Thursday, February 6, 2014

CHARACTERS I WOULD LIKE TO MEET


                                               

Sometimes when I finish a book, I don’t want it to end so I continue on with the story in my mind. The setting and the characters have become so real to me it’s as if they exist in a real place as real people and not in just the writer’s or reader’s imagination. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t lots of books I still enjoy and would give 5 stars to on Amazon even though I don’t quite feel the characters are alive somewhere. I may like the characters a lot and want to read more about them, but it’s not as if I magically want to visit with them. I think this feeling happens mostly with series when the reader becomes better acquainted with a character as the character grows.

But that’s not always the case. I would love to meet Atticus Finch, Scout and Jem. I’ve read To Kill a Mockingbird three times and love these characters. I want to be a neighbor of Atticus Finch for a short while and sit on his front porch on a summer evening drinking iced tea or lemonade listening to him. Occasionally, Atticus would turn to me and say, “What do you think, Ms. Alden?”

Not exactly how I picture Lord Peter Wimsey but close 

And then there’s Lord Peter Wimsey. Oh, how I love him. I like Harriet Vane, too, but it’s Wimsey, a mixture of Bertie Wooster and Jeeves, who Dorothy L. Sayers created that delights me. What fun it would be to talk with him, although I would be listening and laughing more than talking.



Jane Langton
Jane Langton’s Homer Kelly is another character I’d dearly love to meet. Maybe I could sit in one of his transcendental classes on Thoreau and Emerson at Harvard.  But even more I’d like to follow him about quietly listening as he investigates, although I don’t know how silent I could be. I’m sure I’d be snorting trying to hold in my laughter as I listened to him.

Then there’s Laurie R. King’s Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series. The original Sherlock Holmes didn’t appeal as much as King’s Sherlock Holmes.  Hers is a much more rounded character and to me is far more realistic and actually lives – or did live in the past.

I met Louise Penny at Malice when her first book, Still Life came out. I sat at a table with her husband during Malice Go Round. She told us that her husband is her model for Armand Gamache so although her husband is not exactly how I picture Gamache, I can see the love between them is like that of  Gamache and Reine Marie. Armand Gamache, Three Pines and all the characters living there are real to me. I asked a friend my question the other day of what character would she'd like to meet if he/she were real. She immediately said, “Armand Gamache.” Several years ago my siblings, a brother-in-law and I took a trip to Quebec. We stayed for a while in Montreal, camped in a large provincial park and spent a few days in Quebec City. On the trip, with the exception of my brother, who had never read Louise Penny, the rest of us would comment on sights we were seeing that related to her books, and even more so, we all said we wanted to find Three Pines and stay there visiting with the characters who live there. It didn’t matter that Three Pines doesn’t exist. It did in all five of our minds. We wanted to vacation there. When I introduced Still Life to my book club several years ago, after we discussed the book, I told them I’d arranged for a bus to take us to Three Pines and asked what characters would they most like to meet there. It created a lively discussion, and some people actually believed I planned a trip to Three Pines. They believed it was a real place, and I’m not sure they’d not come to believe these characters lived, too.
Louise Penny with actor playing the part of Armand Gamache
I think the characters in the books of my fellow bloggers series writers are well-rounded and come alive for me while I’m reading their books; I’d like to meet Carla Damron’s Caleb Knowles, KM Rockwood’s Jesse Damon, and Linda Rodrigueze’s Skeet Banyon.  Warren Bull’s characters in his young adult book, Heartland were well done, too. As for James Jackson’s Seamus McCree? I’ve met him. He’s Jim. I met him at Malice and he’s become a friend through blogging together. He denies that he’s Seamus. He says Seamus has more hair, is younger, taller, faster, stronger, smarter, and better looking. I disagree with some of what he says; he may not be out risking his life solving crimes, but I think he’s just as smart and looks are relative so to me Seamus is still Jim.


What characters would you like to meet?

16 comments:

  1. Gloria,

    Isn't it great when writers make you want to meet their characters?

    In the Q&As on my website I address this issue of Seamus McCree and me being or not being alike. Here is my answer:

    For starters, he has all his hair. Need I say more?

    Yes?

    Fine, be that way. He's younger, taller, faster, stronger, smarter, better looking and if that weren't enough, he's independently wealthy.

    But he needs to be careful. One electronic search and replace and all that can change.

    ~ Jim

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  2. There are so many characters I'd like to meet. I'm not sure where to begin!

    Richard Jury and Melrose Plant from Martha Grimes's series are two of my favorites. Her character's names alone make me laugh.

    I'd love to meet Goldy from Diane Mott Davidson's books. Kinsey Milhone from Sue Grafton's series.

    Rebus from Ian Rankin's books. DCI Banks, Peter Robinson's main character. Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James from Deborah Crombie's series.

