Today I'm continuing with my recent theme of writing and publishing advice. Apparently, character development happens to be one of my favorite topics since I've written about it on three different occasions. So, I don't have too much new to say, but I do have some links.
Character Development
Character Sketches
Character Sketches 2
Getting to know your main characters is key to writing a great story. And knowing the details of a character is more than knowing that the main characters has brown hair, blue eyes, and is right handed. It's also knowing whether he/she is an optimist or a pessimist, and whether he/she had a rough childhood, and whether he/she has any close friends.
Knowing the intimate details of a character serves three purposes:
1. The intimate details gives the reader more insight into the character. The more a reader know about a person, the more a reader can become interested. It's hard to care about someone that you know nothing about. There's more chance of an emotional investment if you know some details.
2. The more you know about a character, the more alive they become. For me, a character often comes alive in their hobbies, odd quirks, and strange habits. These odd traits can often prove to be hindrances and helps in a book, making a book more interesting.
3. Knowing the history and details of your character will help you and your readers understand a character's motivations. Why is this character going out of his way to help this person? Maybe it's because he regrets not helping someone in his past, or that she reminds him of his sister who never makes an appearance in the book, or that her brother owes your character money and the only way he's going to get paid is through helping her.
Finally, it's the flaws and faults of a character that make them really live. Perfection is not something most humans can relate to. However, at one time or another, we've made mistakes that we wish we could undo. Why should your characters be any different?
When I started writing the Dark Days series, I wrote a number of character sketches to help me better understand the characters I was working with. Danaus, in particular, had a lot of back story that never actually appeared on the page, but I needed to know so I could better understand him.
Here are some links to some of the character sketches that I worked on:
Mira
Danaus
Valerio
Understand your characters, and writing that book will become just a little bit easier.
Showing posts with label characters development. Show all posts
Showing posts with label characters development. Show all posts
Monday, October 3, 2011
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Character Sketches: Part 2
I know I've said it before, but I'm going to repeat it. The devil is in the details. Yet, so is the soul of a character. Strange coincidence, no? I'm joking. But I think a person comes alive in the strange eccentricities and habits that people develop in years of life. Why should characters in your stories be any different?
Do you have a character that touches their visor every time they drive through a yellow light? Or refuses to walk over one of those open grates in the sidewalks? How about a female character that refuses to wear anything but underwear from Victoria's Secret? It's these extremely random facts that breathes life into the character, grounds them into something that a reader can understand and potentially relate to.
Here are some more details that you may to consider jotting down when you're working on your next character sketch:
1. Physical imperfection or things that your character might want to change about him or herself: this could affect how your character acts around other, how she/he dresses, confidence levels, etc.
2. Characteristic gestures: a list of these can help when writing as they can be used along with dialogue tags. (ie. running fingers through hair, drumming fingers, rolling eyes, etc.)
3. Personality type, quirks, and eccentricities
4. Bad habits
In a side note, here is a great music video for Weezer's latest song. It contains all the great viral videos that have taken off during the past couple years. Enjoy and have a great weekend.
Do you have a character that touches their visor every time they drive through a yellow light? Or refuses to walk over one of those open grates in the sidewalks? How about a female character that refuses to wear anything but underwear from Victoria's Secret? It's these extremely random facts that breathes life into the character, grounds them into something that a reader can understand and potentially relate to.
Here are some more details that you may to consider jotting down when you're working on your next character sketch:
1. Physical imperfection or things that your character might want to change about him or herself: this could affect how your character acts around other, how she/he dresses, confidence levels, etc.
2. Characteristic gestures: a list of these can help when writing as they can be used along with dialogue tags. (ie. running fingers through hair, drumming fingers, rolling eyes, etc.)
3. Personality type, quirks, and eccentricities
4. Bad habits
In a side note, here is a great music video for Weezer's latest song. It contains all the great viral videos that have taken off during the past couple years. Enjoy and have a great weekend.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Character Sketches
In a break from my usual babbling about nonsense, I thought I would spend the next few days talking about some of the things I've learned about the craft and art of writing. Today, I'm going to start with something that is near and dear to my heart -- the character.
In a statement that will likely upset some authors and a few readers, I believe that most books fall into one of two categories : character-driven and plot-driven. In this, I mean the driving force, the main focus, of the book is either the main character(s) or it's some event within the book (ie. the plot). Now, I will admit that there are some amazing writers out there who can accomplish both, thus writing books that absolutely blow your mind. How can you tell which the book is? Why did you read it? Are you reading it to see what a character does or if she falls for this guy that's she's been giving the cold shoulder for the past 3 books? Or did you read the book to see how some horrible event is averted?
