Tag Archives: Working biography

Working Biography for “Benefits” Character Karen Kling

National Librarians Day is coming up on April 16. This is a perfect time to highlight the working biography I wrote for “Benefits” character Karen Kling (since she is a librarian), who is main character Ben Schmidt’s best friend.

Working Biography Purpose

This is another in the series of working biographies I’ve posted for characters in my novel “Benefits“. She is not an original character for “Benefits”; she had a huge role in the predecessor book “Benediction.”

As with so many of the working biographies for fictional characters, I used this sketch to draw from but did not use all of it. Additionally, I invented other aspects of character not in the working biography at all. So it’s best thought of as resource and starting point.

Karen is very loosely based on someone in my real life, not a librarian but a (now retired) teacher. This is the working bio I concocted for her prior to writing “Benediction”:

Karen Kling Working Biography

Karen (Ben’s producer and confidante):

She wants the movie Hell for the Holidays to be a success, and a springboard for her to go on to other projects, with or without Ben, She wants to assist Ben as he’s going through Cancerworld, She wants to find out if her husband (Dennis) is having an affair, and if so, who with.
She has an off-again, on-again weight problem, yo-yo.
She’s 46, blond, blue eyes. SHE’S 55 IN THE SEQUEL.
She would shop at Macy’s, but not Nordstrom.
Her day job is as a librarian for the SF Main Branch public library.
Her desire is to become a movie producer. She caught the bug going to the Castro Theater for years.
Married to Dennis Carstens, who is chasing the dot-com boom in SF, and has made some good money at it. Karen drives a new Mini-Cooper that was paid for by this.
IN THE SEQUEL, KAREN HAS GOTTEN RID OF THE MINI AND HAS A TOP OF THE LINE PRIUS, BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE RICH PEOPLE IN SF DRIVE. SINCE BEN AND JAKE HAVE A BLACK ONE, KAREN’S IS RED.
She suspects that Dennis is having an affair (he is) and she’s really curious about finding out the source of this affair.
Karen’s a San Francisco native, that rare bird. Oddly, she’s not what you would expect, some “granola” girl with extreme leftist tendencies. She’s surprising “normal.”
She loves Ben because he brings things to her life that she would never normally experience.
She’s also extremely nurturing, helping, and can very much be in charge and throw her weight around when she wants to.
She doesn’t talk much about her family of origin, though they are scattered about the Bay Area. Her parents are dead, her mother was sick for a long time and that really affected her having fun as a girl. She has a younger brother, Jim, and a younger sister, Peaches (nickname for Persephone) who has two children. Karen’s somewhat jealous in that she’ll never be a mother, “but that’s the choice Dennis and I made.” That’s a lie, they married too late to have kids.

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Like I’ve done with other working biographies, here’s a few rando photos from the Internet to illustrate what was in my mind when I thought of Karen (but blond):

Anonymous Librarian
Anonymous Librarian
Librarians

“Benefits” Working Biography of Character Danny Fernandez

Here’s another in the series of working biographies I’ve posted for characters in my novel “Benefits“. This working biography is for Ben’s sidekick Danny Fernandez. He is an original character for “Benefits” in that he did not appear in the predecessor book “Benediction.”

We’ve all had coworkers we grew to be fond of and depend on in various jobs we’ve had. I don’t think I drew on specifics of any of those people for this working biography, but the spirit is there.

Danny Fernandez

“He is 29. Has Latino background, dark brown hair and eyes, 5’6”. He’s a cub, enthusiastic baby bear. Danny’s an aficionado of what remains of SOMA’s underground gay sex culture. Fetish, gear, leather etc., and does lighting and other behind-the-scenes stuff on wild porno, think Treasure Island Media. His unstated dream is that he wants to be a conventional filmmaker. He has a steady boyfriend, an older bearish guy. They live together. Ben calls the boyfriend BEAR MOUNTAIN, somewhat condescendingly or at least in a teasing manner. His real name is something innocuous, like John Ralston. Danny is also an acquaintance of Tony Ochoa; occasionally they’ve gone after the same guys.”

The working biography in this case is this short. The relationship that evolved during the course of the writing was that of a zany work duo, and probably owes as much or more to my memories of Lucy and Ethel as it does to anything in the gay world. Sisters, out to solve a harebrained scheme.

Here are a couple of images pulled from the Internet to illustrate how I conceived Danny:

Cub #1
Cub #2
Cub #3

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“Benefits” Working Biography of Glenda Bourne

Here’s another in the series of working biographies I’ve posted for characters in my novel “Benefits“. This working biography is for antagonist Glenda Bourne, who also appeared first in the novel “Benediction“.

