Siblings as Characters

In general, what do you think of siblings as character, especially if they are a duo, or have a Sibling Rivalry?

For some reason, it doesn't appeal to me. There are a lot of brother and sisters in YA or children's literature and after a while it can get a little predictable. Platonic partners, as opposed to brother and sister (especially if they are twins) are much more interesting to write. Plus, there's the romance element.

From the top of my head, I can only think of two protagonists whose brother or sister is a central part of the story. And in those cases, they are distant. One case has a crazy brother, and another is a secret sister.

So, what is your opinion?

In contrast, I tend to like siblings in stories, and many main characters of mine have them. They open many new plot possibilities, really. A sibling is a potential plot device waiting to be used- they can enter the plot without making it seem implausible.

That said, I'd like to see more variety in siblings. They mostly come in two forms: The generic brothers who'll sacrifice themselves for one another, and the pair of the good sibling, and the evil, better at everything sibling. I think sibling relationships could use some more room to explore.

I don't have a lot of characters whose relationsips siblings play an important role in the story, probably because I have no siblings myself.

Jack Clive has thousands of brothers, though, and they're all identical. The relationship the men are supposed to share is unique, but Jack himself refuses to participate in it.

edited 1st Aug '11 12:59:47 PM by annebeeche

Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.

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When you think about, the vast majority of people in the world have to have siblings. (If everyone was an only child, we'd die out in a very short time) Therefore, it's unrealistic to have so many characters be only children. And so, most of my characters have siblings. (Not that only-child-characters break my Willing Suspension of Disbelief, it's just when I'm writing I usually give my characters siblings, if it ever comes up at all. But they rarely have too much of an impact on the story.)

Still Sheepin'

Not yet.

While there are some good dynamics out there, there are also a few "meh" ones too. (Spy Kids...)

For some reason, it isn't my preference. From all the duos I conceived in my head, none of them are related by parent.

edited 1st Aug '11 1:48:37 PM by chihuahua0

I've written a few sibling characters before. Mathias and Samantha Watkins*

for one, Sasha and Viktor Ivanov for another. It's very probable I'll make more over time.

I've also written other relations before. Colonel Barry Smith and Lieutenant Joseph Smith are father and son respectively.

I don't think I have a single story that doesn't have siblings as major characters.

I write pretty good fanfiction, sometimes.

To me, close siblings tend to go like this:

You fight, and then ten seconds later everything is total chill.

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How could I forget? I have siblings on the other side too in the form of Boren and Soras! This is relevant as the former causes a major case of Wham in regard to the latter.

edited 1st Aug '11 7:10:09 PM by annebeeche

Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.

As someone who knows first-hand that Sibling Yin-Yang is Truth in Television, I'd be crazy not to have a few familial relationships here and there.

Like Dealan mentioned earlier, there's plenty of room for possibilities when working with siblings. I'm a sucker for Red Oni, Blue Oni relationships, so at a base level they tend to go hand-in-hand with my siblings. But I think that one advantage sibling characters might have is their shared past; the opinions that a big brother might have about an event could be completely different from those of a little brother. It could help define their characters, and create a point of conflict plot-wise.

Also, it seems like the perfect opportunity to create a Back-to-Back Badasses moment. Just two brothers kickin' ass, as it was meant to be.

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You could always write them as people with interpersonal relationships, I know from edxperience that most siblings don't get along too well and sometimes may get in each otehrs thraots. I know my sibliong do at least.

"Eratoeir is a Gangsta."

I have a little sister. We're not blood related- both adopted from different parts of China -but I think we're pretty typical sisters. I can't imagine life without her, which is probably why I have so many characters with not just siblings, but plot-relevant siblings.

edited 17th Dec '13 9:43:08 PM by CrystalGlacia

"Jack, you have debauched my sloth."

I don't know... I usually use familial relationships for heavy-duty story traction and Emotional Torque (the Grim Reaper is a triplet in my one story, and in the other, the hero's stepbrother ends up being a... as close as you can call to the Big Bad in one of the stories, but they end up in an Enemy Mine situation, and they're also stepbrothers with a rather strange backstory).

Since I don't have siblings (I have a stepbrother and stepsister, but they're from my dad's first marriage ages ago and they're much, much older than I) I don't really have a point of reference, so I avoid it when possible just so I don't write it poorly...

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I have siblings of my characters a lot. The trouble I have is that they tend to get neglected in my character development.

