Sunday, June 30, 2019

A Family Dilemma



HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I’ll never forget the day my mom called me, all upset, and, I’ll admit, enraged. She was very unhappy with me, to say the least, because she’d decided that I’d modeled Charlotte McNally’s gorgeous but hyper-critical mother after her.  And moreover, that this person had gone to Boston to have a facelift. And now, she complained, everyone would that that was her.

I explained my way out of it, and ended by saying—Mom, it’s fiction. Charlie McNally is fictional, and Mrs. McNally is fictional She’s not you.

And there we left it.

Mom was right, of course, but I never admitted that.

Families can be tricky. As the wonderful Bryan Reardon explains.


THE PERFECT PLAN?
       By Bryan Reardon

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
             George Bernard Shaw

 
Is that good advice for a writer? I wonder. Recently, at a book festival in Michigan, someone asked me if I write a series. The easy answer was, 'no.' When I thought about the question, my mind made a new connection between my first two books, and my third which comes out this year. The first book is about a school shooting. The second about the bombing of New York's Penn Station. The third book about an abduction. They've been categorized as thrillers, but that never felt 100 percent accurate to me. 

When I got past the action of the concepts, I realized that the three had something much deeper in common. Not a series, but a trilogy of thematically themed stories, all focusing on family.

THE PERFECT PLAN (June 18, Dutton Books) is the story of the two brothers. Together, they seem to have survived a horrible childhood. People see them as strong, resilient and fiercely loyal. That's on the surface. If anyone looked too closely, though, they might see the cracks. They might catch a glimpse at their skeleton.

The older brother, Andrew, is a rising politician, running for office. The younger, Liam, is dangerous and unpredictable. Their story begins with Liam stalking one of Andrew's campaign staffers. When he abducts her in a parking lot, things get worse. Liam seems to taunt Drew with behaviors that seem out of control. 

But, when it comes to the Brennan brothers, things are never how they appear. Their family secret runs deep and dark. And by the end of their story, it will be dragged into the light.

It is in their back story, that I realized this story focuses on family. The brothers grew up in an abusive home, the children of an alcoholic mother. I dove deep into that portion, painting their childhood as vividly as I could. But there is a very real danger in doing that. See, as a writer, if you write about family, your family is automatically going to think you are writing about them.

I certainly don't write about my family. When you plot a story, you need your character to be a certain way, make certain decisions, all to further the arc. If I was to actually write about my family, I doubt too many people would want to read it. My life is normal. Boring. Certainly no one has been abducted. So, I make stuff up.

But…..

Here's where it gets dangerous. Although no one in my stories is an actual real-life person, I can't say that about some settings, or incidents. In The Perfect Plan, some of the story takes place in the backyard of my childhood home. My brother did teach me to tie my shoes. There are a few real-world nuggets thrown in there. I find myself doing that to help me ground the story. Make the characters more believable. The problem is, if some is true, then people might believe all of it really happened. When you write the kinds of books I write, that is not a great thing.

As writers, it can be scary. We are putting ourselves out there in a very real and vulnerable way. As our stories unfold, we might come across a choice. Use something that might resemble a person in our lives. Or shy away, afraid of what they might think.

 Right or wrong, I have chosen the former. It is a risk. There are still people in my life that don't speak to me because they think they were in my first book (though they weren't). But I do it because it works for me, despite the risk.

The funny thing about family, though, is that we tend to keep it all locked inside. On the surface, everything looks great. Just check our Facebook pages. But that's never the whole story, is it? We do anything we can to keep that skeleton locked away. We certainly don't let it dance in front of the neighbors. And I find myself asking the same question over and over again. Do we really know the people we are closest to? And, more interestingly, do they truly know us?


HANK: Yup, that’s a tough choice.  Is what’s best for the book what’s best for the real people? And how do we even know?

What do you think about using your real life in a book? Or—even more difficult—appropriating someone else’s?

And a copy of THE PERFECT PLAN to one luck commenter!

(And yesterday’s winner of  A LONG WAY DOWN  is Margaret Hamilton! Email me your address! Yay!)


From New York Times bestselling author Bryan Reardon comes a tense, twisting story about two brothers locked together in a dangerous game—and an unforgettable tale of a family’s dark secrets.

Liam Brennan teeters on the edge. Early one morning, he snaps, kidnapping a young woman who works for Drew Brennan, Liam’s older brother and the upstart candidate in a heated election. This sudden, vicious attack appears to be the beginning of an unthinkable spiral. But when it comes to the Brennan brothers, nothing is what it seems.
 
To the rest of the world, Liam is the troubled problem child who grew up to be his brother’s enforcer, while Drew has always been the perfect son and a charismatic leader who has his sights set on the governor’s mansion with his charming and beautiful wife, Patsy, by his side.
 
Now, as Liam tries to stay one step ahead of the authorities and his brother, every passing minute provides a deeper glimpse into the brothers’ past, long hidden behind a picture-perfect suburban veneer. With the threat of the truth surfacing, Liam and Drew are driven toward one final, desperate act...

