and why?

    2. How long would you search online for a certain discontinued item?

    3. What is the one object from the past you always wish you’d kept?

    4. Do you have any secret rituals?

    5. What is one thing you can do easily that others find difficult or impossible?

How would your current protagonist answer these questions? How would you?

How might you think outside the box to create charmingly eccentric characters that stand out in a crowd?