Comments on Landless: Are you too nice to be a hero?

Digression into terminology: I'm using "h...

2012-01-16T16:43:25.491-05:00

Digression into terminology: I'm using "hero" here as equivalent to the protagonist, the main character of the novel. The antihero is an established trope, and it's this that I'm chewing over. Do disagreeable people make for more compelling main characters than agreeable people?

I still think there's a confusion in definitio...

2012-01-16T00:46:23.371-05:00

I still think there's a confusion in definitions here. The Nice Guy isn't necessarily the good guy, and the cold-hearted guy isn't necessarily the bad guy. It takes a certain detachment to *do the right thing* which is going to exclude the nice guy immediately. The nice guy will get the cat our of the tree and miss Jimmy falling down the well, whereas the good guy will ignore kitty to get to Jimmy. Or ignore Jimmy to get to The Bomb that Blew Up Manhattan. If you give the nice guy too much to do he'll freeze because he won't be able to prioritise.

Hmm. What I see in these comments is that the prob...

2012-01-15T20:55:19.344-05:00

Hmm. What I see in these comments is that the problem is not with NICE guys, but it's with BORING guys. The problem with nice guys are that they are typically inoffensive, which scuppers the conflict which drives drama. However, standing in opposition to something not-nice forces the nice into conflict.

So it's not that my nice guys are incapable of doing interesting things, but that I'm not giving them enough to do?

Actually, now I think further, a truly fair nice...

2012-01-15T15:58:40.782-05:00

Actually, now I think further, a truly fair *nice* guy would end up cold and unfeeling or go stark staring mad at the decisions he has taken in the past, and must take in the future. Being a hero really doesn't equate with being the nice guy...

Hey, nice guys can make those instantaneous decisi...

2012-01-15T15:48:38.143-05:00

Hey, nice guys can make those instantaneous decision, too, with a minimum of dithering. It's just that if they are wrong, they suffer more afterward.

(But I need a main character I enjoy/like/root for to stay involved in the book.)

It isn't impossible to write a virtuous yet ap...

2012-01-15T15:46:28.548-05:00

It isn't impossible to write a virtuous yet apparently cold-hearted character...doing the unsavoury jobs, taking instant decisions which harm the few to help the many...I would imagine it would make for a cold yet ultimately fair and caring character...

Your next challenge :)

There is a world of difference between 'nice&#...

2012-01-15T15:40:31.864-05:00

There is a world of difference between 'nice' and 'boring'. A bland character who is just 'a nice guy' in the way we describe folk who have nothing noteworthy about them is boring. I agree with Ganymeder that if they are too heartless I don't care about them. In fact I hope they fail.

Nothing wrong with writing Westerns :-p It can be...

2012-01-15T15:22:27.680-05:00

Nothing wrong with writing Westerns :-p

It can be difficult if your main character is not a paragon of virtue but at the same time, look at all the films where the main protagonist is a "good person" but utterly dull, while their more ambiguous compadres are a lot more fun. Han Solo and Jack Sparrow are the best examples I can think of right now.

I really enjoyed the post, but I hold the opposite...

2012-01-15T13:50:49.316-05:00

I really enjoyed the post, but I hold the opposite opinion. In order for the plot to grab me, I need to care about the character. I have to *want* Luke to resist the temptation of the dark side, even if he is a bit of a whiny brat. He's growing up. It's interesting to see how the good guy responds to the horrible things that happen to him and the challenge isn't whether or not he dies, it's whether or not he is able to stay true to himself. There's a lot worse things that can happen to an MC than dying. Or same example, (that Lucas didn't quite pull off) of a good guy (Anikan) falling from grace, perhaps (or not) in the end to be redeemed.

The point is, I have a hard time caring about the heartless bastard if the MC starts off that way. If the plot is his redemption, that makes it more interesting, but I still have trouble initially sympathizing with a bad guy.

I find nice guys to be the most readily appealing ...

2012-01-14T22:55:10.006-05:00

I find nice guys to be the most readily appealing protagonists. It takes the least effort to make me like them. However, a nice guy needs good use. A lot of nice guys have had to handle wars, floods, poverty, horrible diseases, and far nicer fates that still overwhelmed their ability to maintain control. When challenged, the nice guy remaining nice while also demonstrating some degree of capability against a thing larger than himself usually does the trick. It's little different from the usage of the unlikable main character, except you have to make more accommodations in the plot to get me to put up with someone I don't like.

That's very darned interesting. My alpha reade...

2012-01-14T15:35:25.857-05:00

That's very darned interesting. My alpha reader (meaning, of course: wife) doesn't like the main character in my latest, "Baxter's Gold."

"But why?" I demand. "He's a nice guy."

"He's boring."

"Boring! He killed his wife! Of course, it was an accident. Because he's a nice guy."

"I liked the bad guy better."

She's saying all this with a straight face as of it's not ripping me apart inside. "But the bad guy is an insane asshole!"

"But he's not boring."

Sheesh. Maybe I'll flip the story and make it "Insane Asshole's Gold."

Bit in my writer's heart I agree with her. Every time I write a villain, I enjoy it more.

Maybe we should just stick to bad guys, Tony. The meek can inherit somebody else's earth.