Hoi Hoi!
Hello all and welcome back, in this post I'm going to be talking about the early developmental stages for my debut novel, The King's Actors.
Early stages of development started with a 6th grader who admired shows like Steven Universe and Phineas and Ferb. I absolutely adored 2D animation, even before it was going out of style. This was the time when Disney XD was swinging with new TV shows, all hand drawn, and Disney channel shows such as Amphibia and The Owl House started to air around this time. I knew I wanted to create something in the same vein, so most of the first things penned were concept art and character designs. It wasn’t until a year in that I bought a notebook and started writing down ideas for a book.
The story centers around 3 main characters, Rex, Ava, and Chestnut, with Eric and Jason being the supporting cast. So without furthur ado! Let's start with my FAVOURITE character, Rex Thunder!
Rex was pretty easy to nail down. I wanted a main character with the name Rex because at the time it was, and I quote 12 year-old me, "the COOLEST name EVER" His signature color was always blue and I wanted him to have some sort of magic. In earlier renditions, he could shapeshift into a Velociraptor, akin to his best friend, Eric. As I went through different versions of the story, I ended up cutting this, but I instead gave him electrokinesis. By this time, his magic was acting more like a plot device than actually a part of him and the story. After a few added scenes, I managed to add it into the plot and his relationship with his father, that it was a gift to be received when he died.
Backstory: Rex's backstory has definitely been the most developed. At first, his father, the main antagonist, was a stern tight fisted dictator with a short temper. I'll write a separate post later on Felix, as he was one of my hardest characters to create. Overtime, I softened him into a more manipulative charming individual, while also giving him childlike tantrums that act as lasting damage to his son, Rex. The story includes triggering topics like gaslighting, isolation, physical and mental abuse. These developed overtime and I feel, hit home the power Felix is able to weild over Rex. I'm personally more partial to internal conflict verses external conflict and this shows in how the two interact. Rex has the most...complicated backstory, but one of my favourites! Rex was born in 1600's France, but when he was 6 he died and his soul was led to Limbo, where he met His Highness, his father, for the first time. His parents were divorced, leading to His Highness despising Rex because he was a painful reminder of his ex-wife. Rex, locked in his room with all the time in the world, worked to come up with something that he could use to get his father to finally notice him. He came up with a choreographed dance routine and when he showed it to His Highness, everything changed. The King was impressed and had servants teach him to dance. Overtime, Rex became His Highness' personal entertainer; His Jester. Eventually the attention soured into a dark abuse and Rex, desperate for escape, took his second life, only to find that 7000 years had passed in the living world. His physical body returned to the age he had died, 6 years old. Now in the year 8067, the year in which the book takes place, Earth has been abandoned and replaced by another planet New Earth. Each city took inspiration from a different Era and Rex found himself in the Victorian Distract, inspired by Victoria London. Here he met Matthew, the kind soul who took the little boy in as his own and raised him. (Matthew is the main character of He Needs A Father, the prequel book to The King's Actors)
Personality: Rex is a scorpio. He's very reserved and very cautious of people. Having a background in Jester-work, he's a skilled actor and can change his entire mood and outlook on a dime to fit the situation. He's a social chameleon who keeps himself locked away deep inside him. As a general rule, he doesn't talk about his past, but there are certain things he's willing to explain, such as Limbo and the contract of the second life. But even despite Chestnut and Ava's persisting, some wounds are still too fresh. Rex is one of my favorite characters because he is hurt and distrustful. Between him, and my new main character Spade, I think this is a cool contrast, because in Rex's story we get to see the after effect of his trauma, whereas in June 9th, we get to see Spade's story in real time! In the beginning, Rex was alot more cocky and smug, as I was trying to lean into snarky theif trope, but it made the romance between him and Chestnut seem cheap and contrived, so I let him open up to her and slowly peel back layers of pain as he starts trusting her.
Voice: Rex's voice changed a little. In the beginning there really wasn't one, his voice was my untampered with writing style. Overtime I gave him a little more originality and made his voice more action oriented. He's not intuitive enough to have long internal dialogues, but he does notice physical actions, especially in himself. Rex's POV centers on shaking hands, racing heart, sweaty palms, stuff like that. He pays attention to how cobblestone scrapes against his palm and how the humidity effects his breathing, in contrast to how Chestnut notes how the world makes her feel, and Ava cuts herself out of her POV and focuses on what everyone else is doing.
Anyways, that's all for today folks, thanks for tuning in and I'll see you in the next post!
