Larissa Benoliel has written a really interesting article over at the Heroes and Heartbreakers blog, Wingmance: Number Twos Who Finish First. It’s about the importance of interesting secondary characters in making a book series a more compelling read. One of Larissa’s examples, is Terrible:
There are some series where the secondary Character simply steals the protagonist’s thunder, as well as the readers’ hearts. Like in the Downside Ghost Series byStacia Kane, where you might like Chess, the heroine, but you can’t help but fall head-over-heels for her friend and (spoiler?) potential love interest, Terrible. He might be an enforcer for a crime boss, but Terrible has such a low opinion of himself that he has a hard time believing a woman might really like him for him and not because she needs him for something. He can be a jerk—it’s the nature of his business, after all!—but he is so sweet to the people he cares about or who really need him.
I don’t know if I agree that Terrible steals Chess’s thunder. However, I think we all agree that he is an amazing character that really turned out to have a will of his own, given the fact that Stacia originally introduced him to kill him off!
Make sure you read the entire article over at Heroes and Heartbreakers. Larissa also talks about secondary characters in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series and Jeaniene Frost’s Night Huntress novels. (And visit her at her own book blog, Larissa’s Bookish Life.)