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Title: The Complete Writer's Guide to Heroes and Heroines by Tami D. Cowden, Caro LaFever, Sue Viders ISBN: 1-58065-024-4 Publisher: Lone Eagle Publishing Company Pub. Date: 19 June, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.72 (18 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Put this one near your computer
Comment: There are numerous books on creating characters, writing believable stories, etc. This book will help you spark ideas and conflict. Just flipping through it after I received my copy helped me with ideas for at least two new books. If you've already got a character, but they seem to have lost their way, tracking down the core archetype can help answer some of the questions as to what drives him or her.
The text is clear, readable and entertaining. Numerous examples of each archetype is given (most from film and television, which allows for easy review), and it's amazing to see what familiar characters fall under the same archetype. I would have never thought that Frasier Crane and the Professor from Gilligan's Island shared characteristics, but when I walked through the "professor" archetype, I found there were indeed numerous similarities.
Most writers are familiar with the basic archetypes you learn in almost any class -- the hero, the villain, the ingenue, the rogue. This goes beyond that, and offers a solid foundation upon which you can make your characters grow.
Rating: 4
Summary: Great Archetype Reference Guide
Comment: If you are looking for a book that will help you to outline your story, move your main player out of your mind and onto your paper and then journey your main character from point A to point B by using the right formulaic sidekicks and secondary players, this guide is written just for you. It may help you avoid the typical and strive for something a little more nuanced -- outside the usual box.
The authors mix and match 8 hero archetypes (the chief, the bad boy, the best friend, the charmer, the lost soul, the professor, the swashbuckler and the warrior) with 8 heroine archetypes (the boss, the seductress, the spunky kid, the free spirit, the waif, the librarian, the crusader and the nurturer) and come up with all the mathematically possible permutations along with hints about how to evolve characters with one main archetypal trait or characters with less definable layered archetypes. The authors freely use many familiar examples (not just tedious classic literary examples) to illustrate how such interactions successfully play off one another in today's popular films, books and television shows. (Ex: In the movie Blade Runner, Harrison Ford is the Warrior while Darryl Hannah is the Waif.)
Indeed, many of the examples are stereotypical and when you read them your reaction will most likely be, "Okay, this is a no brainer -- I am well aware of this archetype and can recognize it easily in film and books." While this may be true, it is wonderful to have this book where all the archetypes are already laid out for you in a marvelously straightfoward format -- as a reference guide so that time spent pondering over the myriad of personality related intereactions can now be spent on crafting a story with great dialogue, settings, tone and plot instead of worrying wheither or not the characters mesh or not. With this guide, that portion of the thinking is done for you -- you need only see what works for you by looking through the examples or by tweaking your characters after learning about certain reactions in order to facilitate outcomes primary to your plot.
On a purely fun level, this book gets 5 stars. I enjoyed categorizing the characters in the book and then applying the criteria to some of my own personal favorites.
Rating: 5
Summary: Open the book and see the possibilities
Comment: Begin with Hero Archetypes and learn about the Chief or the Lost Soul or the Warrior. See what might make them tick.
Move to your Heroine Archetypes to visit with the Free Spirit, the Nurturer or my favorite the Spunky Kid. Learn how they got to be who they are.
Then you will learn how to use the Archetypes to Create Characters. As most writers understand, great characters are not one-dimensional and flawless. It is their layers that make them truly intriguing. Indiana Jones' fear of snakes made him believable.
Finally play with Archetype Interactions and see how the Waif might react to the Professor type. What if the Waif were layered with the Librarian and the Professor had a bit of the Swashbuckler in him. What would these two encounter? Where would they take your story?
Tami et al's book is invaluable to me. If I had no other book on characterization, I would be fine. My only quibble is that we didn't get the Villains, but Tami teaches a Villains Archetype class online as well as face-to-face. I just recently had the pleasure of taking that class with From The Heart Romance Writers.
Put this on your "must have" list if you want rich, complex characters.
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Title: Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Your Romance Published by Julie Beard ISBN: 002863196X Publisher: Alpha Books Pub. Date: 21 January, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: The Writer's Guide to Character Traits: Includes Profiles of Human Behaviors and Personality Types by Linda N. Edelstein ISBN: 0898799015 Publisher: Writers Digest Books Pub. Date: October, 1999 List Price(USD): $18.99 |
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Title: The Romance Writers' Phrase Book by Jean Salter Kent, Candace Shelton ISBN: 0399510028 Publisher: Perigee Pub. Date: April, 1984 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
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Title: The Joy of Writing Sex: A Guide for Fiction Writers by Elizabeth Benedict ISBN: 0805069933 Publisher: Owl Books Pub. Date: 01 February, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: 45 Master Characters: Mythic Models for Creating Original Characters by Victoria Schmidt ISBN: 1582970696 Publisher: Writers Digest Books Pub. Date: September, 2001 List Price(USD): $19.99 |
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