For some reason, when writing Glenda, I had the image of Princess Diana in my head. Though I clearly state Glenda had long hair, was from South Africa, etc. I think it’s because at the time of writing her initially, I worked with a Brit who had a Diana haircut. So I offer these photos of Diana with short hair channeling Glenda Bourne:

Princess Diana with short hair
Princess Diana with short hair

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Glenda Bourne Working Biography

Glenda Bourne is Ben’s film editor, that’s the starting point of their relationship.

She wants a Baby – but, she’s a single lesbian and she doesn’t want a relationship with a man, she just wants some good sperm!

Glenda is a lesbian, 37 years old, originally from Capetown, South Africa, has lived in SF for almost 10 years. Film editor. Highly regarded in the Indie production community. Lives in small apartment in the Tenderloin, off of Ellis street (note, she moved to Haight in the sequel, to a place on Steiner.)

She’s 5-7, long brown hair, which she often keeps in a ponytail or up on top of her head. She has brown eyes, always seems to have a tan, like she’s outdoorsy, which is odd in SF. She must spend a lot of time in Marin or some other sunny place. She is fit, not fat and not skinny.

She has a lot of anger, and is not the most pleasant person to be around. But she can be persistent and even sweet when she has to, to get something she wants. She originally came to SF rather than LA or NY (more traditional centers for film editing) because of the lesbian scene. But, sadly for her, she’s been unable to really connect with one woman for any long-term thing. She’s had lots of girlfriends, but nothing has seemed to stick.

Now she has angst, because of her age, the ticking clock, and she really wants a child. She’s estranged from her family in S. Africa, perhaps there was some abuse at home growing up.

Her respect for Ben is mostly put-upon, she pretty much thinks his film Hell for the Holidays is shit. It was her ex-girlfriend CJ at Film Artists Foundation who referred Ben.

Her opinion of him has changed recently since she now sees him not as a filmmaker to deal with, but as a sperm factory she can order from.

In the sequel, “Benefits”, Glenda has a car. It’s an SUV. Older, say 1998 black Ford SUV Explorer.

Cover of Jim Arnold's "Benefits" is a street scene in Cole Valley, San Francisco, used here in blog post Glenda Bourne Working Biography.

Spunky Old Broads Day — Character Margaret Schmidt from “Benefits”

So, February 1 is Spunky Old Broads Day. Which ushers in Spunky Old Broads Month. What better occasion would there be to focus on character Margaret Schmidt from my new novel “Benefits?”

I’ve posted a number of working biographies of characters before, to show part of the writer’s process. Margaret Schmidt is no different. Like Ben, Jake, Karen and a few other characters in the book, Ben’s mom Margaret is a returnee. She first appeared in my debut novel “Benediction.”

So — I already had somewhat of a bio going for this Spunky Old Broad when I began “Benefits.” Like with the other returning characters, I added to my greater understanding of who this woman is, and so now have a revised bio. Here is the working biography of Margaret I used as a guide when writing the book:

MARGARET KANNER SCHMIDT

Sex: Female Age: 78. Height and Weight: 5-4, 130.

Skin: white, silver hair. Pale blue eyes. A German look. Even slightly Slav.

Posture: She’s an older lady, slightly stooped though she tries her best to be regal.

Appearance: She’s a very good-looking older woman, looks rich even though she is no longer: “handsome”

Defects: she has a mole “beauty mark” on her right cheek.

Heredity: German. Northern European.

Sociological:

Class: Upper middle class now, was probably more upper class when she was a child. But they’ve lost most of their money and position in the ensuing years.

Occupation: Retired Business Executive.

Education: College Degree in Business. It would be from a small and expensive liberal arts college – perhaps a traditional women’s university, east coast. Radcliffe or Bryn Mawr or Wellesley. Which she still refers to, as that is unusual for a Midwesterner.

Home Life: She lives in an old mansion overlooking Lake Michigan in Milwaukee. Race/Nationality: German.

Place in Community: Junior league, but not an avid member. More when she was younger. Plays piano, gave community recitals when younger. Dabbles now.

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Politics: Rockefeller Republican – now says she is an Independent, because the party is not the same.

Amusements, hobbies: She has a greenhouse in MKE, where, oddly, she collects cactus. She used to drive to the southwest and steal plants from the open desert, which is a crime. She’s lonely, sometimes she goes to the movies, alone, at night, and feels wicked.

Sex Life, Moral Standards: She’s straight, (or so she thinks) but she’s also a divorcee and older. So, she hasn’t had sex in years, but she did have boyfriends after the divorce. But not for a few years now. She still flirts with men, including Jake, which drives Ben insane.

