I Am (Not) Happy About Killing Off Characters In a Book
However, when done right it can still wreck you
Disclaimer: I will be using the novel ‘His Muse’ by Twyla Turner as an example for this article, SPOILERS will be in the second half of this article for emphasis of my point.
We are often told that killing off characters is diabolical, and I think there are at least two reasons for that. One — it is too convenient for some writers to do so. It’ll come off as a “clean” wrap up to a complex situation and two — it can deeply wound readers who wanted to stay in the entanglement of a complex story.
I just finished reading Twyla Turner’s His Muse(2018). I read one other book by her titled Scarred(2014), so I should have known I would get into an emotional, sexy ride complete with me grabbing tissues with snot running all over the place.
Why am I bringing this up?
Twyla did something I haven’t seen since I read RF Kuang’s The Poppy War. She utilized her weapon of cutting off a character. However, to understand why I must write this, you need to understand the story and why I think the need to kill off a character could mean something deeper for both writer and reader.
In His Muse, 44 year old Taryn is divorced and wanting to start over. Her husband…
