The people in my stories

One of the most interesting things I have learned as I have tried to become a writer is how the people in my stories become very real to me.

Every character starts with an idea.  Sometimes the idea is a person I have known.  Sometimes the idea is an historical person I have read about.  Sometimes the idea is someone I wish I knew.

I tend to spend a lot of time with my characters before they ever take shape on paper, but occasionally, one will surprise me by springing fully developed into a story.

My characters are very persuasive.  They won't allow me to make them do things they don't want to do.  They make me delete thousands of words because they would never do or say what I tried to make them do or say.

I have yet to write a character that I wouldn't want to spend time with.  The one character I'm glad I don't know is dead by the time my story is written, and he is just a bad memory.

I know I will have to write real villains at some point.  I know I will have to write a character that no matter how hard I try, I can't like.

But here's the rub for me.  I was taught from the time I was preschool age, that God lived in every human being.  And it was my job to find God, find good, and love that piece of that person.

I have often said in my real life that I'm not going to go to hell for failing to find God in this or that person.

So, I have to figure out how to create those villains and still treat them as creatures of God that are difficult to like, but that my fundamental set of beliefs require me to love.

Which means there will be no Adolf Hitler's or Charles Manson's in my stories.

My character villains will all be salvageable.  I'm not planning to write true crime dramas, so I think I will be okay.

The real villains in my stories will remain the villains that most frighten me.  Hunger, poverty, disease, loneliness, isolation, depression, hopelessness.  I think many characters who seem like villains are really victims of those bigger societal villains.  What do you think?