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About the author:
Kylie Brant is the author of thirty-one romantic suspense novels for Silhouette and Berkley. She's a three time Rita nominee, and has been nominated for five time Romantic Times awards, including a win for Career Achievement. Twice she's received the overall Daphne du Maurier Award for best mystery/suspense novels. Her books have been published in twenty-five countries and translated into fifteen languages. A mother of five, Brant also teaches full-time, working with learning disabled students.
I Meet the Most Interesting People...
Okay, a lot of them are products of my imagination, but they *are* intriguing story people, at least. People who, if they were real, I could admire and respect. People I'd be proud to call friends. Not because they're perfect. Perfection is boring :) My characters are flawed, sometimes deeply. They struggle to overcome obstacles to do the right thing. They've become good people despite sometimes traumatic incidents in their pasts. They're complex, because the most interesting people are multi-faceted, with layers that aren't easily pierced.
When I'm coming up with a new story sometimes it's the suspense plot that will occur first, but more often it's the characters who first spring to life, fully developed. Then the suspense idea closely follows and I ask myself, 'How would these story people react to that situation? What will it make it particularly difficult for them to reach their goal?" There's always an external conflict of course, usually in the way of a villain. But giving characters a flaw or an emotional conflict means they have an inner struggle as well.
My characters, despite any other flaws, are extraordinarily patient :) Some linger in my mind for years, waiting for their turn to have their story told. Others are more demanding, surging to the forefront and beating on the walls of my imagination, refusing to be ignored any longer. Just as in real life, the squeaky wheel is often heard first.
From my earliest years I've always been fascinated by why people do the things they do. In that way I suppose I imagine them from a psychological point of view. Naming them and giving them physical attributes are probably the last things I do for character development, and are the most deliberate actions I take with them. Oddly enough, the physical description of my characters often requires the most thought. I don't necessarily 'see' them so much as I 'know' them--what and who they are and what events have shaped them. I often land on their descriptions simply through the process of elimination--let's see, I haven't had a green-eyed heroine in several books :) Perhaps because of this quirk, the most difficult question I'm asked is: if your book were a movie, who would you cast as the leading characters? I always have to go back and remind myself, okay, what did they look like again? I tend to think that who people are inside is ever so much more interesting than what they look like!
Somehow my cast always seem to have at least one character that adds some comic relief. I don't do this consciously but I have a slightly twisted sense of humorand it sort of works into the stories, even if I don't necessarily plan it that way at first. These characters, whether a health-conscious partner detective, a tattooed scientist with unusual luck with women, or a pint-sized angelic looking lab assistant with the mouth of a sailor lighten the otherwise dark subject matter. They also provide a foil for the main characters, and through their eyes we're given an outside look at the hero and heroine.
The villain, of course, is the most interesting character to write, because evil is riveting. Delving into what events twisted people into psychopathy is endlessly fascinating. Perhaps because I had a perfectly ordinary upbringing, devoid of homicidal maniacs or anything more traumatic than having to wear braces for three years, I have to dig deep for these crazed characters at times. Unfortunately, the news is awash with horrible things that people have been forced to endure. But its also full of stories that prove the resiliency of the human spirit. And I think that factor, when it comes to the closure of the story, makes for the most satisfying of endings.
Some characters I've read have stayed with me always. Scout, from To Kill a Mockingbird. Holden Caulfield, from Catcher in the Rye. Huck Finn. What unforgettable characters have you run across in your reading?
Thank you for sharing with us, Kylie!! Y'all, find Kylie online at her website, http://www.kyliebrant.com/.
About Deadly Intent:
No one knows the patterns and nuances of communication like forensic linguist Macy Reid. She is also an expert on kidnapping, having experienced firsthand the stark terror of being abducted when she was a child. So she is the perfect investigator to be called in when a Denver tycoon's eleven-year-old daughter is abducted—for the second time.
The biggest stumbling block for Macy may be a member of her own team: Kellan Burke, the wisecracking, rule-breaking investigator who relishes getting under Macy's skin. Their styles couldn't be more different; the attraction between them more explosive. And when it becomes apparent that Macy can't solve the case without confronting the demons from her past, Kell is just the man to take her there—and back.
