Can Terrible Characters in Your Writing Be Redeemed?

On The Handmaid's Tale, broken people, and redemptive arcs

Photo by Chris Saran on Unsplash

I like to write about broken people. The fine and fixed don’t interest me. I need you to be someone who’s spends your life dressing your wounds. But the character can’t simply be a flat, evil villain—that’s adorable for children’s movies and the rare breed of psychopath showcased on true crime documentaries, but people ar…