 Bryan Reardon is the bestselling author of Finding Jake and The Real Michael Swann, and now, THE PERFECT PLAN (from Dutton.).  Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Bryan worked for the State of Delaware for more than a decade, starting in the Office of the Governor. He holds a degree in psychology from the University of Notre Dame and lives in West Chester, Pennsylvania, with his wife and kids. 

42 comments:

  1. Congratulations on the new book, Bryan . . . it sounds quite captivating and I’m looking forward to discovering some of those dark Brennan family secrets in your story.

    While I think those true-life “nuggets” of family/friend traits help to make characters more complex and more real for the reader, I’m not at all certain that it would be a good idea to appropriate someone else’s life for your book unless you were writing a biography. I imagine most people would be upset at the idea of having their life used in a book. Perhaps we’re all a bit more private that we might have realized . . . .

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    1. At least we have to try to disguise it a little bit, right?

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  2. I have to admit that I haven't given a lot of thought to how families of writers react to their fictional stories concerning their suspected appearance. But, really I should have thought about it because I have some family stuff that would make a great story, but I could never write it, as I would be afraid people would recognize themselves, or worse, that other people would know family secrets (like your mom being afraid people would think she'd had plastic surgery, Hank). So, one more thing that you wonderful authors have to deal with in writing your amazing stories. There is so much more to writing than meets the eye of the reader. Thank you all for taking the risk that family and friends might be offended.

    Bryan, The Perfect Plan sounds like it has one of those delicious twists I love so much, and the cover is quite enticing. Congratulation on this new book, and I hope nobody stops talking to you because of any of the characters.

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    1. Yes, it is a juggle! But usually, people just think they see themselves in books, but they’re not really the basis for that person. And the conventional wisdom is that people who are portrayed as bad guys never recognize themselves.
      But, amateur me, I made mom so much like mom, it was pretty obvious :-) but she was wonderful. Going into it probably more than we need to :-) it turned out that it was more Charlie and her perception of her mother, than her actual mother. In the book, Charlie realizes her mother is wonderful, and that she has just misinterpreted what her mother says and does. And my mom realized that :-) and it was all a very happy ending.

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  3. The Perfect Plan sounds great! I think it's only natural to use certain tidbits from real life in fiction. But I would hesitate to base someone solely on a specific person. I would be worried they'd recognize themselves. Hank's mom proves it can happen!

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    1. Exactly! But often, real life is just too irresistible…

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  4. Welcome Bryon—this book sounds addictive! I struggle with these questions all the time since my series is set in a real place and has many real people populating the pages. I think it’s quite reasonable to use real bits in fiction—in fact I suspect we do that even if we don’t think we are!

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    1. Yes, I always wonder how you walk that line, Lucy!

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  5. I can already get glimmers of what might be happening in The Perfect Plan--and I'm wondering just whose plan the title refers to: Drew or Liam?

    Currently working on a fictionalized novella that is based on my family--I have distorted the 'true' story and certain characters because those characters are telling a different 'truth'--the truth of this story--not repeating the actual history of the family. I am finding out as I go along how my central character survives and moves through her world.

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  6. Welcome to JRW's Bryon, I have just added A Perfect Plan to my review list. Sounds very interesting.
    I think the question about families breaks down to how well the author is in sync with his family.
    Obviously a loving family with open communication might be more willing to be included. The other factor might be that authors tend to be rather secretive (private?) about the creative process... so a family might not know the details until a work is finished. I have read of authors who have people read a finished draft and then sign off on a character if it is based on them. That I think would be the best way to go. If a character is obnoxious, and the real person does not have insight that they are obnoxious..then I can see a problem might happen.
    I guess that is why most books have the disclaimer "names characters etc are products of the author's imagination....are entirely coincidental." Even though everyone in the family knows the author is talking about "Crazy Uncle Bill".

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    1. Who was it who famously said those disclaimers are the most fictional part of fiction?

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  7. If I was writing a book and used people from my real life, that would be one hellaciously boring read. My family/extended family has a background in law enforcement but I wouldn't know enough about most of the family members to base any character on them.

    If someone reads into a character and thinks it is them, that would be on them, not me if I didn't actually base it on them.

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    1. And don’t you bet that happens all the time?

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    2. I'm sure it does. But it doesn't make them any less wrong if the character isn't actually based on them.

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  8. My family skeleton closet is an over-sized walk in. So it is probably good that I have not the talent, discipline, nor desire to write about them. But it does make for some interesting dinner table conversation after a glass or two of wine.

    Your new book intrigues me, Bryan, so I'm off to Amazon.

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    1. And isn’t it funny, too, how in those conversations you realize that everyone has a different memory of what happened?