Now, before anyone's feathers get ruffled, that's not to say that a plot-driven book can't have great characters or character-driven book can't have a kick-ass plot. I've read both. But one or the other tends to be the driving force in the book.
So, why did I dig myself this hole in the first place? Oh, yeah... characters. I write character-driven books. It can't be helped. It's where I start with every story I write. It all begins with a character walking into my life and saying "Jocelynn, I've got a story for you to tell." Well, not all of them have been quite so polite, but you get the picture. And like the dutiful writer that I am, I scurry off to get a pen and paper so I can start making notes about the character that has just been born.
As a result, I tend to keep extremely detailed character sketches of my main players. The minor character still get some notes, just enough to jog my memory of eye color, hair color, height. But the main characters get several pages. I try to write a complete history of each character. I will say that 95% of the information that I place in the character sketches never appears in the books. However, I know that information and I know in a more complete way how my characters' motives and decisions are going to be affected by those past events. One thing I've heard from several editors over the years that a book should read like it's the tip of the iceberg poking out of the water. The writer should have this whole mass of information just below the surface to back up his/her writing. The writer is giving the reader only a small snapshot of the world the character is living in. However, it should feel like the rest of the world is still functioning even though your character is focused somewhere else.
Am I making any sense? I hope so. I'll go more into some of the details I list for my characters, but today I have a writing prompt I picked up while I attended the Summer Writing Festival at the University of Iowa a few years ago.
You have your character all sketched out in your mind or on paper. Now image that character has a box in his/her closet. It can be any size box -- shoe, jewelry, etc. But the box is shoved in the back of the closet and it's hidden under a pile of sheets and old clothes. Someone wouldn't spot the box unless he or she was specifically looking for it. In other words, this box is hidden. What's in the box? Why is the box hidden? When did your character hide the box and its contents? How often does the character remove the box from the closet? Does your character ever open the box? Why?
I completed the same exercise with one of my nightwalkers when I was in Iowa. Tristan kept in a shoe box a gold watch made for him by his father and given to him on his wedding day. In the comments, please tell me what your character has hidden if you complete this writing prompt. It can be serious or funny.
In a statement that will likely upset some authors and a few readers, I believe that most books fall into one of two categories : character-driven and plot-driven. In this, I mean the driving force, the main focus, of the book is either the main character(s) or it's some event within the book (ie. the plot). Now, I will admit that there are some amazing writers out there who can accomplish both, thus writing books that absolutely blow your mind. How can you tell which the book is? Why did you read it? Are you reading it to see what a character does or if she falls for this guy that's she's been giving the cold shoulder for the past 3 books? Or did you read the book to see how some horrible event is averted?
Now, before anyone's feathers get ruffled, that's not to say that a plot-driven book can't have great characters or character-driven book can't have a kick-ass plot. I've read both. But one or the other tends to be the driving force in the book.
So, why did I dig myself this hole in the first place? Oh, yeah... characters. I write character-driven books. It can't be helped. It's where I start with every story I write. It all begins with a character walking into my life and saying "Jocelynn, I've got a story for you to tell." Well, not all of them have been quite so polite, but you get the picture. And like the dutiful writer that I am, I scurry off to get a pen and paper so I can start making notes about the character that has just been born.
As a result, I tend to keep extremely detailed character sketches of my main players. The minor character still get some notes, just enough to jog my memory of eye color, hair color, height. But the main characters get several pages. I try to write a complete history of each character. I will say that 95% of the information that I place in the character sketches never appears in the books. However, I know that information and I know in a more complete way how my characters' motives and decisions are going to be affected by those past events. One thing I've heard from several editors over the years that a book should read like it's the tip of the iceberg poking out of the water. The writer should have this whole mass of information just below the surface to back up his/her writing. The writer is giving the reader only a small snapshot of the world the character is living in. However, it should feel like the rest of the world is still functioning even though your character is focused somewhere else.
Am I making any sense? I hope so. I'll go more into some of the details I list for my characters, but today I have a writing prompt I picked up while I attended the Summer Writing Festival at the University of Iowa a few years ago.