Her personal premise: She wants to keep control, but feels this is slipping out of her grasp. So, controlling. And failing at it, or only partially succeeding.

Frustrations and Disappointments:

She often still feels she failed at marriage. She’s unsure as to her success as a parent, and overcompensates in the grandparent area. So even though she doesn’t really know the story with Logan, just the fact of him being around is an excuse for her to spoil this child.

Temperament: Mercurial. More often agreeable than not, but she does have her moments, particularly at the extreme ends of the day, either late night or early morning, not the best times for her.

Attitude toward life: she’s closer to the end of her life, and she doesn’t understand what she’s missed and why she still hasn’t found the “secret to life, or to happiness.”

Complexes: Afraid of spiders, is a clean freak, who might even start cleaning the home of people who are hosting here, i.e., Ben and Jake.

Abilities: Playing the piano. She likes to ride a bike and is actually good at this, for a 78-year-old woman. She can access apps on a smart phone.

Qualities: She can cook fairly decently. She’s made great progress at acceptance of Ben as gay, and of the relationship between him and Jake. She’s more and more comfortable with it.

IQ: very high.

I used a lot of the bio; a lot I did not use. (Such as her propensity with piano, and her green thumb.) There will likely be another installment of this series so Margaret will be around for more. Who knows, maybe there’s a piano recital in her future? Wouldn’t that be “spunky?”

Working Biography for Character “Logan Bourne” in “Benefits”

Even for children characters, it’s helpful to write a working biography. Here’s what I wrote for nine-year-old Logan Bourne in “Benefits:”

Logan Bourne

His name is LOGAN BOURNE. Ben or Jake joke that she named the baby after their favorite porn star.!

He’s 9 or 10 in Sequel 1. 4^th grade?

Sex: Male Age: 9. Height and Weight: LOOK UP AVERAGES FOR KIDS: 65 lbs, 53 inches high. Conceived in September, born in May or June. Gay Pride day?

Skin: white, light brown hair. Blue eyes – he got these from Ben.

Posture: Normal for a kid, he’s skinny.

Appearance: He looks like Ben would as a kid. Cute but also an every kid sort of look.

Defects: cowlick

Heredity: Half American, half South African, Dutch. Generic White Kid.

Social background:

Class: He’s part of a struggling family. But gets lots of help from Ben and Jake. Glenda doesn’t always do well with money and her income can be sporadic.

Occupation: he’s a kid in grade school. The Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy in San Francisco.

Education: see above

Home Life: Let’s say precarious. He lives in a one bedroom apt with his mother. He sleeps in the living room, in an alcove she made up just to be his room. They curtained off a bay window area, so he has a view and light. It’s a beautiful San Francisco view, not Tenderloin; let’s say she moved to The Haight. The apartment is: On Steiner Street at Waller in the Lower Haight. 210 Steiner St. Yellow building, 4 story, 1 bedroom apartment with a big bay window which is curtained off and made up as Logan’s Room, facing west.

Race/Nationality: White, Irish, German, Dutch

Place in Community: He’s a kid in school, he’s medium popular, ok at sports but not spectacular, a good student, plays video games.

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Politics: none

Amusements, hobbies: video games, is a fan of the SF teams, the Giants, the 49ers. Has some swag from those teams (a backpack).

Sex Life, Moral Standards: he’s a good kid. Likely straight. Ben is agonized that the kid shows no signs of impending queerness.

Personality Aspects:

His personal premise: he wants to “write code.” He only says that because he hears that constantly in the midst of SF’s tech boom. This horrifies Glenda, horrifies Jake. Maybe Ben thinks maybe the kid will strike it rich and support them all in their old age. It’s all undecided.

Frustration, disappointments: He’s better at math than at English.

Temperament: Like all kids these days, he has trouble focusing and on attention to things. A bit scattered, ADHD.

Attitude toward life: Happy kid. Wished he had a live-in Dad. Knows many gay women for a kid.

Complexes: Not an extrovert or an introvert. He can speak up, speak his mind.

Abilities: Won spelling bee two years in a row. Ben is very proud of this, being in marketing and all.

Qualities: he’s affectionate and he smiles a lot. Likes cats. – his one lesbian trait. Still hasn’t gotten one of his own.

IQ: very high.

How Working Biography Was Used

Some of this working biography I used; much I did not. It’s best thought of as a go-to resource when a question comes up, such as: What does he like to eat? What does he play with? What (if anything) does he like in school?

