No, not Megadeth, the band with the most on-the-nose name in the history of Heavy Metal. I'm talking about taking a character in a novel, and killing her.
No, not in the story. Not that she gets killed. I mean, actually eradicating her from existence, as though I were a god and she were a creature of my creation, and I control her destiny and all that stuff.
A week ago I got another email from my agent. It turned out she thought the novel would work better without a certain character--a major character. She gave the advice so casually. It was off the top of her head. And at first I felt like screaming. Writing a new beginning was a pain in the ass, not because of the beginning itself, but because I had to go through the entire damn book afterwards with a fine-toothed comb, making sure I referred back to the beginning wherever dramatic, and making sure everything made sense. That took forever.
Imagine how long it would take to get rid of a vital character. It would take forever, right?
The thing is, Leslie (agent) was right. It wasn't a vital character. I was amazed and appalled that it took me all of two days to get rid of her. I worked solidly for about 14 hours per day, but still. Most of it was easy.
All the same, I still can't believe just how long this process is. I like having an agent who's a perfectionist, but I had imagined you get an agent, she contacts publishers, you sell your work (or you don't). Apparently it's nothing like that. You get an agent, she has ideas about nailing a market, you work for what seems like forever, then... what? I don't know. I'm still at phase two. As I said, it seems to last forever.
There's a lesson in all this for me. Sophie, who is now dead, served the purpose of leading the main character forwards. This detracted from my central character's dilemma, in a way, because it stopped him from having to carry his burden alone. She wound up serving the purpose of explaining things, letting the reader know where we were going all the time. That stops the reader from engaging with the dilemma, too.
So next time I want to bring somebody to life, I'll ask if they really deserve to be there. I'll tell them that they can have a state pension, health care, all that stuff people should get from first-world countries. I'll do all I can to make them healthy and vibrant, so long as they're willing to get a job.
