A Life of Crime

I'm still waffling on my hero. I'll be writing him in a bit, too. I'll just see who shows up.

My villain is different for me. I've never had a villain on the page so much, interacting with the characters so much. I want him charming, to the point where the heroine ALMOST falls for him. But he's done some bad things. I'm kind of basing it on The Lord of War.

What I worry about is falling into the cliche of why he is the way he is. I tried to make a list of 20, which they say to do when you get stuck, but I've got a list of seven. I'm kind of partial to one, or perhaps combining two, but they're still a bit cliche.

What do you think?

- villain was an abused child

- villain was a poor child

- He became a villain to avenge a death in his family

- gang involvement

- takes over family business (This could possibly be the most sympathetic, but also the least proactive.)

- was a soldier, is disillusioned

- was a prisoner, made connections

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cliché pasts that lead to motivation are okay, imho. The clichés are there because they're realistic. Who he is now is what needs to be unique. If you can, go with the one that increases conflict for the heroine.

MJFredrick said...

That makes sense, Mary Beth. I think I'm going to combine two of them, one of them the soldier one, because her ex and the hero both were soldiers that chose a different path.

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MJFredrick
I'm a mom, a wife, a teacher and a writer. I have five cats and a dog to keep me company. I love bookstores and libraries and Netflix - movies are my greatest weakness.
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