As a writer, one of the most frequent questions asked is “Where do you come up with your ideas?” More specifically, people want to know how characters are created.
Most of my characters are difficult to pinpoint where they came from because they are an amalgam of different people. There may be a part of a character’s personality that comes from me, a part that comes from my former boss Jack, apart from my great aunt Bessie, and even a part from the old woman who sits in the corner of Starbucks every morning.
The two primary characters in A Body in a Bathhouse, Mitch O’Reilly, the main protagonist, and Trent Nakos, his love interest, are a mix of who I am and who I’d like to be.
I am Mitch. Well, that’s going a little overboard. I’ve never fought in a war, nor have I ever been a private investigator, but I relate to many of his personality traits. Mitch had a rough past and is a broken man. I’m not trying to elicit sympathy because my life is pretty terrific these days, but I had my share of trials and tribulations that would bring many to tears. I became a very broken man. It took a lot of work, therapy, and more importantly, the help of friends, to get me out of the hole I was in. Those days are a part of me forever, and they are part of Mitch, though he is still trying to dig himself out.
Another part of me reflected in Mitch is his sense of humor. It’s dry, sarcastic, and he’s a bit smart-alecky. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good old-fashioned belly laugh. I just plain love to laugh, but my overall sense of humor is more subtle.
Another part of Mitch that is part of me is his keen sense of observation. It’s perfectly fitting for him as a PI. It’s perfectly fitting for me as a writer. Wherever I go, I take notes of what I see and hear, especially the absurd. Every time my husband tells me I’m nosey, I remind him that a writer is never nosey—a writer is always doing research.
Mitch’s love interest, bathhouse manager Trent Nakos, is more who I’d like to be. Like me, Trent loves to laugh, but Trent loves to laugh a lot—and he does. He sees humor in everything. He’s playful, fun-loving, and sometimes acts like a big kid. I share some of those same traits as Trent, but like most of us, I’d like to be a little more like him.
One trait Trent shares with Mitch is his care of others, sometimes to a fault. His naivete is part of his charm but gets into some trouble too.
I could go on for pages about characters and character development. It’s my favorite thing about writing. My list of characters and personalities is so long I don’t know if I’ll ever use them all and that’s a pretty wonderful problem to have.
I guess, when it comes down to it, I want to be a little more Mitch and a little more Trent too. That’s what makes them perfect for each other.
On the verge of bankruptcy, private investigator, Mitch O’Reilly takes any gig that comes his way, while running his Eye Spy Supply shop in a forgotten Los Angeles strip mall. After two tours in Afghanistan, Mitch’s life amounts to operating his store, coping with his fun-loving sister, Josie, and scoring with anonymous men he meets online. That changes when he gets a break. A beloved comedy scriptwriter is murdered at a bathhouse, and Mitch is hired to prove the innocence of the club custodian. Adapting from a two-bit gumshoe to a high-profile sleuth proves more challenging than he expected.
As if Mitch didn’t have enough to deal with, charismatic bathhouse operator, Trent Nakos, enters his life. After a heartbreaking past, the manager is the definition of a man the brooding P.I. actively avoids.
Following leads from sprawling mansions to sketchy hoods is demanding but becomes more troublesome when deadly threats jeopardize the biggest opportunity of his career.
After growing up in Michigan and North Carolina, Brad Shreve criss-crossed the country while working in the hotel industry. In addition to working in hotels as a bellman, front desk clerk, and reservation call center director, he’s managed coffee houses, waited tables, sold potato chips off a truck and even hocked pre-burial funeral plans.
He credits Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak for developing his interest in art and storytelling. He’d spend hours on the floor sketching and painting and writing stories. My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George gave him his first inklings that he’d like to be a novelist someday.
In addition to perpetually thinking of how to kill people, he’s a proud dad, a beach bum, and coffee house squatter.
He currently lives in the Los Angeles South Bay with his husband, Maurice.
Website/Newsletter Sign Up: www.bradshreve.com
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I’ve been waiting for this book for a while now. Can’t find it on amazon.de yet :/
Thank you for bringing this to my attention, dee. Probably an error on my end. I’ll take a look and you keep your eye out. 🙂
It works now. Thanks a lot for checking it out 🙂