When I heard Neil was
spotlighting supporting characters on his blog, I knew I had to be a part of
it. I’ve always found creating secondary characters to be one of the great joys
of writing—when your genre is romance, you don’t have total freedom with your
MCs. They have to be, as a rule, the sort of guy the average reader can imagine
falling in love with.
The best friends, the
colleagues, the family—that’s where a writer can really have some fun!
I was tempted to write today
about Dr Nadia Pawlaczek, the strong-willed lesbian Cambridge don in my first
novel, Camwolf:
“How could I
forget? I’ll be there, Nads.”
She winced.
“Nick, darling, please don’t call me that. It makes it sound like you’re
talking to your testicles.”
But instead, I’m going to take
a look at Gary from Pressure Head:
Gary was currently ruffling Julian’s neck fur as we
waited for the food to arrive. “Who’s Daddy’s sweetie, then?” he cooed.
“That’s a good question,” I said, leaning back in my
chair. “What happened to that bloke you met in London?”
Gary made a
face. He’s one of those blokes who are not exactly fat but still soft all over,
like an overstuffed teddy bear, although in his case it conceals a quite
respectably muscled upper body. “Turned out to be a total cow. We shall not speak of him. No we won’t.”
The last bit was to the dog.
“And how’s your love life, darling?”
That was to me, Julian’s love life having long been consigned to the vet’s
dustbin.
(Julian, in
case you were worried, is a St Bernard.)
Gary’s character was introduced
very deliberately. As I’m sure readers have noticed, main characters in m/m
romance tend to be rather butch and straight-acting, and I wanted to experiment
with writing a guy who was a bit more obviously camp. We have a great tradition
of camp men in Britain—men like Quentin Crisp, Kenneth Williams, Frankie
Howerd, or Graham Norton. So much so, in fact, that for some it’s more a
media-savvy persona than their real character.
But
there had to be more to Gary than just a few effeminate mannerisms and a flair for
drama. He’s got his own IT firm, he’s a bell-ringer (as the title to this post
attests, I just couldn’t resist the gags) and because I can rarely restrain
myself from giving my secondary characters their own love interest, he’s got a
boyfriend…but Darren, bless his little porn star heart, is a whole other blog
post! ;)
Gary is also a good friend to
my narrator, Tom. Working from home, Gary’s always ready and willing to meet up
for a pint or a pub lunch and a natter whenever Tom’s struggling to work out
what’s going on in his fledgling relationship with our other hero, Phil. This
is important, because the average British male needs a pint or two (or three or
four) before he’s ready to talk about his feelings. (Gary, it should be noted,
is not the average British male).
Gary looks at things from a
different perspective to Tom—and is just self-obsessed enough to be relied on
for a spot of comic relief when things are getting a bit dark.
And after all, isn’t that what
side-kicks have always been for?
Oh,
and if you’re wondering where Julian (the dog) got his name? Totally named
after famously camp comedian Julian Clary. The fact that Julian is also the
name of one of my werewolf main characters in Camwolf is entirely coincidental. Honest. ;)
About JL Merrow's PRESSURE HEAD:
Some secrets are better left
hidden.
To most of the world, Tom
Paretski is just a plumber with a cheeky attitude and a dodgy hip, souvenir of
a schoolboy accident. The local police keep his number on file for a different
reason—his sixth sense for finding hidden things.
When he’s called in to help
locate the body of a missing woman up on Nomansland Common, he unexpectedly
encounters someone who resurrects a host of complicated emotions. Phil
Morrison, Tom’s old school crush, now a private investigator working the same
case. And the former bully partly responsible for Tom’s injury.
The shocks keep coming.
Phil is now openly gay, and shows unmistakable signs of interest. Tom’s
attraction to the big, blond investigator hasn’t changed—in fact, he’s even
more desirable all grown up. But is Phil’s interest genuine, or does he only want
to use Tom’s talent?
As the pile of complicated
evidence surrounding the woman’s murder grows higher, so does the heat between
Tom and Phil. But opening himself to this degree exposes Tom’s heart in a way
he’s not sure he’s ready for…while the murderer’s trigger finger is getting
increasingly twitchy.
Product Warnings
Contains a flirtatious
plumber with hidden talents, a cashmere-clad private investigator with hidden
depths, and an English village chock full of colourful characters with plenty
to hide.
***
JL Merrow is that rare beast, an English person who refuses
to drink tea. She writes across genres,
with a preference for contemporary gay romance, and is frequently accused of
humour. Her novella Muscling Through
was a 2013 EPIC ebook Award finalist.
She is a member of the UK GLBTQ Fiction Meet organising
team.
Find JL Merrow online at: www.jlmerrow.com
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