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I know I already said this, but it feels like a public announcement kinda thing. Happy Birthday @Tcr!!!

So, let’s not pretend this is me having an epiphany… This is me procrastinating with a good question… lol. So, as I come to the end to one of the many stories I have here… The major climax that leads to the denouement and subsequent finale and goodbye is becoming a pain in the ass to write. I’ve been finding myself having trouble writing some deaths of characters that are both minor and major characters in the tale and have, hopefully, been good enough to warrant someone actually cheering for survival… It’s problematic… on every level. So, my question, since I’m going to make a wild assumption that everyone grows attached to their characters (...we’re writers, I’m pretty sure we all do this… Even Bob...)… How do you all murder your characters? Do you struggle with it? Prefer it quick and simple as the end grows near or do you prefer long, drawn out deaths? Do you find yourselves procrastinating? Or is just an easy decision, like putting toast in the toaster?

I’ve killed off characters often, despite how attached I get to them. It’s often literally painful for me, but if it’s necessary for the story, I’m ruthless about it. I take Stephen King’s advice: “kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.” (Which is, of course, Mr. King quoting William Faulkner: “In writing, you must kill all your darlings” who was in turn quoting Arthur Quiller-Couch: “If you here require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: ‘Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it—whole-heartedly—and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings.” Sort of a stretch to interpret that as killing off one’s characters, but there we are. )

@CloverReefI think I remember that scene, you were in the zone at that time. You were all like “I’m starting it” and then it was like “I’m done it!” I was like… Damn, that tornado blew through pretty fast. And I definitely agree with the attachment to the characters. I have grown attached to mine (even if I’m unsure anyone else has) and, beyond any measure of doubt, it makes it really hard with this scene. Because I kind of don’t want to, but it also has to be done for various storytelling points and because I set it up throughout the last few chapters with that intention. And it’s a really painful time to write (even if she isn’t an MC...) But I wholeheartedly agree with that idea of high emotions and tensions. In the one I referenced for me, it’s a scene that, in the last moments of the character, truly defines them, which makes it a highly emotional and highly important moment for said character. I guess I’m always worried that those are the scenes that are going to fail badly in getting the point and the emotion across. If that makes sense. Because if it’s just another character death, then it’s a ‘meh’ sort of reaction. (Which doesn’t intend to sound as bad as it probably does...) @Desiderius PriceAll my characters I grow attached to. Although I don’t entirely think that I’ve used this one as much as I probably could have. She’s become more of a background character with higher importance (...does that make sense? It makes sense to me...). But the manner of death here is just… Heroically emotionally painful… So I’m procrastinating writing it. lol.

I grow very attached to my characters, in the sense that, even when I get detached from a story and decide to drop it, the characters haunt me for months, sometimes years to come. As we speak, Blackbird is fucking taunting me. But even though I’m so attached to them, oddly enough, I don’t have any problem killing them off. If I got it planned right, like it comes at a pivotal moment and accomplishes something important, I get excited about it. High emotions, high tensions, those are some of the easiest scenes for me to write. When I killed off a main char in Blackbird, that scene took me an hour when most of the scenes in that damn story took me weeks, sometimes months. How I kill them off varies. I like to make it dramatic and bloody, but I tend to favour what’s best for the pace of the story. I’ll only really do an off-screen death if it needs to be a mystery to the reader… or if the character and their death isn’t all that important.

Lets give Bob a red shirt, see what happens More seriously, it depends on the character. If I’ve grown attached, I will typically procrastinate in the story, making sure they’ve had a good time, before I do the deed. Method, the method, unfortunately, more depends on what I’m trying to achieve, and i generally go for simple methods too. (Shove in front a train is about the most complicated I’ll do; gunshots are relatively humane.) There was one character I took out last year, and the location was a nice suggestion from @DirtyAngel. In my current series, I tend not to depict on-screen deaths too often, I will but not often, instead typically making it out-of-sight, so it’s more of, ‘look, there’s a body!’ And while committing the deed, I’ll adjust the soundtrack on my computer, typically more sad/sorrow that helps me put me into that right frame of mind to follow through with it. My $0.02 worth.