How Usopp Made Fawbry Work
Hearing back from fans of The Malja Chronicles, one character keeps coming up as a favorite — Fawbry. He's a favorite of mine, too. He's the comic relief, for one, and though he is quite cowardly, he can summon upon a bit of courage when his friends are in desperate need. Many characters influenced the creation of Fawbry but no bigger than Usopp from the anime series One Piece.
Those of you who have followed the blog should not be surprised that a Japanese cartoon had a major influence on The Malja Chronicles. Anime, in general, helped shape the structure of Book 1 (The Way of the Black Beast) by forming a team of individual archetypes that aided in propelling the classic hero journey plot along. Layering these two — classic western plot with eastern archetypes — was a huge challenge and part of the delight in writing the book. It provided many surprises along the way, one of which was Fawbry.
I like humor. In person, I'm constantly cracking jokes. Growing up, I found a role model in Hawkeye Pierce from M*A*S*H. Yet despite a life of silliness and laughter, my short stories and novels tend to be darker, bloodier, and serious. But I wanted some humor in Malja's world — especially because without any humor, that world would be way too bleak. Fawbry was my answer.
As a writer, I often create problems for myself that I've got to figure out how to solve. Many times these are plot issues, but in this case, I was challenging myself to figure out how to write a character that could be both funny and heroic, often switching from one to the other in a matter of sentences. Going in, I had no clue how to pull that off.
If I've been remotely successful, we have Usopp to thank. All the characters in One Piece (a comedic, action-adventure, pirate tale) can switch from silly to serious on a dime, but Usopp has the added layer of crying in fear for his life at one moment and jumping to save the day in the next. He may be terrified as he attacks a bad guy, and he may gladly run for his life in the next moment, but for that brief second of time, he is a hero. That was what I needed from Fawbry.
Characters have a way of surprising a writer, too. This happened when Fawbry finally got fed up with Malja (the scene in the horse stall) and verbally unleashes on her. He is angry and fearing for his life and he lashes out at her because there is nothing else he can do. The surprise comes in the form of love and caring. He doesn't know it quite yet, but at that moment, he revealed to me that he actually cares about Malja — not just as a tough lady who can save his hide and protect him, but as a person who can be trusted and who he wants to help. He's got a long road to go before he understands it, but that's the moment I knew it — which for Fawbry fans is important because that's the moment Fawbry's involvement in the series became far richer.
As I work on Book 3 — The Way of the Brother Gods, Fawbry's role keeps taking strange turns. I've tried to force him into one peg or another, but he cares too much for Malja and Tommy to let me make the plot go the way I want. He can be a coward, sure, but like Usopp, he'd hate for his friends to think he let them down.
Maybe that's why readers respond to him so well. Fawbry is more human than a hero. Let's face it — if we had to deal with half of what Malja goes through, we probably would be afraid, too. Fawbry allows us to experience that reality as well. And, hopefully, like any good comic relief, he does it with a touch of humor.
What kind of characters do you connect with?