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  9. A story about my family would probably be pretty boring too, but I sorta collect stories I hear about actual people, some are friends, some are people I've heard about or read about in the paper. I'm sure if say an old classmate were to right a novel about small town life in the Sixties everyone here would be trying to figure out which character was based on what class member.
    P.S. Hank, I just started read FACE TIME two days ago and I admit I wondered.

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    1. Oh, did you? So funny! But when Mom finished the book, she absolutely loved it… She called me, in happy tears, and said oh! You have written a mother-daughter love story! So all is well.

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  10. Congratulations on your new release!

    I'm finishing a mystery that includes a mother's relationship with her 14 year old daughter. I'm about to turn it over to my own young adult daughter for a critique. It's not about her, it's fiction. Will she believe me?

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  11. Congratulations on your release! About the brothers, are they based on the Biblical brothers Cain and Abel? I wonder if their mother had postpartnum depression? Was she an alcoholic before she had children? If so, then the brothers could have fetal alcohol syndrome? The themes reflect what is really happening in current news.

    Hank, your comment about your Mom reminded me of something. It is off tangent, though. I remember reading that Agatha Christie grew up in a happy family, yet she wrote many stories about dysfunctional families. How on earth did your mom know that you based the character on her? When I wrote stories for creative writing classes as a kid, I often based characters on people I knew outside my family because I felt that I needed to protect my family. Remember that in the Deaf world, they saw Deaf parents as being better than parents who could hear. LOL.

    Diana

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    1. Great questions!
      As for my mom, once she had decided that Charlie McNally was me… (True and not true at the same time…)It was an easier jump for her to decide about Charlie‘s mother . And Charlie’s mother was the same age, gorgeous, stylish, and very very very… Critical. But she meant well.
      And your observation about deaf children is the perfect explanation of point of view.

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    2. Hank, it sounds like your mom was very observant. Yes, the Deaf world is quite different. If you have seen Doc Martin on PBS, I actually thought his parents were Deaf before we met his parents later in the story. Often I meet hearing adult children of Deaf parents who are similar to Doc Martin.

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  12. Hank and Bryan, have you heard Craig Johnson's story about his dad and Longmire? Craig based cranky, old former Sheriff Lucian on his dad, but his dad went to his grave convinced that he was the basis of hero Walt Longmire. LOL. Sometimes we see what we want to see.

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  13. I think you can't help but use your real life in a book. I do. Just not literally. Fortunately my husband is a very forgiving soul, and I'm a very good cook.

    When I was in a writing group, we'd spend the first 20 mninutes sipping wine and catching up on each other's lives. And every once in a while, one of us would tell a story about something taht had happened to them, and chase it with "And you can't use that!" Because we're all, to some extent, magpies appropriating other people's experiences, too.

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    1. And who was it that said everything is copy, Hallie? :-)

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  14. Congratulations on this captivating story! Using family stories is always a great idea since there are fascinating tales which are ideal for inclusion in a novel.

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  15. Congratulations! What a novel! Families provide the best fodder since truth is stranger than fiction and long lost stories are the best. When I think about what happened through the years to my family and how they managed it brings me to tears.

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    1. Awww...is that good or bad? People are always surprising, and so resilient..

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  16. Congratulations on the new release! I always try to guess which nuggets in any novel are from life or from imagination. I'm often wrong, but it's a fun game.

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  17. This sounds like an exciting story and an author that is new to me. More for the TBR stack! Yes, it is a tough question. Nobody is "just" what they seem, and families have a lot that stays beneath the surface. My sister and I can attest to that, and even we rarely talk about some things. But as for putting it into your books? As a reader I don't really think about if the author is writing about his/her family or friends as much as I think they have to be drawing on all their experiences that have shaped them. However, we don't have any authors in our family so I've never recognized myself!

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    1. Secrets that both of you know..but won't discuss? There's a plot, right there! xoo

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  18. Congrats, Bryan! I love stories that delve into the underbelly of families. So much material! I’d pillage my own as well as that if anyone I’ve ever met. Occupational hazard :) I am already invested in finding out how the brothers turn out in your book! Well done.

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  19. Since I'm not a writer, I can only imagine writing about characters based on family or of those I'm around. Would I be tempted to paint those who have caused me a great deal pain in the worse possible light as a way to seek revenge, while using that famous disclaimer? And what about the reverse? Would I make a much beloved person so absolutely "perfect" that even when they made a mistake no one would believe it?
    Your book sounds fascinating. It has me thinking of my siblings and myself: the goody-goody, the charmer who got away with a lot and the pusher who wants things done their way and only their way.

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  20. Thanks so much for all the thoughtful comments. I think I agree with them all. I had gone through and responded to each from phone but it didn't seem to work. I'm not great at this whole internet thing ;) Also, I want to thank Hank for allowing me to come visit. You are the best.

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  21. YAY! It worked! Bryan, you are fabulous. And the winner of your book is MARLA BRADEEN! Email me with . your address..and it'll be on the way!

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  22. I appreciate the work here, you are doing a great Job.

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