I have a question for Saka-Steph, Mare, Rose, and anyone else who writes stories that alternate between all five guys' POVs:
When you balance the five POVs that way, do you find that some of the guys are harder to write than others? If so, which are the hardest for you and why? Do you think the ease or difficulty of writing the guys has to do more with how well you like them or how well you can relate to them?
"Here We Stand" is my first attempt at writing all five POVs. (Except in Undead but it's AU and it had five original characters too). I usually go with Brian and Nick, sometimes AJ. I wanted to challenge myself and I loved the idea of a reunion story so when Mare mentioned it in a thread here I ran with it. Honestly it's harder than I realized lol. The biggest challenge is trying to make sure they each sound unique while still sounding like the Boys we know.
The easiest for me are Nick and Kevin. Kevin's role I know very well, I can relate to the big brother thing, I kind of write him like how my oldest brother is with me, the youngest of five siblings. So I can easily picture him. Nick is the same way, I get a lot of him from me. I can relate to him in a lot of ways. When I write him, it flows like it doesn't with any of the others.
AJ's not hard persay, but I like delving into his issues too. In that the biggest challenge is to make sure he doesn't slip into "Nick" as I write him. Usually it's remedied by his cursing or just how he'll say whatever the hell he's thinking. Sometimes I try to have him comedic or I give him emo on a darker level than I give Nick. It depends on the story.
Brian's not hard to write normally, but in HWS he is. I think it's simply because I find it hard to relate to him. I usually rely on his bond with Nick to get me through lol. It's why even though he's my fave with Nick, he's harder to write in stories and why I only have one Brian story lol. And even in that one I take everything away so I can write him better
. I just have virtually nothing in common with Brian or his lifestyle right now so he's hard to write. In HWS I focused in on his Kevin bond because honestly, that's the one thing I can relate to lol - a family member who's like one of your best friends and in some ways closer than your siblings, but you never noticed growing up lol.
Howie's the other one I have a hard time with. But this isn't his fault. His sense of humor is really one that sneaks up on you. He's hilarious but it's just the kind that's hard to translate into words in a story. He's also in some ways similar to Brian. And so I run into the same problem I have with AJ/Nick, trying to make sure he doesn't start sounding like "Brian". I also can't relate to Howie much, except on the idea of having four "brothers" (in my case siblings) who seem to outshine you or get noticed, for both good and bad things. So usually I focus in on that because it's how I relate to him.
So the point of this long post is that yeah, it has a lot to do with how much I can relate to him as people.