I’ve always thought of myself as knowledgable about children and what they’re like. That’s mostly from my own upbringing as second oldest in a family of eight kids. However, my childhood and teen years were a long, long time ago now. I’ve never had children of my own. So a lot of this is vicarious observation of nieces and nephews and friends’ kids, along with random behaviors I might observe out in the world. In a word, imperfect. Hopefully, it was good enough to seem real.

Why not read the book and find out?

Part of the facade of Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy, the real-life school of a fictional character, Logan Bourne, in Jim Arnold's novel "Benefits." — The Harvey Milk Civil RIghts Academy in San Francisco, where the fictional Logan Bourne attends school.

Working Biography of Character Tony Ochoa in “Benefits”

In “Benefits,” main character Ben’s partner Jake is caught fooling around with Tony Ochoa, who Ben recognizes as someone he’s seen in his work neighborhood! A younger man – thus, I had to concoct a working biography for Tony Ochoa.

What You Use a Character Biography For

A novel working biography is used as a resource for character development. The process I’ve used over and over again is to answer a series of questions about the character. Include as many facets of the fictitious person that you can – physical, emotional, psychological, practical and so on. Figure out their tastes, hobbies, loves and hates. The novelist won’t use all of a working biography – but it’s there to draw from down the line. It can help provide an answer to the question “What would Mr. X do in this situation?” Invaluable, because that question keeps popping up throughout a story.

Got my original list of character outline ideas from one of the great all-time writing bibles, The Art of Dramatic Writing by Lajos Egri.

Working Biography for Tony Ochoa

SWEATER BOY, aka ANTONIO (TONY) OCHOA. Tony Ochoa. So, he’s Latino.

Sex: Male Age: 28 Height and Weight: 5-10. 175 or so.

Skin: light brown. Hair – black. Eyes: brown

Posture: lanky, slim. Body hair? Yes, some, very dark.

Appearance: He’s actually kind of slender. He looks young, maybe even younger than 28.

Defects: No defects, but I’m thinking that he has tattoos that he might regret, that might have been done in college under the influence. He wouldn’t regret them, tho. He has a rose on his ass.

Heredity: His father is from Mexico. His mother is from Puerto Rico. He was born in the U.S., in the Bay Area – say east bay, city of Alameda.

Class: He’s middle class now, he has a tech job.

More details . . .

Occupation: He has a tech job at a startup in SF that makes apps for financial concerns.

Education: BS, San Francisco State University

Home Life: starts out by living with some roommates in the Mission. It’s a bunch of people since the rent is so high. It’s a 3 bedroom type railroad flat, 15^th and Capp in the Mission. He has 1 male and 1 Female roommate.

Race/Nationality: Latino, Mexican and Puerto Rican heritage.

Place in Community: He’s not involved politically yet, too young. He wonders what all that is about, though. There may be some nascent leanings.

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Amusements, hobbies: He does play some video games. He likes older guys! So he looks for them where they hang out.

Some hobbies – he likes going out to Ocean Beach. Plays an instrument – the guitar. But not well. He tries to play Spanish guitar. (like flamenco?) He has taken lessons, maybe he still does.

And the personal, very personal . . .

Sex Life, Moral Standards: he’s gay, has been around quite a bit. First experience was with an older guy and he’s just stayed there. With that group. He’s versatile, but likes to top more. Unlike Ben or Jake, he did start out living a “straight” life.

His personal premise: He wanted to find a husband, so he was surprised when he found 2. He’s probably more conventional than either Ben or Jake in that he wants a solid home life.

Frustration, disappointments:

Temperament: Somewhere between Jake (who’s very chill) and Ben (who is very dramatic) – so generally easygoing, but he’s deep and you can’t always read him.

Attitude toward life: an optimist, rather than a pessimist, and this is one of the main things that attracts Ben and Jake to him. He’s fun. Definitely has quirks of youth and his specific generation that Ben and Jake don’t/or no longer possess.

Complexes: He doesn’t like cats. Some minor symptoms of OCD – like closing open drawers and cabinets, other “checking” type stuff. Afraid of fire, always checks stove before leaving and unplugs appliances, the small ones.

Abilities: there’s the guitar. He might be handy – that is something Jake in particular would feel comfortable with. Can fix minor things. Would make him handy around the house.

Qualities: kind to kids – Logan in particular will love him. He might giggle. LOGAN might like him more than he likes either Jake or Ben.

IQ: high.

Photo Inspiration for Tony Ochoa

Here’s a few random images of guys (stolen from you, the Internet!) that I think of when I dreamt of Tony Ochoa. Plus, it’s fun to look at pictures of cute Latino-looking guys and beardos, is it not?