Growth and Development....a la Rose Hathaway

Richelle Mead’s sixth and final book in her Vampire Academy series came out this week. I got my hands on a copy of Last Sacrifice on Thursday and tore through the latest chapter in this saga – finally finishing while curled up on the couch this afternoon with a down blanket and a hot chocolate for company. (Rose has a weakness for sour cream and onion potato chips and candy bars…I thought the hot chocolate was a fitting tribute.)

You know how a traditional story arc and character development “rules” say that the main character (well, heck…all characters, I guess) should change throughout the story? They should show growth, learn from their experiences, and in the case of YA fiction – perhaps even grow up a bit on the inside as well as on the outside during their adventures?

It is hard to do! At least I think it is. Often, I find myself knowing more about how I want my character to act – who I want them to be – at the end of the story. Backtracking to allow for that change and growth is just darned difficult. I think we tend to grow and change at an alarmingly slow pace as real live people compared to the accelerated development of a character written on the page. It takes 10 years (give or take a few) for a child to grow through adolescence into adulthood. But your MC…Well, he or she has to cast off childish things in 300 pages or so.

Granted, your MC isn’t going to tackle everything real humans do…BUT she needs to have problems and lessons that are realistic enough that your readers will connect with her. Her issues, her growth need to be believable. In a word: honest.

Enter Rose Hathaway. Of all the young women in YA lit today, I’d most like to braid hair and pain nails with Rose. She’s sort of my hero. Or maybe Ms. Mead is really the one I want to hang out with…Either way – popping popcorn and bonding with either of them sounds like it would help my writing career along!

If you’ve read the Vampire Academy series, I’d love to hear what you think of Rose (and Lissa, Adrian, Dimitri, and the others) as characters. And if you haven’t read Ms. Mead’s contribution to modern vampire lore – then I’d suggest that you can read them with a writing lesson in mind: Character development.

Rose begins the series as a child. An impetuous, bold, leap-before-she-looks girl. I don’t want to give away any points of the story, and Ms. Mead’s work can certainly speak for itself, but I will tell you that Rose transforms throughout the series. She is a different character in Last Sacrifice than she was in the beginning (Vampire Academy).  She grows, develops, changes – from student to warrior, from girl to woman, from idealist to realist. Her character is honest in her growth. She makes mistakes. She slides backwards and then has to run twice as hard to make up for lost time. She tries to protect everyone around her, and forgets to save some protection for herself. And in the end, she is different. She’s still Rose – but in a way that lets Rose the woman shine.

Not only is she a great example of character development and growth – but she’s a strong girl, a beautiful character, and something many readers might find unexpected in a story about a school for vampires: she is a role model.

So girls: Be strong. Be warriors. Be lovers (eventually). Grow up – but make mistakes along the way.

And Writers: Be strong. Be warriors. Be lovers (always!). Help your characters to grow up and make their own mistakes along the way.

Go forth and tell stories! We need more strong girls and strong writers in the world today.

(If you'd like to read another Carpe Keyboard post that talks about Rose Hathaway and the Vampire Adacemy, click here.)

Love Bites. Bella Swan vs. Rose Hathaway. (Or How to Write a Heroine.)

I have a confession. I feel like I should be holding a styrofoam cup of bad coffee, looking out at a ragged circle of strangers, testing the waters for a new type of 12-step program.

My name is Karen, and I read all 4 Twilight books. And enjoyed them. Even though somewhere in my writerly brain I realized they were…well…pretty much mediocre. (But let’s face it – for those of us trying to break into the writing biz, we’d love to figure out what Stephanie Meyers did to achieve such success!)

But the story….Ah! The Story! What could be better than the forbidden love between “everygirl” and her undead dreamboat? And who could resist a man (oops, vampire) who avoids all types of…well…penetration? No human blood. No sex. Hm. How fascinating frustrating.

As a hopeful writer, the biggest thing I learned from reading about Bella and her erstwhile love story was how not to write a teenage girl/young woman heroine. Bella was not the kind of character I hope to write about. I want my young women to have power. Bella did not. I want my young women to act on their own. Bella did not. I want my young women to live feisty, interesting, smart and touching stories. Bella…well… you get the idea.

So you can imagine my hesitation when I first saw Richelle Mead’s series, Vampire Academy. The covers feature beautiful young women with flirty looks in their faces – including glistening lips and, by book five, the addition of a brooding young man with a slight grin and a five o’clock shadow. Another Bella? And her scruffy Edward? I think I actually groaned when I saw this set of books on the shelf at Borders for the first time.

But my curiosity got the best of me. Would this flirty girl with the pouting lips be different? And thanks to Ms. Mead’s storytelling, the answer is a resounding YES.

Characters need depth. Any creative writing class will tell you this fundamental truth. They need to step off of the page, stride through your room and take up space. They should speak and act with roundness and depth. They should have strengths and weaknesses. They should screw up, and learn from their mistakes. Just like the rest of us.

It’s enough to make some of us writers throw down our pens and stomp one foot in a fit of childish tantrum. How to accomplish all of this? How to create a whole person?

Don’t look to Bella Swan as a character study. Instead, turn to Rose Hathaway. Drop Edward like a rock. Instead, focus on Dimitri Belikov.

Mead writes Rose into life with a refreshing attitude. Rose is a troublemaker. She is a risk-taker who is in training to be a body guard for her best friend, who happens to be a vampire. She’s a smart ass. She’s beautiful – and she knows it. She knows how to use her body as a deadly weapon, but she can turn around and use it, just as effectively, to flirt her way into and out of trouble. She is smart, quick witted, strong, and decisive. She is the antithesis of Bella. No wallowing. No waiting around for her boyfriend to save her. No pouting. Rose is action – planning, leaping in, solving problems and often creating more. She is sexy and deserves a love story with much more guts than that of the pair from Forks.

Enter Dimitri. No vampire…but a dark, brooding, smart and decidedly honor-driven Guardian. He is not a vampire, but his love is still forbidden. He is her teacher – 7 years older than Rose, but as quickly and deeply in love with her as any man with a heartbeat should be. After all, who could not fall for Rose? With her beauty and her attitude, she is darned near irresistible. (Yep – hint of girl crush here!)

So – Mead created a strong, powerful, feisty, and action-driven heroine. Then gave her a forbidden love to resist… (no spoilers, I promise). 

Have I figured out exactly what Mead did to achieve this? Was it dialog? Description? Conflict? Story arcs and galloping plot? In truth, I’m pretty sure it was her skillful use of all of these things, with a little storytelling magic thrown in for good measure.

I’ll keep trying to figure it out. At least while I wait for the sixth (and final) volume in the Vampire Academy series to arrive in December. In the meantime, I’ll use Rose and Dimitri as examples of characters who really do leap off of the page (and occasionally off of a bridge) and into the reader’s head with a force I’d love to imitate. Maybe there is a formula – and maybe not. But if I keep finding characters like these, I’m bound to figure out a little something about writing some of my own.

Where have you found characters who were so real, you thought maybe…just maybe…you could lure them off of the page and into the empty chair next to you at Starbucks? I’d love to know…