Read an excerpt!
Contest!
Kylie is giving away one copy of Deadly Intent to you lucky readers! This one's open to wherever The Book Depository will ship! Please make sure you check their list of countries before you enter...
For one entry, answer Kylie's question: What unforgettable characters have you run across in your reading? Make sure your email address is included, so that I can contact you if you win... Do it before 6pm CST Nov. 10th. Good luck!
Extra entries:
+1 Tweet this giveaway, comment separately with your twitter status.
+1 FB share (www.facebook.com/dreyslibrary), comment separately with your FB name.
+1 List this on your blog sidebar, comment separately with your blog link.
Don't want to wait? Purchase at IndieBound, Amazon, The Book Depository
25 comments:
The most unforgettable characters are the ones who "star" in series such as James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux and Billy Bob Holland as well as William Kent Krueger's Cork O'Conner.
littleone AT shaw DOT ca
I agree, PoCoKat! I love Lee Child's Jack Reacher (my hero!) and Robert Crais's Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.
The unforgetable characters for me are the ones who are in the Twilight series. I love reading the whole series. I couldn't put the books down. Please enter me in contest. I would love to read this book. It sounds really good. Tore923@aol.com
Tore, obviously you're not alone. That series is hugely successful!
The most unforgetable characters I've read are Claire and Jamie Fraser of the Outlander series
chey127 at hotmail dot com
Chey, what made them unforgettable for you?
Congrats on the upcoming release, Kylie. I love your Mindhunters books. I'm a comic book fan and Magneto from the X-Men comics is unforgettable to me. You can say for certain that he's a good or bad guy because he wants to protect his people, but his methods are questionable.
janie1215 AT excite DOT com
Ah, an anti-hero :) Talk about a complex character! I love it...and it takes a great author to pull off the character's redemption, if it comes to that.
I loved the character of the main character in Charles Martin's A Mountain Between Us.
bgcchs(at)yahoo(dot)com
Benita, I'm not familiar with that work but it's wonderful when a character is written with such depth that they stick with you.
The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew were the first characters that I wanted to read every book about them. Cynthia Parker - the white woman who was captured and then married into the tribe - made quite an impression upon me in the book Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee.
Thank you,
Christine
womackcm@sbcglobal.net
As ossmcalc, I tweeted about this giveaway http://twitter.com/#!/ossmcalc/status/29225729449
Thank you,
Christine
womackcm@sbcglobal.net
As Christine Womack, I posted about this giveaway on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/womackcm/posts/157280897641858
Thank you,
Christine
womackcm@sbcglobal.com
Christine, I was a Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys fan, too!
As a fan of JD Salinger, Holden Caulfield is one of those characters I could never forget :)
Happy Halloween!
Stephanie
thestephanieloves@gmail.com
Stephanie, yay, another Holden Caulfield fan :) I confess I understand him better from adulthood but as a teen I was amazed the book had been written in the fifties...it seemed so current. I think it's a story that will never go out of style.
Congrats, Kylie!
Another vote for Nancy Drew which I grew up reading (and I read all the Nancy Drews)!
delilah0180(at)yahoo(dot)com
Yep, Nancy Drew ruled in the day :)
The first that pop in my mind are Eve and Roarke from the In Death series.
Sounds like a great book. Congrats on the release!
bacchus76 at myself dot com
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bacchus76 at myself dot com
Deadly Intent looks wonderful! I loved Nancy Drew too, even had some sort of cookbook as a kid that she had penned! Another character that has always stayed with me is Scout. I've re-read that yet again with the big 50th anniversary hoopla this year and I have to say, TKAM is truly timeless.
Most unforgettable character is Esteban in Isabel Allende's The House of the Spirits.
melikesart(at)gmail(dot)com
Unforgettable characters that I run across are the ones that are the unlikely ones, such as the handicapped Cheyenne in Girl, Stolen or the paralyzed guy who wrote about his life in The Diving Bell and the butterfly. They are inspiring.
caliblue7 at gmail dot com
My favorite characters in books are Kinsey Milhone, Harry Potter & Aragorn (Strider). Thanks for the giveaway!
megalon22 at yahoo dot com
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