Josh grinned, wide and natural. He seemed too young and energetic to be the father of teenagers. Shiny tanned face, yellow polo shirt, white shorts, whiter teeth. Too casual for a business appointment, all of them, but this was Los Angeles. He looked like a youth pastor at a church camp, or a charismatic cult leader.
Josh is Paragon Dufresne's chipper, youthful father.
Charity Dufresne
Paragon’s appeal was such Charlotte had barely noted the girl beside her. Cutoff jean shorts and flip-flops, ironed platinum hair. Thin and tan and plain, a low-wattage version of her more-famous older sister. Charity played with the phone in her lap and didn’t look up at her dad’s introduction.
Paragon's sister. Paragon and Charity appear to have a complicated relationship.
Marti Bob
When Charlotte left the conference room, Marti was pacing up and down the hallway, agitated. She was bright-eyed sparrow of a woman, spindly and small-boned and sharp. She frowned at Charlotte. “Is she in there? Have you gone downstairs yet?”
One of Charlotte's bosses at the entertainment law firm of Ausberger, Bender & Bob.
Trinket Hale
Trinket padded across the room, bare feet sticking out of her wide-legged pants, eyes barely visible behind a bush of yellow-gray hair. “Wait until everyone’s got one, then I’ll tell you what we’re going to be doing.”
A playwright/former soap opera star, Trinket teaches Charlotte's acting class.
Bob
One of Charlotte's former classmates from USC's theater school.
Melissa
Oh, hell. It was Melissa. Melissa had the matching scene, only with Addie’s lines highlighted. Melissa was glossy and beautiful and lifeless, a low-wattage vortex that dragged her scene partners into the abyss with her. Charlotte had never worked with Melissa. She might be a lovely person, and Charlotte might be a rat for thinking so poorly of her.
A student in Trinket Hale's acting class.
Rachel
One of Charlotte's former drama school classmates. Rachel stars in a television series called Eden's Folly.
Holly
A blonde woman, middle-aged and leathery, propped open the front door of the theater with a cinder block. She shielded her eyes against the sun with her hand and squinted at Charlotte. She frowned. “Here for the auditions?” she asked. A purple velvet halter top barely confined her extravagant bosom; her feet were bare, and her toenails sparkled with purple glitter. “You’re early.”
Holly runs a local theater group called the Hollycould Players.
Lenny Carter
Works in a comic book store, runs a blog called Dead Man's Blurb. Charlotte encounters him while researching Queen of Angels.
Trey Aaron
Former tween star, now starring with Charlotte in Queen of Angels.
Freddie Ramirez
The writer of the Queen of Angels comic and a screenwriter of the film version.
Taura Trejo
Taura Trejo was the first big name to show up. She came with a bodyguard, whom she left at the door. Taura was gamine and lovely, with dark hair, huge eyes, and great skin. She clutched her paper cup of coffee and waggled her fingers at the group. “Hi, everyone. Sorry I’m late. I overslept.” She gestured to her pants. “I was in such a hurry, I just came here in my pajamas. I’m so lame.” She laughed.
The star of Queen of Angels. Taura is name-checked in Demon City as well.
Kerri
She was met outside Customs by a girl with a dark ponytail and a baggy black parka. Rick had said someone would meet her; she hadn’t known what that would mean, but apparently it meant a girl barely out of her teens carrying a hand-lettered sign reading “CHARLOTTE DENT.” Ripped black canvas shoes, leggings bunched at the ankles, a tiny blue star tattoo at the corner of her left eye.
“Hi. I’m Charlotte,” Charlotte said.
The girl glanced at her. She grinned. “Yes, you are.” She thrust out a hand and shook. Metallic blue polish on bitten nails. “I’m Kerri. I’m one of the P.A.s.” She looked at Charlotte’s two suitcases. “That’s everything?”
Kerri works on Queen of Angels. She thinks Charlotte's pretty awesome. She probably pseudonymously defended Charlotte on a message board from one of Joegirl's attacks.
Sir John Hyde
“It’s my first film role,” she said. “I have this fear that if I complain too much, they’ll replace me.”
He looked at her for a long moment, the lines of his face standing out. The cold turned his skin gray, and his makeup sat on it, too orange and obvious. A painted corpse laid out for viewing in a funeral home. “Well, that’s silly of you. Of course they might replace you,” he said at last. “They might replace you because you complain too much. Or they might replace you because they don’t like your nose or the sound of your voice, or because the pretty starlet some studio head wants to fuck wants your role. It’s out of your hands entirely. There’s no sense at all in worrying about it.”
An eminent English actor, slumming it in Queen of Angels.
Paul Yin
Paul Yin might have been in his early thirties, or he might have been twenty years older than Charlotte. He had a lithe, wiry body with ropy arm muscles and unlined skin. Long hair tied back in a ponytail implied youth, but his grave demeanor suggested he’d been doing this all his life, and doing it very well.
Charlotte's stunt trainer on the Queen of Angels set.
Margo
Charlotte's stunt double in Queen of Angels. When Charlotte is injured on set, Margo fills in for her.
Gwen Dent
Her mom was at her desk in her office, which wasn’t much more than a cubicle of glass separating her from the industrial floor. Charlotte felt a rush of reassurance just at the sight of her. Solid and practical, hair short and unfussy, gray streaks untouched, a beacon of competency. She looked up, and Charlotte saw the confusion in her face. It was the hair, still short and dark from the shoot, and she wasn’t supposed to be here, in this office, in this state.
Charlotte's mom, who is an administrator at a paper mill in Idaho.
Karl Dent
Charlotte's father, in declining health from advanced MS.
Frank Gainsborough
A mentally-ill man who breaks into Charlotte's apartment and stabs her.
Doctor Gott
Treats Charlotte after Charlotte is stabbed by Frank Gainsborough. Doctor Gott also appears in Wrong City, treating Vish's head wound.
Christie/Joegirl
Christie was pretty. Hair a little indifferently styled, posture a little slouchy, her shirt and slacks under her apron a little frumpy, but even viewing her through critical and spiteful eyes, Charlotte had to admit she was pretty. Good bones, clear skin, thick hair. Charlotte would bet she wasn’t a native, that she’d moved out here not too long ago with plans of becoming famous. She’d probably been the star of a few plays at her high school, had probably done well enough at her college theater program, and she’d misjudged the gap between that and the multiple layers of shiny polish she needed to make any kind of impact in Los Angeles. She looked about like Charlotte had when she’d come out here, so many years ago, unformed and arrogant and baffled by the way the world failed to conform to her ideas of how her career should unfold. Give her a few years; she’d learn.
One of Simon's biggest fans and Charlotte's biggest online detractors. Charlotte tracks her down to her day job at a coffeehouse in the Valley with the intention of confronting her, then realizes she's being a creepy stalker herself.
Alex
He grinned. A wide, pleasant face with lots of freckles, peroxide white hair with sandy brown roots. Short leather jacket and heavy buckled boots. Was this a real, genuine London punk? “American, right? Been with us for long?”
Simon's London flatmate. A working actor. Lifelong friends with Simon, is quite possibly his lover as well.
