Crafting Characters: Where to Begin

Shoe Tree in Utah

So this is the prodigal return of me. Is it possible to return to yourself? I'm not sure, but I do know I've been gone for far too long. And instead of boring you with my intrepid exploits and occasional lame excuses as to why I have been absent for so long I'd just jump right back into helping you improve your writing.

One thing I’ve learned in my absence is the importance of everyone's story. Think for just a moment about your own life and the stories which you have that have never been shared. It would be terrible if you died having not shared your story. So I want to make sure you become the best writer you can be so you will feel confident to share your story with the world or at the very least your loved ones.

For the next few written posts and some video posts I want to share with you how to create amazing characters. For this exercise take a look at the story you want to write, or perhaps the one you've already written but you feel your characters aren't developed as well as you'd like.

In any story you need at a minimum two characters:

1. Protagonist (good guy)
2. Antagonist (bad guy)

Carrying on the most basic idea here your protagonist wants to accomplish something and your antagonist wants to keep the protagonist from accomplishing said something. Now don't get hung up on the idea these two characters have to be two separate entities, they can be the same person, and it is possible your antagonist isn't a person at all. It could be possible for your antagonist to be the weather, or a great disaster, or even an illness.

The same goes for your protagonist. Just because your protagonist is the hero of the story it doesn't mean they have to wear a white hat. Your protagonist can be a terrible villain as long as your antagonist is an even viler villain. The whole point is not to limit you to one idea or mold.

Now you can see your options are limitless look again at your story. What type of person or thing inhabits the role of protagonist? Grab a blank sheet of paper and answer the following four questions about your protagonist:

1. What does your protagonist do in life?
2. If a person saw your protagonist for the first time what is one prominent feature they would recall?
3. What is your protagonist doing right now at this very moment in time?
4. What is the one thing your protagonist wants?

Was that hard? It’s okay if it was. The main purpose here is to get your mind moving and thinking creatively. Now, this type of exercise is not limited to fiction writing, if your story is a nonfiction memoir or biography this will help you understand yourself or subject at the time in question.

I want you to think about your antagonist. This is the person or thing that will be at odds with your protagonist and the meaner and more diabolical your antagonist is the more your reader will love it. In the United States we love our protagonist to be able to overcome in the end but don’t ever make it easy. 

Now turn the page over so you have a completely blank slate again and answer the following three questions:

1. What is the worst thing your antagonist has ever done in life?
2. If a person had met your antagonist before and was asked any question about them what type of feeling would they have and why?
3. Why is your antagonist compelled to see your protagonist fail?

Okay this is just the basic building blocks you need to start developing your characters. Next time we’ll start looking at what it takes to make a multidimensional character.

Ciao,

Clark

Back At It

I'm still alive and kicking over here in the desert. Right now it's so hot that my sweat is sweating. Honestly I went out and started a fire the other day just to cool down a little.
It has been too long and although I'm still not able to get videos uploaded I wanted to get back to blogging here. These past few weeks have been very eventful, I've been getting some feedback on my first manuscript which means that I'm getting another step closer to releasing Loves Deception.

Overall the feedback has been very positive which is great for me because I won't have as much to rewrite. Of course it's not perfect and there are some changes that must be made. I think the most interesting thing that I'm seeing in the feedback is that as the author I sometimes forget that the reader doesn't know all the background of the characters that I know. It's just like in life, you're explaining something and it makes perfect sense to you because you have all the background information but to the person you are explaining it to might be a bit lost and may even have to make large jumps over the holes in the information you are giving (or not giving).
So in writing, or in day to day conversation, it's really the same: be detail oriented. So how can you be more detail oriented in writing? Start with the scene set up:

• Where are your characters?
• What are they wearing?
• What time of day is it and how is the weather?

These seem so simple but can be easily overlooked as a writer because they are seen in our minds eye as we are writing and therefore are sometimes left out. As you are placing these set up details look for natural areas to place them. If you simply use the first page jotting down every detail you can have the opposite effect of helping your reader see what you see and instead they can become bombarded and actually tune out the details.
Next look at your character and plot details:

• Are your character's emotions showing?
• Is the plot moving forward?

Good detail will help to set up future chapters or can simply move the plot forward. If the detail you have in your chapters does neither it may be unnecessary or need additional detail added in.
I love watching movies but many times they cannot show you the deep emotion in a scene the same way that you can when you read it. Now with character emotions you can go one of two ways: tell what the character is feeling or show what they are feeling. Here are some examples:

Mabel's eyes lit up as she saw Henry enter the packed room.

vs.

As Mabel saw Henry enter the packed room she could feel the happiness wash over her.

Of course sometimes it might be better to have a combination of the two styles: 

  

Henry pulled the cell phone from his pocket; it was Jasper calling him. Henry's countenance dropped as it always did when Jasper called.

In this way you can show his emotion but tell that it happens often, the only way to show that it always happens would be to put several scenes in the story where it continued to happen and there may not always be room for that.

Try using both out to see which you like better.

Come back often as I will be revealing the last two characters in Loves Deception and keeping you posted on my writing and sharing tips to improve your writing.