Peaches Pengelly - Super Hero

Having finished one children’s manuscript it is now time to plan another. For Toby Farrier I used a bus to get my story started. In this case I’ll use the food court of a shopping centre. I’ll pretend to conduct interviews with likely characters and cast them into the plot.

This story will be a crime mystery and the protagonist I need is a girl who is about fourteen. I am working on a few names but I like, Peaches Pengelly. Frumpy in her appearance and shy, even with the people she knows. Peaches is invisible. She is awkward around boys. Now I need a title, and a plot.

I read Elizabeth George’s book about writing recently and became captured by the method she uses to develop her characters. Subscribing to often quoted phrase that character builds plot, I will construct a setting in which I meet and interview Peaches for the role.

I like my character’s name now having typed and said it aloud a few times, so stay tuned as I develop her story. I am not big into fantasy or historical sagas, so in the planning stage the story will be contemporary and set in an industrial city ravaged by crime.

The things I need in the plot:

·         A crime/murder/kidnapping or all of them that only Peaches can solve.

·         A sidekick every hero needs a sidekick and this one should be reluctant. Possibly a boy with issues.

·         An arch enemy or apocalyptic event. Either will work for me.

·         Her superpowers come from her ability to think and problem solve.

Well there is a start.

I will begin my character interviews in the food court of a shopping centre near you soon.