My heroine’s confidante - and more

Juliette needs a confidante, of course. I’ve mentioned her in my outline of Juliette’s character. Here’s a little more about her:

Bronwyn
I already like Bronwyn although I hardly know her. She’s in her early twenties. She’s plump and greedy and more or less manless (although I know that in referring to her during my exploration of Juliette’s character I gave her a boring boyfriend – but I think that I have stumbled upon a more interesting arc for her: perhaps she could, over the course of the story, relieve Juliette of the burden of her oh-so-bothersome ex, Rob Whelan). She works as a librarian in a newspaper. She is quite judgemental, and too often for comfort hits the nail on the head with her inituitive inductions. She shares the flat with Juliette, loves The Parks with perhaps even more passion than Juliette does, and feels that Juliette’s taking a job on the production might spoil their mutual appreciation of the soap.

The “baddy” of my story is the sexual predator, Jonathan Nesbit. He tempts Juliette to apply for the part of Blair in the soap. His object is to get into her pants although, as executive producer of The Parks, he would not lightly recommend someone to play a major part who was talentless.

It’s also important that he be sufficiently attractive to act as a real red-herring. My readers must not instantly identify him as the nasty piece of work he ultimately turns out to be. They must believe that Juliette could quite legitimately fall for him and his wiles. If he were too obviously a cad, she would come off as a fool in the eyes of my readers. So I will try to make him funny and smooth, sophisticated and well-travelled.

Jonathan Nesbit
The 37ish producer of The Parks. Twice married, to women significantly younger than himself – and he now takes pleasure in escorting women in their young twenties – or even teens – to the sorts of media dos that a prominent television producer is frequently invited to.

He is a muddled man who conceals his lack of heart or soul – and a core of fear that all these good things could come to an abrupt end – beneath and behind a mask of sophisticated cynicism. His view, frequently aired, of the show’s faithful audience, is that it is sentimental, slow witted and lacking in sophistication.

He lives in a sumptuous (well, fairly) apartment in Hyde Park, furnished in black and white. He has a picture of a horse that, as a boy, his father forced him to shoot when it broke a leg.

He drives a cheesy sports car of some description that keeps breaking down.