I was blog browsing, and I came across a guest post by Fonda Lee on Fantasy Book Critic. She is discussing her novel, Exo, and I liked what she said about creating characters that are more complex than 100% good or 100% evil. Real people aren't that simple. She writes,
"There’s no shortage of stories about good guys vs. bad guys, especially in YA fiction, which is packed full of courageous rebels and foul tyrants. Personally, I’m far more interested in writing stories that reflect truths about our own world…and those truths are rarely so simple. . . . I write books for those teens: the ones that question the world, the ones that suspect that so much of what adults tell you is a matter of perspective, that sometimes the more you know, the less certain you become, and that the uncertainty is a good thing, a way to be certain that your mind is still open. In Exo, . . . [t]here are no 'good guys' and 'bad guys' to be found here—only people, all of them doing what they believe is the right thing, based on their worldview and the circumstances of their lives and experiences. And that means they hold certain opinions, they say and do things that some readers will not agree with, they make decisions that are well intentioned but still questionable."
Black and white characters aren't interesting to me because they aren't real people. To read Lee's full post, click here. How do you feel about good guys that are a little bad or bad guys that think they're doing the right thing? Comment below, and tell me your opinion.
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