by John M. Floyd

I’ve heard that three of the many things you should try to do as a fiction writer are (1) create interesting, believable characters; (2) inject humor whenever possible; and (3) write what you know. The hidden message here is that (2) and (3) can sometimes add up to (1). When you make the reader laugh a bit at your characters, and when you write about feelings and events you’re already familiar with, you automatically make the people in your story more real and believable, and more interesting as well.

Humor is always a plus. Our favorite fictional characters are often those who screw up occasionally, and especially those who aren’t afraid to poke a little fun at themselves. Imperfect characters are more believable because we can identify with them—all of us are klutzes from time to time. As for self-deprecation, I’d be willing to bet that some of the people you like the most in real life are probably those who can easily laugh at themselves. The same is true of characters you read about.

As for “writing what you know,” I feel especially qualified to write about folks who goof up now and then. Consider this regrettable but true episode from my own past:

My college roommate and I (did I mention Dumb & Dumber?) often double-dated because I was poor and car-less. On one occasion I had somehow secured a first date with a particularly stunning coed, and the four of us—my roomie and I and our dates—had gone to see a movie (Bonnie and Clyde) in downtown Starkville, Mississippi. The girls were waiting nearby while he and I stood in the incredibly long line to buy tickets to the feature. (Two of the things I remember most about that occasion are my secret desire to impress my date that night and my roommate’s grudging comment that she was one of the best-looking women he’d ever seen in his life, including his own girlfriend.)

After about twenty minutes he and I finally made it to the front of the line, bought our tickets, and rejoined the girls just outside the theatre door. That was when my date looked down at my hand and said, “Which one of us is going in?”

I stared at her, wondering what she meant, until I looked down too. In my hand was one ticket. Not two tickets. One. I’d been going to the movies alone or with one of my buddies at least a couple of times a week, so I was accustomed to buying only one ticket, and since my mind had been focused on other matters that’s what I’d done this time too.

All these years later, I still can’t think of anything intelligent I could’ve said at that point. What I did was say nothing at all. I just gave her her ticket and turned and trudged back over to stand in line again. My loyal roommate of course called out, “We’ll save you a seat,” and the three of them happily entered the theatre. I think I finally made it inside at about the same time that B & C were rudely ambushed and machine-gunned at the end of the movie. (Okay, not really—but I was pretty darn late. At least I didn’t have to spring for popcorn and Cokes.)

I can’t even describe how stupid I felt that night (and I deserved it, for being careless as well as car-less). But I also feel that I can describe it when a similar situation happens to one of my characters. This was one of those terrible and unforgettable events in life that I think probably made me a better writer, so some good came out of it. On the other hand, I never saw my date again after that night—even from a distance.

I can think of a lot of examples of klutzy behavior in fiction: Stephanie Plum managing to wreck or blow up every car she owns; John Dunbar bashing his forehead on the doorframe as he rushes out to see who’s dancing with wolves; big-city cop John Book trying to milk an Amish cow; Vincent Vega accidentally shooting a guy in the back seat of their car; the lawyer in Body Heat making a suggestive remark as he approaches a lady he thought was someone else; Derek Flint squawking and honking instructions to his pet dolphins; Ben Braddock trying to explain his absence of luggage to the hotel desk clerk when he books a room for him and Mrs. Robinson; Butch Cassidy forgetting his newly-learned Spanish words during a Bolivian bank robbery.

In all the cases mentioned above, we can relate to the people who did these foolish and/or clumsy things, and we somehow like them more because of it. (Even if they’re hired killers.) Their mistakes and discomfort and goofiness make them more familiar, more human. And just as we in real life prefer to hang around with—and do business with—people we like, we as readers will also hang in there with a story about people we like. We want our fictional protagonists to succeed and be happy, and when they do and are, we’re happy too.