Hiding, Finding Easter Eggs by Andy Scheer

Readers in the know will smile.

Last week I found an Easter egg. Not the type that gets hidden in the spring, but the kind some authors place in books.

In Death on a Vineyard Beach, Philip R. Craig needed a detective on Cape Cod. So on page 72, he writes the client had hired “a man named Aristotle Socarides.”

For most readers, that’s just another name. But for those in the know, “Soc” is the protagonist of a Cape Cod detective series by fellow New Englander Paul Kemprecos.

In the course of a novel, you need many supporting characters. So why not include some people you know?

When he was learning the craft, now-bestselling author Steve Berry met regularly with a writers group. Two of its members were Nancy Pridgen and Daiva Woodworth. In Steve’s second published novel, The Romanov Prophecy, his protagonist works for an international law firm: Pridgen & Woodworth.

For years, thriller writer Jack Du Brul has known book collector Wayne Valero. When Jack needed a name in Corsair for an Undersecretary of State for Mideast Affairs, the assignment went to Wayne’s wife, Cristie. Though Wayne knows all the co-writers for thriller grandmaster, Clive Cussler, he’s still waiting to find his own name in a novel.

That could be a good thing. There’s a well-known quote attributed to Mary Higgins Clark: “When someone is mean to me, I just make them a victim in my next book.”

The prize for the most-included name may go to Leigh Hunt. In a dozen or more of his Dirk Pitt novels, Cussler included his friend—often as a character who got killed in the prologue.

Or you could even include yourself in your own books, much the way Alfred Hitchock gave himself cameos in many of his movies. If you want a precedent for this, look again to Clive Cussler.

I was typing a description of Pitt and a classic car he was exhibiting at a concours meet. In the scene, he walks over and extends his hand to the old white-haired, bearded man who was exhibiting the car next to him. I wrote, “Hello, my name is Dirk Pitt.” The old fellow shook his hand and said, “I’m Clive Cussler.”

I immediately thought, Why did I do that? I meant to change the name, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed fun to leave it in. ... Now readers wait for me to show up.

You might not want to go that far, but your novel does have room for quite a few names. As long as you don’t defame someone, why not?

Pay Heed to Your Neighbors by Andy Scheer

Need inspiration for a character for your novel, short story, or even a comic strip? Pay attention to your neighbors.

That what a young cartoonist named Sparky did.

While living for a time in Colorado Springs, Sparky was developing his new strip and trying to build its audience. In the evenings, he'd play bridge with a neighbor couple. Sparky and Philip Van Pelt had served together in the 20th Armored Division. Recently they'd been surprised to meet in the stairway of the office building where they both worked.

“We grew up a few blocks away and they would play bridge all the time,” said Philip Van Pelt's daughter Martha in an article in the Colorado Springs Gazette. “During that time, when they were all playing bridge, he was developing the characters.”

Philip Van Pelt's wife was named Louanne. In 1952, Sparky Schultz introduced to his strip a new character named Lucy Van Pelt.

“Mom always said ... she was much nicer than [Lucy],” Martha said. “She was a loving mother, but she was very bossy. She even looked a little like her [Lucy], if you look at some of her old pictures, with dark wavy hair.”

“[Lucy] really does reflect a lot of her character,” said Louanne Van Pelt's son David Merrill. “What he did with her, a lot of it was accurate. But he was pulling out the eccentric moments instead of the normal moments.”

Schultz lived near the Van Pelts for only about a year before moving to California—and to fame and fortune with his comic strip “Peanuts.” But he continued to stay in touch with the Van Pelts,

Louanne Van Pelt died April 6 in Colorado Springs at age 85. An article in the Gazette said she left behind “three children, a 'passel of grandchildren' and an enduring, if somewhat ill-tempered, comic legacy.”

Detergents and Character Lists by Andy Scheer

Those were the first two topics in the “Hints from Heloise” column that appeared a week ago in my morning newspaper.

I scanned the first, about whether you can use new “HE” (high efficiency) detergent in older top-loaders. Turns out you can—but you shouldn't put old-style detergent in the high efficiency front-loaders. Standard stuff for Heloise.

But the next item wasn't. “A.M. in Ohio” wrote this:

Dear Heloise: I read a lot. I list the characters and their reason for being there as they are introduced. This way, it's easier to keep track of them as they reappear. It works for me.

I can't imagine such a scenario. (Granted, I can't imagine following most hints people send to Heloise.) But are books really published with such generic characters that a reader needs to keep a scorecard?

For years in the Thick-Skinned Manuscript Clinics at the Writing for the Soul conference, Jerry B. Jenkins has advised novelists not to give two major characters a name that begins with the same letter.

An upcoming Writer's Digest book on fiction I just finished editing advises that each line of dialogue should be character-specific. Meaning that if you tried to put one character's words into another's mouth, it would sound out of character. As a test, she suggests this:

Compose a line of dialogue for each POV character in your story. Use language only that viewpoint character would say—but no speaker tags. Show your work to someone who knows your story to see if she can identify who is speaking.

Yes, this writer suggests making a character chart like A.M. suggests, but only to help you plan the story—and to see if you can streamline the cast by combining several character's roles into one.

Maybe if more writers followed that advice, A.M. in Ohio could have more time for charting detergents.