You have your character all sketched out in your mind or on paper. Now image that character has a box in his/her closet. It can be any size box -- shoe, jewelry, etc. But the box is shoved in the back of the closet and it's hidden under a pile of sheets and old clothes. Someone wouldn't spot the box unless he or she was specifically looking for it. In other words, this box is hidden. What's in the box? Why is the box hidden? When did your character hide the box and its contents? How often does the character remove the box from the closet? Does your character ever open the box? Why?
I completed the same exercise with one of my nightwalkers when I was in Iowa. Tristan kept in a shoe box a gold watch made for him by his father and given to him on his wedding day. In the comments, please tell me what your character has hidden if you complete this writing prompt. It can be serious or funny.
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Character Development
When creating a world in which to play, there are thoughts about societies and moral structures, traditions and technological developments, that all must be laid out but the characters that move about in this construct are, for me, the most fun to play with.
Urban fantasy is typically written from the first person point of view (POV), which in general, I did not use too frequently until now. First person POV offers an excellent way to get into the head of your main character, intensfy both the emotions and the action, and provide a surprise or two for your readers.
But first person can also be a bit limiting if you want to provide some in-depth details about some of your other characters, particularly when your main character is a bit biased -- or just plain hates one or more of the other characters.
Interestingly enough, that is where Tristan comes in. I had a character appear that played a major role in my main character's past. Unfortunately, my main character has a deep loathing for this other character and resulted in some rather one-sided rants and comments.
Characterization comes from actions, thoughts, words, and how other characters interact with other characters. Mira's (my main character) thoughts, actions, and comments all provided nice information about Sadira (the minor character), but I wanted a little more detail -- more proof that Mira just wasn't going off the deep end.
Thus, Tristan was born. His job was to interact with Sadira outside of Mira, and show that there was more to Sadira than what Mira was saying. But Tristan surprised me. His existence provided an unexpected insight into Mira's own past as she was forced to face some ugly skeletons that she had packed away.
Tristan continued to surprise me in many ways as the story unfolded. His single job was to act as foil to Sadira, but somewhere along the way he developed a complete personality, a soul, a moral fiber, a history, and in the end, a life of his own. By the end of the book, he surprised me yet again. Despite the fact that he appeared somewhat late in NIGHTWALKER, he became one of my favorite characters.
There are some writers that say the characters they create are just that, creations that will do their bidding. For me, my characters are so much more. If you know them well enough and breath enough life into them, then they become living, breathing entities with drives and ambitions and fears. I just try to act as a guide, push them in a direction and remind them of tasks that must be accomplished. How they get there and what they have to do to reach that point, it honestly feels like they decide on their own. There are times I am proud of them and others when they disappoint me, but they are always my family and friends.
Urban fantasy is typically written from the first person point of view (POV), which in general, I did not use too frequently until now. First person POV offers an excellent way to get into the head of your main character, intensfy both the emotions and the action, and provide a surprise or two for your readers.
But first person can also be a bit limiting if you want to provide some in-depth details about some of your other characters, particularly when your main character is a bit biased -- or just plain hates one or more of the other characters.
Interestingly enough, that is where Tristan comes in. I had a character appear that played a major role in my main character's past. Unfortunately, my main character has a deep loathing for this other character and resulted in some rather one-sided rants and comments.
Characterization comes from actions, thoughts, words, and how other characters interact with other characters. Mira's (my main character) thoughts, actions, and comments all provided nice information about Sadira (the minor character), but I wanted a little more detail -- more proof that Mira just wasn't going off the deep end.
Thus, Tristan was born. His job was to interact with Sadira outside of Mira, and show that there was more to Sadira than what Mira was saying. But Tristan surprised me. His existence provided an unexpected insight into Mira's own past as she was forced to face some ugly skeletons that she had packed away.
Tristan continued to surprise me in many ways as the story unfolded. His single job was to act as foil to Sadira, but somewhere along the way he developed a complete personality, a soul, a moral fiber, a history, and in the end, a life of his own. By the end of the book, he surprised me yet again. Despite the fact that he appeared somewhat late in NIGHTWALKER, he became one of my favorite characters.
There are some writers that say the characters they create are just that, creations that will do their bidding. For me, my characters are so much more. If you know them well enough and breath enough life into them, then they become living, breathing entities with drives and ambitions and fears. I just try to act as a guide, push them in a direction and remind them of tasks that must be accomplished. How they get there and what they have to do to reach that point, it honestly feels like they decide on their own. There are times I am proud of them and others when they disappoint me, but they are always my family and friends.
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