Both Milo and Flinn have a few of them, and the differences in how they interacted explain some of their traits. Milo is the oldest child by a large margin and absolutely dotes on his younger siblings, while Flinn was the youngest and vaguely resented them all.

Be not afraid...

I set out writing my Suenyaverse with the idea of subverting a lot of classical fantasy tropes, and one of the ones I set my eyes on was the wise older king and his daughter the beautiful princess. So instead of a father/child dynamic, I made the "king" and the "princess" figures siblings, with the king being older by such a significant margin, his role in his younger brother's life was essentially parential, though not enough so to prevent them from acting like brothers. It was fun!

I also got an idea for a series of kid's stories recently (I gotta stop doing that) about a Brother–Sister Team, but I decided to mix it up by (again) gender-flipping a number of usual sibling tropes, and by adding a nonrelated third character to make a Power Trio.

Strangely enough, though most of my characters do have siblings (Ran being one of my rare exceptions), their siblings often play so little role in the story they might as well be only children. Nick, in particular, who has nine siblings, but they're totally irrelevant by virtue of being dead.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada

In a case of what is clearly write what you know, I tend to bring cousins in more often than siblings. Though each story idea of mine tends to have at least one sibling pair.

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Oddly enough, while my characters do often have siblings, they rarely play an active role. They exist, and are spoken of on occasion, but they rarely appear in person. Something similar happens with parents.

Partially, it's simply because I don't think I can make something interesting of the dynamics. Partially, I tend to describe settings that would not normally allow family to interact in a work-related fashion, which is where most of the trouble comes and hence the interesting, writing-worthy bits are. And partially I think it has to do with my own realization in high school that surprisingly few people actually know their siblings by adulthood no matter how close they once were. Your initial impressions are formed before you're properly equipped to make good ones, and you will drift far in your formative years, as will they if they're remotely similar in age.

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I think siblings work great for children's literature and YA, as siblings are a big part of life in that age group.

I am actively working to make my sister duo seem very realistic. They care for each other, annoy each other, and don't always work together.

Doodles

Most characters ought to have siblings because most people in real life have siblings. But for adults, they don't need to play a big role in the story; my sister lives in another state and I only see her a couple of times a year. (Childrens' and teens' siblings ought to play a significant part.)

Regardless of whether we see them, though, having siblings or not should affect your character. My fivesome has an only child (serious, mature, controlling), a man with a much younger sister (uncompromising, a leader), a man with a couple of similarly aged sisters (feels pressured to act masculine), a middle child with a lot of siblings (laid back, a negotiator), and a youngest child with a lot of siblings (goofy, attention-getting, irresponsible).

I am not sure about everyone else but I had come from a large extended family and I am not sure how many cousins, uncles or aunts I actually have. However, at least three of my aunts avert the adults drifting apart trope. My mother and her sisters and brothers are very close despite having lives of their own

"Eratoeir is a Gangsta."

Siblings in my works...everyone in the Five-Man Band has them.

MC: He has a year younger sister who was adopted alongside him. She's really possessive and seeks his approval, which is hard due to his nature as the resident stoic.

The Lancer: Has three older brothers who all graduated schools and went to different parts of the country, two to the country one to the city, to get job. He currently lives with his cousin, who more less acts as his surrogate mother.

Dark Action Girl: Has older brother in military. She thinks that he deserves the title of the heir of her family, due to his lack of hesitation when killing people. He has no problem being treated as her inferior, though.

The Chick: His brother is the Big Bad, although the latter is illegimate child.

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After reading the thread I realized that in every story I wrote, there's always a sibling pair (let's see...two twin pairs in one story, one boy-girl and one boy-boy pair, which ironically are some of the bad guys in the story, three brothers and a sister who used to love each other in the aforementioned story but then the eldest brother and youngest sister left the other two brothers [who are some of the Big Bads in the story], and then I have triplet brothers in a different story; the youngest triplet is only mentioned in passing though). I always like to put my sibling duos in the angle of Vitriolic Best Buds; most of the time they have a constant love-hate relationship that keeps going on and off.

I think that's because I have an elder brother who's hardly at home now; we don't talk like we do in the past and I pretty much hate him now for lots of personal issues over the years.

edited 3rd Aug '11 4:42:23 AM by MrHollowRabbit

If brother-sister relationships that you write or you read are getting predictable, then clearly you have to talk to more people, read better books, and use your imagination a bit more.

Nobody has the exact same relationship with their siblings. Because nobody is the same.