Hmm.  An interesting question, Alex! 

After careful pondering of the idea, I do not recall having a smoker in any of my stories.  I would like to believe that that's because I write in the things that are most familiar to me, and as I am a professional vocalist, smoking would not be in that realm. 

That is not to say that I have not smoked.  I stopped for my health.


My mother would have beaten me to within an inch of my life if I had continued after she'd caught me.  I started in fifth grade at the tender age of 10 (thanks to the neighbor next door--who by the way was an Olympic athlete in Women's hockey later!) and stopped about six months later.  My mother had discovered a bit of ash stain on an article of clothing and whupped the truth out of me.   
I was also encouraged not to spend time with that neighbor anymore, since it was getting me into trouble.  (Since the aforementioned neighbor had also taught me how to box, and got me into several fights, well...you can imagine that Mom wasn't real pleased.)


Anyhoo, would I make one of my characters smoke?  I guess it would depend on the character, but I'm inclined to say no, simply because after studying voice in college and seeing ALL sorts of photographic and video demonstrations about what your throat looks like even after a short period of smoking, I would be rather grossed out.

(might I suggest:  www.entusa.com/voice_box_cancer.htm  just to see what I mean?  Not a kick or a message, just interesting pictures.  And the biopsy video is fascinating!)

Again though, I suppose it depends on the character.  I'd never rule it out, because you know all our characters and stories ACTUALLY exist on some parallel universe, and we're only seeing it in the window in our minds 

-Kate

And here, I thought all of my questions posed in the past were interesting. 

You make a good observation, Fonk - it does add to the sin-ister aura of a black hat to have him or her as a smoker.

But then, how about the professorial sage with a pipe in hand . . . 

Sorry about that, my mom always warned me about being a bad influence . . .

Hmm.... It's never crossed my mind.

I don't smoke, don't have close friends that do (which is just luck I guess), wouldn't start because I couldn't afford it in the first place, and I don't like the idea of addictions, but I got nothing against it when it comes to the fiction realm. Come to think of it, one of the characters I'm planning for my own series may smoke and drink sometimes; a short jerk who leads a crew of thieves and has a  big ego, and enjoys an occasional cigar and cigarette, because that's his character.

It's not like it's worst than 98% of the rest of the stuff fictional characters go through. 

But they can! .... Because they're fictional.