{"id":93838,"date":"2019-05-13T11:51:12","date_gmt":"2019-05-13T00:51:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/?p=93838"},"modified":"2019-05-20T11:36:01","modified_gmt":"2019-05-20T00:36:01","slug":"writing-flawed-characters-with-john-purcell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/2019\/05\/13\/writing-flawed-characters-with-john-purcell\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing Flawed Characters with John Purcell"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From Vanity Fair to Fleabag, it seems we all love a flawed character, and John Purcell’s novel The Girl on the Page<\/a> is full of them.<\/em>
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, John breaks down just how his flawed characters came into being (and why he loves them so much).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n
\"The<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\n\nThe original spark of an idea for The Girl on the Page<\/em> came to me while listening to Amy Winehouse\u2019s Back to Black<\/em>. I love how heartache doesn\u2019t discriminate. Everything else in your life can be perfect, but if your heart is truly broken, there is only one trajectory open to you – downwards.\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s even worse if you\u2019re the cause of your own heart break. If you\u2019re the one who fucked it all up. No matter how we\u2019re feeling most of us need to get on with our days – we have bills to pay, mouths to feed, places to be. Be it work, raising kids, looking after family and friends, we have to get on with it. Life just doesn\u2019t stop when our hearts are broken. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So I had a character in my head. A woman who has betrayed the man she loved. A woman who will not forgive herself for doing so. A woman who must grin and bear it and just get on with her life. Because I\u2019m a little bit evil, I really wanted her to be successful in every other part of her life but love. <\/p>\n\n\n

\"Amy<\/a>

Amy Winehouse, the inspiration for Amy Winston<\/p><\/div>\n

Over a couple years this as yet unnamed character loitered around in my imagination. When she got bored, I gave her a job. She was now an editor at a large publishing house. Then I named her after my original inspiration, Amy. She became Amy Winston, a hugely successful writer and editor at the top of her game who, having betrayed the love of her life, seems hell-bent on self-destruction.<\/p>\n\n\n

She was, in short, a very flawed character without a novel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The thing is, for more years than I presently care to admit, I had been writing and rewriting a novel set in nineteenth century England, a novel I had put my heart and soul into. But also a novel no one wanted to publish. It had become a creative block, an impediment to all future work. Then, out of the blue, I had a publisher for the book. But as soon as someone wanted to publish the novel, I knew I wanted nothing more to do with it and binned it. The relief I felt on doing so was enormous. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quietly, almost imperceptibly, came a knock at the door of my mind. Two new characters had arrived and proceeded to make themselves very comfortable in the lounge. Helen and Malcolm, two great writers nearing the end of their lives (and tethers) who have been shuffling around in my mind for the longest time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These two characters had walked straight out of my memories of the years I had spent sitting in my second-hand bookshop. Two characters I now realised I had known and loved for years. But things weren\u2019t right with them. Helen had made a life changing decision without really consulting her husband of fifty years, Malcolm. Enter Amy, one of the many consequences of Helen\u2019s rash decision – she had finally found her novel, The Girl on the Page<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To me, there should be no flawless characters in fiction. Flaws are the parts of a character which define them. Flaws create drama. Flaws entertain us. Flaws are relatable. Flaws make us like them. All the characters in The Girl on the Page<\/em> are flawed. Some deeply, like Amy, some mildly, like Trevor. But none are flawless. They may think they are – yes, I\u2019m looking at you Julia – but they are not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To make the great lie that is fiction seem real, it needs to be a little cracked.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Purcell breaks down just how the flawed characters of his novel The Girl on the Page came into being (and why he loves them so much).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":96081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[6677],"tags":[9872,2879,8902,6621,7884,6624],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/WritingFlawedCharacters-social.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93838"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93838"}],"version-history":[{"count":43,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93838\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96853,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93838\/revisions\/96853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}