Natalie Aureole
Natalie Aureole
Plainwood's "Sinister Recluse"
| Physical | |
|---|---|
| Gender | female |
| Species | Human |
| Relations | |
|---|---|
| Locales | Plainwood |
| Meta | |
|---|---|
| Series | Sinister Recluse |
| Voice actress | Nel |
Natalie Aureole ['næ-tə-li ɔ-ri-'ol] is a "twenty-something-year-old" woman who moved to Plainwood in the Sinister Recluse series.
History and origin
Natalie Aureole moved to Plainwood during the events of Sinister Recluse: The Statue on Riverside. She appeared as a mysterious lefthander from the States with unknown goals or origins. She had hoped for a smooth transition, but was met with a rude awakening, as Plainwood was a place extremely dedicated to its fear and aversion to the supernatural, and especially against those who are lefthanded. Within her attempts to assimilate with the crowd and blend in, Natalie found herself making more and more cultural mistakes that made her stand out, including using the taboo left hand in daily interactions. As such, many of the townspeople of Plainwood, especially its mayor, Matt Kennett, feared her and suspected her as a Sinister Demon.
General description
Traits and abilities
Personality
Natalie is known to be shy and reserved. She has an innocent demeanor and tends to shut down when people around her are talking to or about her.
Relationships
Not much is known about Natalie's life before she moved to Plainwood, but she did have at least one acquaintance from before, known as Riley Saint Yves. Natalie seems to greatly admire and respect Riley out of everyone she had lived with before her move to Plainwood. She also mentions a Dan and a Moira in some of her journal entries. Not much is known yet about these people.
When Natalie moved to Plainwood, the relationships she made were difficult for her. The first encounter she had with anybody was with Eileen Pritchett, and even that was on accident when she panicked and managed to mysteriously blow up Eileen's house, erroneously thinking the house was vacant. She hasn't been able to shake that moment out of her mind, and because of that, she had inadvertently tarnished her relationship with Eileen.
Despite the cultural faux pas she had made in her first few days in Plainwood, Natalie did make some genuine friends, notably with Morgan Bailey. When everybody else was suspicious and fearful of her, Morgan was the only one who treated her with dignity and respect. Since then, Natalie had considered Morgan her "safety net" for Plainwood.
Development
Inspiration
The first idea of Natalie Aureole and her concept came to be in 2017, when Adam was about to fall asleep and had a semi-dream of somebody saying, "What's your escape from reality?" and a girl (the precursor to Natalie) saying "This," while simultaneously creating a portal into another reality made of bright lights. Later after that image, Adam thought that idea was inspiring and wanted to turn it into something more. He had considered writing a story about it. Adam had only ever attempted to write a full-length novel many years before, which he had hastily abandoned, so he wanted to start fresh, especially after having read the first Welcome to Night Vale novel as an inspiration to write and have fun with it.
This spark of inspiration was the basis for Sinister Recluse, which was originally called Normal..., and started out as a more slice-of-life adventure novel about a mysterious girl with supernatural powers who moved to a place called Pine Creek (proto Plainwood) and whose residents distrusted her. At this point in development, still around 2017, Natalie and other main Sinister Recluse characters such as Eileen and Vivian were high-school age, rather than adults. Between the first idea of Natalie's concept and the first draft of Sinister Recluse (still called, Normal...) in July of 2017, Adam had been toying around with different names and designs for this mysterious girl. The name Natalie had floated around in his mind but he wasn't dead-set on it until he began writing his first draft. His original design concept for Natalie, never drawn, was similar to Jinx from Teen Titans, specifically the hair. It wasn't until Adam went to a friend's party and noticed an outfit he thought would be fitting, that the first design for Natalie was created in November 2017.
Since her development, Natalie had always been a shy, reserved, and awkward girl.
Design
Within development, Natalie had undergone some design changes, including her outfit and skin color. In 2019, Adam changed her skin color to add more diversity into his character repertoire and to the main character of his series. He also changed her outfit in 2025 from a semiformal dress to sweats to symbolize more of her tendency towards comfort, but Adam is currently considering bringing back the original design, as it symbolize her role in the series better: forced to look nice but being uncomfortable in doing so. Her hair had also undergone some changes, as she originally had purple ombrés, which later changed to more subtle light brown, and finally to a bleached color. Again, these color choices may be reverted, depending on how it fits with the new design.
Etymology
Natalie has no apparent etymology, but Adam chose it because it kept going around in his head when trying to think of a name for the character. The last name, Aureole is French for halo, which represents Natalie's innocent demeanor, as well as the physical blinding brightness she can emit from her hands.
Natalie being known as the "Sinister Recluse" comes from the word sinister, which is Latin for both evil and left, with recluse referring to how she keeps to herself and stays out of people's ways.
Profiles
Natalie Aureole is a girl who recently moved into the town of Pine Creek. She was seen moving into the town's infamously mysterious "house with the raven statue," where no one has ever lived for 100s of years. On Natalie's first days in the town, she tried her best to avoid interactions with anyone so no one would be able to know more about her and her... secrets. One thing we know for sure about this girl is that she is not one of the more normal residents of the town, which is saying a lot, considering most of the people in Pine Creek are paranoid and superstitious weirdos, which makes Natalie more than unsettled. Despite all this, within her first few days in the town, she's actually made good friends with Vivian Fay and Eileen Britchett--and to some extent, Dylan Britchett as well. She's been having so much fun with the two that she's been beginning to forget the main reason she moved there...
Occupation: N/A
Loves: Good friends
Hates: Being the center of attention
Natalie Aureole, originally from New Jersey, is a girl who recently moved to Plainwood, Oregon, in the Monnelleyan Mountains. She moved into the house right next to the town's famously talked about and feared "house on Riverside Road with that raven statue," making her the next-door neighbor of the Britchetts and the across-the-street neighbor of Matthew Kennett. She doesn't know Mayor Kennett too well but has heard stories about his superstitious tendencies, which makes her a little uneasy. That on top of the fact she moved into a new eery-vibed neighborhood in the middle of the woods made her very unsettled and timid at first. But at least she's made very good friends in her first few days, so that keeps her spirits up. That is, it will until more bad happenings brew up in town and a dedicated ghost hunter has to come in. Luckily, Kennett and Denouement only have hunches, and don't have proof they're right. So far.
Occupation: N/A
Loves: Fresh air
Hates: Being the center of attention
