Repeat People

Do you reuse characters? I’m not talking in a series, I mean do you take a character you used in a story and place them again in one that’s totally unrelated?

I attempted to do that in Unscripted Transformations, but wound up having it be a sort of sequel to Heart Pulled to Pieces. In a first draft for a story that has yet to be published (I’m still working out the kinks) I brought in a pair from An Altered Ending,  though since they don’t relate to the story I’ll probably hack them later on. But now I have an idea for a new tale, and I’m thinking of bringing in one of my characters that I love but who didn’t last long in the story they were in.

You see, I believe if a character is awesome they should have their story told. You know, if they haven’t already. Or maybe, like in Eddie’s case, the story that’s yet to be told. I’m also a big fan of when other authors do it. One that brings characters from their other books into their stories quite often is Emily Giffin, and it’s always a treat for me to read who she’s brought in from her other books. Maybe some people get annoyed by this, or think it’s cheating. Maybe it is, but who cares. I like the connection, the six degrees of separation that is so true to real life that doing it in story telling seems to make the world real.

What do you think? Do you love or hate seeing characters from previous books appear (either as major roles or supporting) in an authors other works?