Careers for Characters

Well, that month went by fast, and here we are in November, considering "the right career for your characters."  So, how do you build a career for your cast list?

In my Regency romances, careers as we understand them did not exist for most of my heroines, but they were trained from a young age to expect to manage a household and raise a family. Today, we consider that a career rather than an expectation. However, my leading ladies all had a streak of independence and wanted more than being lady of the manor.

Emmaline followed in her father’s footsteps and became a spy in the Peninsular Wars. Juliana learnt to sword fight because she didn’t want her brother to have all the fun, and Olivia loved books and knew her way around libraries. One of my Regency belles, Hester, was an herbalist and healer. Charlotte learnt map-making skills from her father and millinery from her mother. Phoebe grew up on a farm and became a competent horsewoman. Tilly, my Brides of Banff Springs heroine, became a chambermaid at the famous Banff Springs Hotel. The heroine of my new cosy mystery series is a sixty-six-year-old retired primary school headmistress.

I don’t recall having to create a career for any of them, as they all evolved organically. Charlotte was the only one who gave me any trouble. As I saw it, the story was that Charlotte would be a lady’s companion in a quiet country home. I thought she might become the vicar’s wife, very genteel and respectable, but Charlotte wanted adventure, so that was what she had, and then some. It took me a while to figure out a connection between spying and map-making, smuggling and millinery, but once I built her backstory, it came together quite quickly.

When we start writing, we are encouraged to write what we know. I knew very little about any skills my heroines needed other than using herbs and horseman(woman)ship. I’ve been around horses since

Those were the days.

I was five years old and became interested in herbalism at age nineteen. My kids used to take one look at my preparations and grumble that ‘Mum’s doing her witchy thing again.’ Spying during the Napoleonic Wars was rife, and the Duke of Wellington was rumoured to have a network of some four thousand spies. I have always liked maps, so it wasn’t too hard to work that theme into Charlotte’s story. The millinery, not so much. I don’t know how many YouTube videos I watched on sword fighting, but that grew to a new level when I attended some fencing classes.

As the author, you can choose any career for your character, but they will tell you what they like and don’t like, what they can and can’t do, and what they might want to learn. Authors may use their own experiences of a career, as John Grisham did with his legal thrillers, or let their imaginations run wild as J.K. Rowling did with Harry Potter. With judicious research, you can build careers for your characters about which you, the author, know nothing or a little. Dick Francis, the author of over forty horse-racing-related thrillers, had many different careers for his characters, from glassmaking to art, horse transport to meteorologist, a barrister to a movie star playing detectives on the big screen.

Once an author has the career background, has done the research, and has begun writing, what emerges is as authentic as possible. However, I hope none of my future characters wants to climb mountains or be a trapeze artist, as I have no head for heights. Now, I will drop in on my fellow bloggers and see their take on the subject.

  

Helena Fairfax  http://www.helenafairfax.com/blog

Anne Stenhouse  http://annestenhousenovelist.wordpress.com

Connie Vines  http://mizging.blogspot.com/

Dr. Bob Rich   https://wp.me/p3Xihq-3m7

Diane Bator  https://escapewithawriter.wordpress.com/

Marci Baun  http://www.marcibaun.com/blog/

Skye Taylor http://www.skye-writer.com/blogging_by_the_sea