Character Histories

I created a guest post for my friend Minnie about the importance of backstories and histories of characters which made me think, "I wonder if my readers are curious about the backstories of my characters? Did they know that practically all of my characters had one???"

So, I decided to post a few of them to give you all an idea of the creative work (and research) that goes into developing my characters. You can't just have a major character plop into a story out of thin air... there are timelines and history that needs to be consistent, especially when you are dealing with ancient vampire races.

***WARNING!! THERE MAY BE SPOILERS AHEAD!! PROCEED WITH CAUTION***

Emil and Vasile and onto Sadie

Emil (a main character in my book) was born in 1416. His mother was the very last full-blooded vampire named Celestina who had fallen in love with human named Beryx. Unfortunately, Celestina wasn’t strong enough and passed away during childbirth but not before letting Beryx know that baby Emil was different; the first of his kind. When Emil reached 16, the age of a Genetic Vampire’s transition from full human to vampire, he… Let’s just say he ran into some conflicts with his father… anyway, the same year he elopes with his first love Victoria (a human). In 1433, he leaves her shortly after Vasile (main character) and Millicent (died at birth) are born to an experiment with creating more genetically born vampires. Vasile, at this point in Emil’s life, is completely forgotten until Emil receives a notice that Victoria had passed away in 1450. When he goes to her funeral, he meets Vasile again (who had grown to the age of his transition) and passes himself off as someone his mother talked to regularly in the village market; soon Vasile is recruited by Emil as an apprentice. Vasile’s apprenticeship only lasts half a century or so until Emil marries Jacklyn in the 1500s (a human girl that he then changes into a vampire; a bitten vampire, as they’re called). About a century later in the 1600s, after going to America and leaving Jacklyn to tend to his castle, Emil is married to a woman named Rose, who he changes into a Bitten Vampire. She gives birth to his son Thomas. But in a turn of unfortunate events, Rose was burned at the stake soon after Thomas’ birth at the
accusations of being a witch. This causes Emil and Thomas to go back to Transylvania in attempts to forget about their sorrows. Thomas later returns to America in 1988 and marries a woman named Miriam who gives birth to Justin and Sadie.

Jacklyn and Adrian

Adrian was two when his mother gave birth to Jacklyn. They were quickly best friends and inseparable. When they were teens (Adrian 17 and Jacklyn 15), they spent most of their time in the surrounding woods of Emil’s castle making up stories of what goes on inside of the castle and discussing rumors that they’d heard. Emil began to sit out on one of the many balconies of his castle and whenever they were close enough he would call out to them. Every so often he would offer them water or food. Jacklyn would
always accept but Adrian always felt unease when he was around Emil, which caused him to refuse. Emil found himself disliking Adrian because he was worried that he would cause Jacklyn to stop coming to the castle; he mainly gave attention to Jacklyn who was very intrigued by Emil and Vasile. Jacklyn began to visit them often (ignoring Adrian’s attempts to keep her from going) becoming more and more fascinated by the secrets inside Emil’s castle.

Adrian struggled for years to keep close to his sister but after she started a relationship with Vasile, it was like she was never there. Shortly after Adrian hears his sister has begun dating Vasile, he is shocked to find out that she was now getting married to Emil. Jacklyn was turned into a vampire on her nineteenth birthday. A year later, Jacklyn meets with Vasile to convince him to turn her brother as well so she would never lose him. Vasile, unable to say no to her, turns Adrian and quickly becomes friends with him so that he would always have a quick connection to Jacklyn.