Hello, jungle dwellers. Craig here again, and today I want to talk about the pet character. I’m using this term, but it applies to any animals and even things like SIRI or other artificial intelligence characters. For you paranormal fans, maybe it’s Grandpa’s haunted tiki mug.
Firstly, the pet is a side character. They exist in the story for a reason that relates to another character, usually the main character.
I find them useful when you have a loner. Your character is going to spend a lot of time alone, and if they talk to the animal you don’t have to write out pages of internal thought. Without even acting, the pet can serve a purpose.
The pet should act in some way, even if it’s just comic relief. I have a trunk novel where a dog threw a horse turd in the air like a ball as the enemy army approached. Maybe that wasn’t great, but it’s not unrealistic, and allowed me to make things tense twice.
I’ve written many pet characters, and am likely to do so again. In my novel, Panama, there is a horse that just doesn’t like one of the main characters. This character thinks he’s cursed to become a vampire, and because the horse is white, he reads more into this than he should. It’s a fun bit of stress for the main character.
I added a stupid dog to The Playground, to help with a loner type character. The character is a brutal thug for hire, but there has to be some humanity inside if he likes this dog. I like the scene where he scraped a microwave burrito onto the floor for the dog. He’s a slob, and he’s not into hugs, but it revealed a bit of character. Some tiny spark of decency exists in there somewhere. This can be used to make your antagonist more realistic than a mustache twirling evil entity.
The trick is to do something with the pet character. Having your bad guy simply petting a cat isn’t enough. The cat has to play a role of some kind too.
Most of you are familiar with my character Lisa Burton. Before she became the spokesmodel for my blog and books, she appeared in her own novel. Lisa is an experimental robot headed toward being dismantled. She rescued a giant rabbit destined for a butcher shop. Ah! They both faced a similar fate, and at least in Lisa’s artificial mind, they were destined to be together. They wound up helping each other, but Bunny’s part in that was small. Still, Bunny’s part happened and he existed for a reason.
Pet characters are great, but they should have a purpose in the story. They need to be more than that bad guy’s cat. They can add comedy, distraction, a shoulder to cry on, someone to talk to, fear, fear for, even a stress point in divorce situations. If they are more AI or haunted, they can add research and bits to the plot, but at some point they will become more of a main character if you let them.
Like in all things, there are reasons not to add a pet character. You may have read something about various tropes, like raping the girl to spur the hero to new heights. Killing the pet off has been done in similar fashion. I get it, it becomes a trope because it works. It’s also been done to, well, death.
I have never killed off the pet character. I’m not saying I never will, but I don’t like the trope and feel the same way about killing off mentors. Pet characters are some of my favorites, but they serve a purpose other than to entertain me while I write.
How about it you authors out there, do you use pet characters? Let’s hear from the readers too. Do you guys like the pet character in stories?
Craig Boyack
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Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog 
I always include pet characters. They work great for all the reasons you’ve mentioned here.
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Heck, you even included my pet in one. That’s gotta be a first.
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Reblogged this on Lyn Horner's Corner and commented:
Interesting post about using pet characters in a novel.
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Thanks for sharing, Lyn 😃
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Thanks for the share.
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I’ve only written pet characters in my non-fiction book Six Cats In My Kitchen. Your post has me thinking about introducing a pet character in a future romance project. Thanks for the inspiration.
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Glad I’ve got you thinking about it. Hope it works out for you.
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I once used a pet kitten to foil a would-be assailant. I like pets for comic relief, but also for empathy when needed.
Great post, Craig!
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Sounds like an interesting bit to me.
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I slipped a cat into my third novel but otherwise haven’t included pets. I’ll likely do it more in the future. Pets are a good way to help show what our characters are like. Are they kind to animals? Find them a nuisance? Etc. Says a lot about a character, just as it does people in real life.
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Must be a big novel… ba, dum, dump. I write a lot of animal characters, and find them quite useful. Readers relate to them too, so it helps get that powerful emotional experience we’re going for. Reference the creepy true story I related to Vashti down below.
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I used a pet character in a novella, Food for Poe, and I’ve got one in my current work. That character (a dog) will transition to the next book too. As a reader I enjoy pet characters and do not like when they’re killed. I read a book recently where the pet died, but to be fair, I knew going in that was the way it had to end. Pets can definitely fill the role of a character or enhance other characters. Entertaining post, Craig!
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Thanks, Mae. I loved Poe, by the way. There are some books where that issue is the story. More power to them, but those aren’t what I write. You’ve read my stories, those animals that show some character always seem to survive somehow, even Ethan’s white horse.
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I included a pet character in Sarah – since my cat gave me the whole idea for the book, thought it was only right to include a cat character. What Staci said about reader’s reacting more harshly to a pet’s death than a human’s (in fiction) is true, I think. Yesterday I was considering reviewing a book, but when it mentioned animal cruelty in the description, I passed.
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I agree with Staci. I’ve had Sarah on my reader for too darned long. I need to get to it soon.
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It’s my understanding that readers react more harshly to a pet’s death than to a human’s (in fiction). I’ve written pets into stories before, and I love doing it because they can reveal so much about the human characters. Your example from The Playground is an excellent depiction of just that.
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I’ve heard that too, and that’s why I don’t take things out on the animals. I’ve written hunting scenes and dispatched food animals in my stories, but never the pet character.
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Very interesting and informative post, Craig! I need to incorporate more pets in my writing. Thank you Craig and Chris!😊
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Like all things, do it with purpose. They can be pretty useful characters.
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I like the idea of giving your loner character a pet to avoid having to write down all his thoughts. I think pets can also serve as comic relief when things have been tense for a while.
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I’ve done that too. They can even find clues as long as it’s realistic. True story: A guy was flying his classic WWII Mustang around my hometown. He flew it into a hillside and died. A week later, someone’s dog carried a human nose into their yard. This could be a great start to a murder mystery.
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Wow! Yes, I can see a great thriller or murder mystery stemming from that scene. 😮
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Interesting post, Craig. Never thought of a pet character as a loner prop. Good idea. I would caution killing off a pet. Might be more backlash trouble and not worth it as a trope.
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You’re familiar with my stories. It would have been hard to write Clovis without the dog. I never kill them off.
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The dog was genius.
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Thanks.
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