The second most important character

Welcome back to another blog hop, with #OpenBook. Here’s this week’s prompt.

Don’t forget to click the purple button to see what everyone else has to say on this week’s subject. It’s at the end of my post.

Do you have a favourite secondary character in your books? Or a favourite sub-plot?

My favourite secondary character has to be Cy. He’s Andorra Pett’s trusty sidekick in so many of her adventures. And he’s gay.

I wanted to write a sympathetic and believable gay male character, based on the many fine gay people that it’s been my privilege to know and work with. Because they’re just people. It was important to me that he wasn’t portrayed as the bad guy, or as being eaten up with neuroses, or even with the stereotypical traits beloved of the media, as is often the case. Cy is just an ordinary man, doing his best, coping with prejudice by showing that he could rise above it.

Cy is Andorra’s biggest supporter, a best friend in every sense of the word. If he wasn’t the way he was, they would have made a great couple and they both know it. As it is, the fact that they will never be more than friends has taken the pressure off their relationship.

That being said, they act like an old married couple anyway, bickering and blundering about in their efforts to solve crime and keep each other alive. Their banter is a joy to write, neither one takes prisoners or holds back, exchanges are always frank and open, usually with a fair dash of sardonic humour.

Yet above it all, they complement each other and between them, they make a great team. When Andorra finds herself alone, in Andorra Pett and her Sister, and in Andorra Pett takes a Break, she needs to get another sidekick to bounce ideas off and do a lot of the confirming deduction. This is not to say that she’s incapable of doing it herself, just that she’s not used to having to.

Cy feels this loss of partnership too. In a way, he’s jealous of Andorra having adventures without him, even though he mutters about never having a quiet life when he’s actually involved in one. Even though he may be distant and uninvolved, he always has plenty of advice to offer, especially with the benefit of perfect hindsight.

He gets his chance to be part of the team again in the story I’m writing at the moment, Andorra Pett and the Luna Mining Conspiracy. We’ll have to see how he copes, at the moment, he’s just about holding his own.

And I’m also toying with the idea of him having an adventure all of his own, just to see how he manages without Andorra when there’s dirty work afoot. I’m pretty sure that he’s more than capable of looking after himself,

Until next time.

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