Character Questionnaire.

[MAYOR HECTOR "HADES" TORMEI]

From Creative-Writing-Now.com. You can use this for your current characters or to help you develop new characters for this site or for other projects.

1. Name:

2. Age:

3. General physical description:

4. Hometown:

5. Type of home/ neighborhood:

6. Relationship status:

7. Current family:

8. Family background (parents, previous marriages, etc.):

9. Friends:

10. Other close relationships:

11. Relationship with men:

12. Relationship with women:

13. Job:

14. Dress style:

15. Religion:

16. Attitude to religion:

17. Favorite pastimes:

18. Hobbies:

19. Favorite sports:

20. Favorite foods:

21. Strongest positive personality trait:

22. Strongest negative personality trait:

23. Sense of humor:

24. Temper:

25. Consideration for others:

26. How other people see him/her:

27. Opinion of him/herself:

28. Other traits, especially those to be brought out in story:

29. Ambitions:

30. Philosophy of life:

31. Most important thing to know about this character:

32. Will readers like or dislike this character, and why?

[MAYOR HECTOR "HADES" TORMEI]

Additional questions you could consider (from the same source)

1. If your character has a job, is he or she good at it? Does he or she like it?

2. What are your character's bad habits?

3. If you asked about his or her greatest dream, what would your character tell you?

4. What's a secret dream that he or she wouldn't tell you about?

5. What kind of person does your character wish he or she could be? What is stopping him or her?

6. What is your character afraid of? What keeps him or her up at night?

7. What does your character think is his or her worst quality?

8. What do other people think your character's worst quality is?

9. What is a talent your character thinks he or she has but is very wrong about?

10. What did his or her childhood home look like?

11. Who was his or her first love?

12. What's the most terrible thing that ever happened to him/her?

13. What was his/her dream growing up? Did he/she achieve this dream? If so, in what ways was it not what the character expected? If your character never achieved the dream, why not?

14. In what situation would your character become violent?

15. In what situation would your character act heroic?

[ERIK DANIEL LENOIR]

1. Name: Erik Daniel Lenoir, known mostly as Danny, sometimes Daniel

2. Age: 45

3. General physical description:
Height: 5'10"
Eyes: Hazel
Hair: Reddish blond and curly
General Description: Hides facial distortion and missing nose behind a prosthetic nose and skin. Is nice looking wearing the prosthetics. Has long slender graceful hands and narrow shoulders. Moves gracefully most of the time unless in one of his psychological episodes. Has an engaging and sincere smile.

4. Hometown: Born in London, England; now makes his home in New York City.

5. Type of home/ neighborhood: Lives on the top floor of a 25 storey high rise condominium. His penthouse occupies the whole of the 25th storey. The condo is situated in Manhattan and has an amazing view of the whole city and out onto the Atlantic.

6. Relationship status: Single, never married.

7. Current family: Parents still alive and residing in London. He visits them usually once a year.

8. Family background (parents, previous marriages, etc.): Is the great-grandson of the original Erik who was thought to be a phantom haunting the Palais Garnier in Paris in the 1880's. Found to actually be a man and not a spectre, this personage was written about by Gaston Leroux in his famous book, Le Fantôme de l'Opéra. Danny's father and grandfather did not inherit the deformed face, but unfortunately Danny did and looks remarkably like his great grandfather except that his eyes are both one colour and his lips are normal.

Danny has never been married, in fact has not dated much. His previous dating experiences were not good and generally lasted only a month or two. His odd behavior is to blame for that.

9. Friends: None really, save perhaps his employee Bernice "Bunny" Jones who treats him like a son. She does the cleaning/cooking/shopping for Danny.

10. Other close relationships: None at the present time.

11. Relationship with men: None. Hopefully he will make some friendships soon. He is working on it.

12. Relationship with women: He has started relationships with a couple ladies. So far, not much has happened. He is still trying.

13. Job: Works for the prestigious firm of Feinstein and Fitzgerald, an architectural firm, as a consultant. Runs his own small business as a webmaster, computer analyst and consultant, systems analysis etc. He also writes computer games just for the heck of it. His real love is music. He sings, plays several instruments and writes music in the classical style. Unknown to anyone else, he also has a darker side, wherein he quietly steals money from financial institutions by hacking into their computers.

14. Dress style: Casual, most of the time. Open neck shirt, dark trousers. Will add a tie and suitcoat when working at the firm. At home, he may wear sweats or jeans. His clothing is always clean and never ripped.

15. Religion: Was brought up Roman Catholic.

16. Attitude to religion: Does not go to church most of the time. Believes in God and in the Bible. Knows he strays far from the Ten Commandments and does feel somewhat guilty about that. But puts it out of his mind. Hopes for God's mercy.

17. Favorite pastimes: Walking about Manhattan after dark. Frequents Central Park.

18. Hobbies: Music, art, computers.

19. Favorite sports: Will watch an English football (soccer) match on the telly when he can find one. Likes American baseball moderately. Would love to get a sailboat and go sailing as he did with his parents in England. But he has never gotten to that. He spends large amounts of time alone in his penthouse and inside his own mind.

