Beautiful People: Gwendolyn Copperstone

A few months back I found Beautiful People, a blog meme for writers to get to know their characters better.  With NaNoWriMo coming up in a month and a half, I thought I'd start getting to know my main-character-to-be a bit better.

Some of you may recognize Gwen's name, since Gwendolyn Copperstone is my NaNoWriMo username and the name I comment under for WordPress blogs.  Gwendolyn Copperstone started out as my dream pseudonym, then I used it for NaNo, and she somehow evolved into a character that lives in Spryll, a fantasy world I made up a few years ago, but never did anything with.  Go figure.

Here's a blurb for Gwen's story, so the answers below will make more sense:
When Gwendolyn Copperstone, a young herbalist in the land of Spryll, suddenly inherits her uncle's insolvent manor, she finds herself flung into a world of deceit and danger. Her uncle had secrets, and someone will do everything they can to make sure Gwen doesn't find out what they were.

That's not really all there is to it, but it will serve for the purpose of this post.

There's usually a new set of Beautiful People questions each month, but the hosts are taking a break, so I'm just going to start at the beginning of their archive and play around for the next little bit.  This set of questions is from March 2011.

What is her full name?  Gwendolyn Owena Copperstone

Does her name have a special meaning?  Not really.  Her middle name means "born to nobility; young warrior" in Welsh, and that kind of fits with her story, so that's why I gave it to her.

Does your character have a methodical or disorganized personality? Methodical. 

Does she think inside herself more than she talks out loud to her friends? (more importantly, does she actually have friends?)  I'd say it's about equal.  Gwen has some very close friends that she talks to, but she also spends a lot of time to herself in her garden.

Is there something she's afraid of?  Hmm, this is not something I'd considered yet. Let me think.   She's afraid of accidentally poisoning someone, and failing to save the Manor. Also thunder and lightning, I think.

Does she write, dream, dance, sing, or photograph? Dream, yes.  The others, no.  Unless you count writing letters.

What is her favorite book? (or genre of books) Ooh, another one I hadn't thought of yet. Somehow I forgot to include books in Spryll.  Huh.  Well, her favorite book would probably be her favorite plant and/or flower book. Maybe a book on herbal medicine. 

Who is her favorite author and/or someone that inspires her? Hmm.  Not any of the characters I've invented thus far.  I will think about this.


Favorite flavor of ice cream? There is no ice cream in Spryll.  I'll have to come up with a Spryllian alternative.

Favorite season of the year?  Spring.  Spring is when her garden comes back to life after the winter cold.


That was fun!  I'll be doing more of these.  Kirk Out.