I listened to a podcast today in which someone quoted an interview with Jim Butcher, writer for the Dresden Files. Jim basically said that he loves to torture his protagonist, presumably to heighten the comedy and drama of the show. And I realized that I don’t go far enough with my characters in that way. I treat them too nicely. Perhaps, in a sense, I’m too “nice” of a person to write dramatic fiction. I hope not, because I sure love doing it.

So from this realization, I have formed my next step. I’m going to do some brainstorming around my main characters on how to “turn up the psychological heat” for each of them. I may end up throwing all these ideas out, but I want to see what happens if I can make things a lot worse for each of them. I just hope I’m not too squeamish. I want to get my hands a little dirty here. I’ll let you know how it goes.

After all, words are messy.