Have you written a story and during the rewrite another character has hijacked the main character? Wanted his or her day in the sun?
This has happened many times to me. One book that comes to mind is Alina Eternal.
Alina started out as having eternal life, she had lived for a century and was always one step ahead of those wishing to find out her youthful secret. Her crime, not aging, ever.
Her clever disguise leads her to Jay, a desk clerk who was only written in to add a bit of entertainment while she was disguised as a man. Nothing more. Ricco was written in to be a love interest nothing more.
And yet both characters became entangled in her near capture and escape from a detective who just wouldn’t give up and leave her alone.
Alina’s voice was drowned out by both Jay and Ricco and in the first few rewrites, Ricco became power-hungry and Alina started to take a back seat.
Ricco was too strong, too cocky and although I tried to get Alina to step up to the plate and charm him into submission, it was Jay who tamed the manly beast and sorted him out.
And although the tale is all about Alina, by the final rewrite it was a toss-up who won second place. Nether men wanted to give up the number one position.
I invite you to read it and you decide. Seriously, I had no say in this book. The three characters took me on an adventure I enjoyed the hell out of and don’t regret for one second giving them the keyboard to write their own destinies.
As the author, I did give them life so I can take credit for that!