    I haven't even scratched the surface of my must-read list. Great topic, Gloria. Now I have to go online and see which of the series have new releases I haven't yet read.

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  3. Okay, Jim, if you say so. :-) It is special if writers create characters like that.

    Elaine, I have a whole long shelf of Martha Grime's books including her several that didn't include Richard Jury and Melrose Plant. Like you I have too many characters from books that I feel a real connection in to in some way or another.

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  4. Good blog, Gloria. In addition to meeting the fascinating characters on your list, I’d like to go on an archeological dig with Amelia Peabody (Elizabeth Peters), travel to Japan with Rei Shimura (Sujata Massey), and cook with Goldy Schultz (Diane Mott Davison).

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  5. I think the original Sherlock Holmes would find me boring. Laurie King's Holmes is less judgmental and friendlier I think Barbara Hambly's Benjamin January would be a fascinating person. I'd also like to meet the continuing characters of Scott Turow.

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  6. Kara, it's been a long time since I read the Diane Mott Davison books, but I enjoyed them at the time - too many new series and new books to read. My sister, who loves to cook, loved them even more.

    Warren, I agree about the original Sherlock Holmes. All the PBS modern Sherlock can be fascinating, I'm afraid he would have my head spinning. I'll have to try the two authors you mentioned. So many books, so little time, a popular refrain with so many people, I'm afraid.

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  7. I'm totally on board with you about Atticus. I want to be related to him.
    Great blog!

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  8. Carla, isn't he one of the best characters ever created. Harper Lee, who never wrote another book, was the cousin of my first English professor when I started college. We, the English professor, not Harper Lee, thought it might be because she never felt she could produce another book as good as this one was after all the acclaim it received. It would be hard to match it.

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  9. I'd live to meet Jeeves, from the PG Wodehouse stories, and Hamish McBeth, from a mystery series set in Scotland and made into a TV series. One of my dogs, a labradoodle, is named Hamish. He has unruly redish-brown hair and constantly has a goofy look on his face. He is an enourmously polite dog, except that he runs at full speed into my knees with his boney head.

    Thanks for the nod toward Jesse, Gloria. I am, of course, very fond of him. He is a composite of people I have known.

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  10. Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane are two of amy all time favourite characters - I re-read Strong Poison over Christmas, and still found it a very enjoyable novel.

    I read To Kill a Mockingbird at school when I was twelve, and it made a lasting impression on me. I recall reading the whole thing instead of just the chapter I was supposed to read for homework that week. Atticus Finch was such a perfect hero. And I always remember this quotation from him - "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb into his skin and walk around in it."

    Really, a perfect lesson for awriter, as well as for a person.

    But if I had to settle for meeting just one fictional character, it would have to be Francis Ceawfod of Lymond. He's the hero in a great series of historical novels based in Tudor times, by Dorothy Dunnett. Six long novels, and a perfect story. Lots of real history, and lots of adventure all mixed up together.

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  11. KM, I love Jeeves, too. I wiped out all the P.G. Wodehouse books in a used book store once - at least the ones that weren't duplicates or ones I already had. Bertie Wooster never ceases to amuse me, but I don't particularly care to meet him.

    Who wrote the Hamish McBeth series? I love almost anything British.

    Ann, I came rather late to Sayer's work - maybe ten years ago, and I fell instantly in love with the books. I've reread the ones with Wimsey and Vane several times.

    I've never read anything by Dorothy Dunnett. I'll have to write that name down.

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  12. I'd love to meet Matthew Corbett from Robert McCammon's "Speaks the Nightbird" series. It would involve time travel, but I'm totally cool with that. 1699, here I come!

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  13. Sarah, I've never read that series. I'm getting so many series to look into. Now, if I could only hire someone to do all my work while I sat around and read all day. I'm going to write that series down. I don't mind Time Travel. I love the Brother Cadfael books.

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  14. So many good characters to choose from, Gloria! What a fun blog. I know I'd love to hang out in a pub with Melrose Plant. And travel to Three Pines and have some cocoa at the bistro with the whole cast of characters of Louise Penny's book....

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  15. Shari, I'm going to have to catch up on Richard Jury and Melrose Plant. I haven't read the last several ones. I think it would be lovely, too, on these cold days to sit in the bistro with the residents of Three Pines.

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  16. M.C. Beaton wrote the Hamish McBeth series. To tell the truth, I like the BBC series as much as I like the books, and that's pretty rare.

    Another less-well know British author I like is Frank Parrish. He has a character, Dan Mallett, who reminds me a bit of Jesse.

    The is a new "tribute" Jeeves out, I think it's called Wedding Bells. I don't usually like "knockoffs," but I enjoyed that one. Although it does kind of put the nails in the coffin for more Bertie and Jeeves books.

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