A recent blog post from a writer of comics and long form fiction included the following statement in a blog post about "GOOD STORY":
"A good story doesn't allow them to be the same person at the end they were at the beginning."Writers/Authors/Creators who blog about their craft often site this as a given fact even though there are hundreds of examples that debunk it.
Read any Robert B. Parker (or Crais or MacDonald or Stark or countless others) book and the characters in them are not changed in any way at the end of any one book. They are not changed (with the exception of being updated over time - which is not what the above statement is about) over the course of a series. They are not changed by a television series or movie made about them.
Spenser (as well as Hawk, Elvis Cole, Joe Pike, Travis McGee and Parker) is the same man in every Robert B. Parker book. Period. In fact, the books are written from the stand point that Spenser is as good as he is BECAUSE he WON'T change.
Please feel free to weigh in here with comments....
