Quirky characters...and fun facts

Most authors love to get great feedback about their books. There’s something so special about being told that the careful crafting and hours of creation have meant something to another person – especially when you consider that everything between the front cover and the back cover is completely fictitious.
 
I’ve had plenty of people tell me how much they’ve enjoyed my stories. Some ask when my next book is coming out (watch this space!) and can’t wait to read another. But most of all, people tell me about how much they enjoy the characters I’ve created and love how real they feel.
 
Just recently I received some feedback from a reader who had enjoyed my story, The Journey. She said she particularly liked the character of Cedric Olliver. If you haven’t read The Journey, it’s a story about a group of people who get together for a two-week walking tour through New Zealand wine country. The group walk during the day, and in the evening stay at some fabulous properties along the way, and are fed great food and get to taste great wine. And plenty of eventful things happen on the way.
 
I’ve got a real fondness for Cedric. He’s a real outsider on the trip, socially inept and unsure of himself. About the only thing he is sure of is his knowledge of useless facts. Cedric seems to have a photographic memory for trivia and uses what he knows in as many conversations as he can. As main character Lindsay observes, “The way in which Cedric managed to interweave all these relatively useless pieces of information could very well be some sort of undiscovered art form.”
 
In fact, during the course of the novel, Cedric trots out fifty pieces of trivia. In order to manage this from a writing point of view, I assembled a list of trivia and then, every time Cedric was in a scene, I’d get out my list and try to incorporate one of those facts into the story. Here are just a few of fun facts I managed to use:
 
Did you know that the electric chair was invented by a dentist?
 
Did you know that each year insects eat one third of the world’s food crop?
 
Did you know that an ant can lift fifty times its own weight and can pull thirty times its own weight?
 
If you want to read more about Cedric and his fun facts, check out The Journey. And perhaps you have your own fun fact to share. Just let me know. I so appreciate hearing from my readers.
 
Best wishes

Keitha