Yummy heroes

I’m getting ready to start a new book, and that means I have to come up with a great hunk for the hero. Oh, what a problem to have. Creating a wonderful hero is so much fun. Where do you begin?

Actually that is a very good question. I would love to hear from writers on where do you begin when you are developing a new hero for your book. I know that some people look for a picture that will inspire them. I did that (see the photos). I wonder if there is a computer program you could make a composite of several of these photos and put them together to form a new hunk. Of course, it’s hard to go wrong with Hugh Jackman. I found a picture in a magazine of Jon Hamm that was great. I couldn’t find it on the Internet, but I have the hard copy and will be using it for inspiration on one of my heroes. I’m a visual person so I like to look at a picture so that when I have to describe him I’ve got something in front of me. Does anyone have a favorite site to go to for good photos of likely heroes?

But the picture isn’t everything. We still have to come up with a yummy physical description and a heroic character. Sometimes an occupation will be a big part of our character we create. Other times, it won’t play much into our hero’s character sketch. In my Heart of the Amazon, I used the premise from several movies to motivate me when forming my hero. I described that book as the African Queen meets Romancing the Stone. My hero’s character (and for that matter, my heroine) was a mix from those two movies.

But ultimately that fantasy man comes straight from my mind. And coming up with my hero is definitely the fun part of writing.

So what do you like as a reader in a hero?