Character Types: The Brat

Good morning everyone!

Still plugging along on “Love the Sinner”, the story is sitting at around 45,000 words at this point, and is roughly two thirds complete. 

I realized today that I am sort of inadvertently participating in National Novel Writing month this year! (Not that I would consider my work literature, lol).

To keep my content from drying up completely, I thought it would be fun to do another post about my writing process. 

Today, I want to talk about character archetypes in general and one specific type of character in particular (maybe on other days I will discuss other character types as well.)

When writers sit down to create characters, often certain types and traits come up again and again. You can read story after story and be able to tell after just a few paragraphs what the characters in the story are like just from being familiar with the way stories are written and what is popular. 

This is particularly true for erotic stories. I enjoy trying to get into the heads of my characters a bit, but frankly, most people aren't massively concerned with deep characterization when it comes to their smut. Especially when a story is only a few pages long, often its useful to let the reader know, for instance, that the main character is a “wimp”, the main character’s girlfriend is an “innocent”, and the villain is a “bully”. People know these roles, and already know what the characters are like without too much spilled ink.

It’s not a bad thing. It allows the author to short hand information and get right to what people really want to read: the filthy stuff. 

Today, I want to talk about one character archetype that I particularly enjoy, “The Brat”.

Examples of Brats in my Stories:

Renee Cross (Dominant)

Jackie Song (Dominant)

Blaire Beaumont (Submissive)

Who is the brat? 

The number one defining quality of a brat is youth. Often 18, the lowest acceptable age for a character in an erotic story. The brat has all the attractive physical qualities of youth, and are usually energetic and even bubbly. But although young people are typically less confident and experienced, the brat turns this on its ear. The brat is supremely confident, whether that is earned or unearned. They also tend to be annoying, or at least mildly abrasive. The brat tends to feel superior to others and looks down on them. Also, they are usually spoiled, expecting others to bow to them and give them their way. 

Dominant Brats:

Although brats tend to start out simliar, their roles are very different depending on the plot of the story. One of my favorite chartacter types is the dominant brat. In this version, they aren’t misguided in their confidence and superiority, they really are just better than the other characters. This can add a nice little thrill to the plot. It may feel unfair to the main character that the brat looks down on them, but the brat’s high opinion of themseves is proved right again and again. These characters work well when paired with older submissives: it adds a twist of humilation. The older main character is in theory supposed to be older, more influential, and more experienced that the young brat, but keeps getting led around by the nose sexually anyway. 

Submissive Brats:

I haven’t explored this character type quite as much, but it is popular, and I see Blaire Beaumont from “Dollar Swine” fitting this archetype. We recognize that being spoiled and looking down on others is bad behavior, especially for younger people who should perhaps respect their elders. So it can feel satisfying to see brats “tamed” and shown the error of their ways. That process can be extremely humiliating for a brat with a high opinion of herself, which satisfies kinks for a lot of people. 

Do Brats have to be women? 

No, I don’t think so. I just think male brats look a little different, and are almost always dominant. I have read a number of stories about cocky young high school studs dominating and corrupting their teachers or other older women. I think these characters fit into this archetype as well: they are young, they are entitled, and a source of the older partner’s humilation is being ensnared by someone who should be beneath them. I would argue that Tyler from "Miss Udders" is a male brat.

Well, what do you think? Do you enjoy Brat characters as well? Is there some aspect of them you think I missed discussing? 

I typed up a list of other common character archtypes that I thought up off the top of my head. Are there any that you think would be interesting for me to talk about their role in stories? Or are you just not that interested in this type of content? Let me know in the poll!