The basic premise for the series is that Max is a former professor in Michigan (somewhere) who loses his job and moves with his wife to North Carolina, where he gets a job researching things for a bad guy named Hall. Soon Max discovers his office is haunted by the ghost of a detective from the 40s named Drummond. So, OK, we have a normal guy and his ghost sidekick.
But then about midway through the first book Max's wife Sandra reveals she can see ghosts. Not just Drummond but all ghosts like the kid in The Sixth Sense. At that point it's like, "Wait, wait, wait, why the fuck have we spent all this time with ordinary, boring Max when his wife literally has a superpower?" She can communicate with (and even punch) ghosts while Max can...read books at the library?
It really makes me wonder why this isn't the Sandra Porter series because obviously Sandra is a lot more interesting than Max. I mean, really, she sees dead people! While he's just some ordinary schlub. It just bugs me that we're not focusing on the right character.
I mean, it'd be like if when I wrote the Scarlet Knight series instead of focusing on Emma, the superhero, or the witches or Marlin the ghost I focused the series on Becky, an ordinary person with no superpowers or anything. It wouldn't make sense.
Not to say that can't sometimes be interesting like comics focusing on Lois Lane or Astro City or Common Grounds with issues focusing on ordinary people dealing with the issues superheroes create.
A way for this to work is if the boring guy is the one who actually does all the work solving the crimes and the superpowered people just get all the credit.
But usually you want to focus your story on the most interesting characters. It's the old idea: lead with strength. In this case, lead with your most interesting characters. If you have a character who's a ghost or has superpowers, focus on them over some ordinary guy.
That seems like common sense to me, but what do I know?
1 comment:
Not having read this, but Max could've been interesting without a special power like you said. However, I suspect he wasn't. I once read a book where the viewpoint character was not the main character, but the focus was on the main characters. It turned out to be a good read.
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