The Writing I Love Is All About Nuanced Characters

…and too often they are hard to find.

Image by eroyka

Most of the best stories ever told have well-defined villains. They are completely evil. They have no chance at salvation. There is nothing about them we can rescue. We can despise them fully, they are impossible to like. Even villains who are scary and cool aren’t really likeable, not so much because of their interference in our heroes’ path but because of their absolutely despicable nature.

I’ve been thinking about this because recently I’ve been enjoying a series of books that doesn’t have a clear villain. Granted, I am not being completely honest: some of these books I’ve read have specific villains that fulfil their villainous roles seamlessly, but the big one, the one behind it all… he isn’t that easy to pinpoint. I think we could do with more villains of the type. Actually, are they villains to begin with?

The sort of character I am referring to is rare. Indeed, they are found among the protagonists if lucky and among the secondary characters when not so fortunate. Complex characters that shift from being reasonable to using dubious methods to achieve their ends are hard to see. They are hard to create and hard to write about too. Yet, they make for some of the best characters I’ve ever enjoyed.