20. Favorite foods: Will eat most anything. Mrs. Jones tries to keep him eating healthy with the things she cooks for him, but he sometimes forgets to eat at all.

21. Strongest positive personality trait (s): He is quite charming, kind and sincere.

22. Strongest negative personality trait: Obsessive Compulsiveness.

23. Sense of humor: Definitely has one. Will occasionally pull pranks on other people. Of course the others may not find it so funny.

24. Temper: Has a bad temper and can get quite angry, but it usually builds. It has something to do with his mental state and his different perception of reality when his mental state goes wrong.

25. Consideration for others: Generally tries to be considerate of others, although because he is so into himself, that his perceptions of what is considerate and what he thinks is considerate could be quite different.

26. How other people see him/her: At first glance he is quite normal. But as someone gets to know him, they can see that he is not quite right. He is very intelligent which is obvious, but he can't handle stress and can go to pieces if stressed too much. His obsessions look frightening to other people, especially the women he sets his gaze upon.

27. Opinion of him/herself: Very high opinion. Danny is a genius in many areas and he knows it. He is a bit put off when others don't agree with that. Then there are the times when he is very unsure of himself, when he becomes more mentally unstable.

28. Other traits, especially those to be brought out in story: Definitely his strange compulsions and obsessions and his changing mental states, depending on the situation. When he is stressed too much, who knows what could happen? His manic states will be brought out, I am sure.

29. Ambitions: To marry a beautiful loving woman and have a fairytale life ever after.

30. Philosophy of life: He believes life to be difficult.

31. Most important thing to know about this character: Danny is basically a good person. The criminal activities he has engaged in are white collar crime and he does it because he feels a compulsion to do it...and because he can. He also hates authority of any kind. He doesn't seem to see his criminal activities as very wrong. He normally only steals money from banks and large institutions. He is kind and generous and would never hurt anyone unless by accident.

32. Will readers like or dislike this character, and why?
I don't really know. I hope they like Danny. He is fascinating, I think and has a strange, unpredictable personality.

ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

1. If your character has a job, is he or she good at it? Does he or she like it? Yes, Danny is very good at whatever he attempts. the only thing that makes him sweat a bit is when he has to give presentations of his designs in front of small groups at the architectural firm. That is somewhat stressful, but if it 's a small group, he has learned to deal with it.

2. What are your character's bad habits? Danny is somewhat lazy and doesn't pick up after himself, nor will he do his laundry, cooking, cleaning or shopping. He has hired Mrs Jones to do this for him. If left to his own devices, he might do some of this, but his mental state keeps him from having regular hours or times for doing anything. He also lets himself become obsessed and will leave everything to feed on his obsession. This could be an obsession with a particular lady or a creative venture that he will not put down until finished.

3. If you asked about his or her greatest dream, what would your character tell you? He believes if he finds a woman to love him, they will have a fairytale life and the world will be wonderful.

4. What's a secret dream that he or she wouldn't tell you about? He hasn't told me yet.

5. What kind of person does your character wish he or she could be? What is stopping him or her? Sometimes, when he is of normal mental status and is able to think clearly, he wishes that he could be completely normal like everyone else. Taking his medication regularly and on time would help with this problem, but unfortunately, would not alleviate it completely.

6. What is your character afraid of? What keeps him or her up at night? Danny is afraid of anyone finding out about his deformed face, although he really has not much to worry about with that. He also is very afraid that someone will find out that he was in a mental institution in England for some years. It doesn't keep him up at night, though.

7. What does your character think is his or her worst quality? He hates it when he gets nervous and shaky at some stressful moment. He thinks it makes him look ignorant and unworthy.

8. What do other people think your character's worst quality is? His obsessiveness. When he dates a woman, he tends to take over her life.

9. What is a talent your character thinks he or she has but is very wrong about? He thinks he has a way with women.

10. What did his or her childhood home look like? Having lived in London in an expensive apartment when Danny was young, when he was about ten years old, they moved to the outskirts of the city, in an almost rural area. They lived in a comfortable two storey house, quite large, but very cosy. The home had beautiful gardens tended by Danny's mother and it was a solitary and lovely place to grow up. Unfortunately, the small school he was sent to was not kind to Danny.

11. Who was his or her first love? He hasn't told me about that yet. I expect someone in school while in England. But at that time he had no prosthetics on his face, so undoubtedly all the girls thought he was a horror.

12. What's the most terrible thing that ever happened to him/her? Being put into a mental institution. It was humiliating and he was treated badly. His parents had hoped that he would be given therapy to help his mental state, instead, neglected and tossed in with all the others with various mental aberrations, Danny simply became worse.

13. What was his/her dream growing up? Did he/she achieve this dream? If so, in what ways was it not what the character expected? If your character never achieved the dream, why not? Danny always wanted to be normal and accepted by everyone. To be just the same as everyone else. He has partially achieved his dream, for he looks normal now, but since he doesn't really act normal, he has not really achieved his dream.

14. In what situation would your character become violent? Danny is not prone to violence, except when in a deep state of mental disturbance. Then, if he got hold of any type of weapon, he could hurt someone.

15. In what situation would your character act heroic? If a girl were in danger, he would most likely try to save her. He would save a child or even a man whose life was in danger.
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