 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Author Interviews | Illustrator Interviews |
| Writing Tips | Illustration Tips | Poetry Tips |
| Play Writing Tips | Author Websites |
Writing Tips:
Characters
For me the voice of my characters is the most important thing to master. Are they fifteen years old but speak like a middle-aged man? Are they thirty and sound like they’re ten? Ensuring that your characters’ voices are credible is crucial. Once you have captured their voice, then their habits, flaws, motivations, likes, dislikes etc fall into place. Be very careful that your characters make plausible decisions. Many stories fail because the character acts in a way that is just not realistic. One can still be creative without defying some basic laws of human nature. |
Randa Abdel-Fattah offers
tips on: Characters
Think of yourself in different moods – sometimes you are angry, or quiet, or stubborn, or happy-go-lucky. Build a character around a particular mood of yours. Remember although people are different on the outside, on the inside we’re very much the same. Give your character a questionnaire to learn more about them – what shoes do they wear, what’s their favourite drink? Favourite music? What is their deepest fear |
The reader has to be able to believe in them. Whether they're good or bad, strange or sinister or funny, they have to behave as real people would. And I think their names are important. You can say a lot about a character from the word go by finding the right name. |
I write a brief biography (a few pages) of all my major characters. That way they become real people to me. A lot of the information I include might never be used but it helps me to get to know my protagonists. As well as physical descriptions, I write down things |
They're the main ingredients of your story. If your characters are right, they will determine the plot for you. They will tell you where they want to go and what they want to do. See them, hear them, get to know their thoughts and feelings. The more you do that, the more they will enrich the story and the more they will act in a believable way. |
Characters are really important to me. The whole story starts with them – while I’m writing they are totally real to me. I might be writing one book when a new character appears in my head… and I know that a whole new book is about to unfold. I get ideas for characters from all around me – kids I see in the street, even! It’s fun to try on a whole new personality and ‘become’ someone different. You have to really believe your characters if they are going to convince the reader. |
I would have ONE main character and often I base this character on different aspects of ME. In one book my main character was a hypochondriac (thought she was ill all the time) I was like this as a teenager. In another book one of my characters hits out at another child with a recorder. I did this when I was a young child. |
Try to make them memorable, not just a 'typical' teenager or a 'typical' mum. Give them little quirks, even the minor characters. For example, your hero's dad might only appear in a few scenes, but you could do something like make him a terrible driver, for example. Then you've got a chance to add a bit of humour. |
Try to make all the characters interesting and strong, different from one another, not just a voice saying things. You can practise this by writing lists about people you know well, their looks, their behaviour, their clothes, their way of walking etc, then of people who you just notice in the street or on the bus, and then of made-up characters. I think if the reader feels they know the character and understands them, then they care about them and want to know what happens to them by reading on - even if your character is the villain! Make them live! |
If you don’t find that these ‘grow’ under the pen as you write, there is a problem. If you take enough trouble over a book, they will always get deeper and richer as you go along. |
Don’t tell your readers what your characters are like. Show them. The best way is by showing how your characters speak (dialogue) and how they react under stress. The verbs you chose are vital here. A frightened character stutters, stammers, babbles. A confident one drawls. |
Have no more than three in a story. |
It often helps to base characters on people you know. But never use teachers! |
For me, creating characters is the best part of the whole business. It feels a very powerful thing to do - to create a living, breathing person on the page that everyone believes in. You want a character that the reader recognises because he/she is sufficiently life-like and yet one that's a little larger than life -funnier, more outrageous, more evil - so that he/she lives on in the reader's imagination, that's what you're aiming for. |
I have never fully based a single character on a single person from real life. I’ve come close. Normally, when something looks like a story to me, it comes out of one distinctive characteristic of a life I have known. The sad, nomadic existence of the title character of GYPSY DAVEY was like that. But then I take that part of the real person I have known and I combine it with all manner of other physical and psychological details to fit the story I need to tell. One should not feel committed to drawing pixel-perfect representations of real people when a mix-and-match version will tell your story better. Fiction, by having more freedom to manoeuvre, can often be truer than reality. |
Characers are so important. Character creates story - Imagine you're trapped in a lift with the worst bully in the school who turns out to be claustrophobic. Or with the annoying friend who talks too much. Or the daredevil who wants to climb onto the roof to try to get help. Same scenario, different stories because of different characters. |
Somebody could write an encyclopedia on how to come up with characters, and not cover a fraction of the subject. The best way to start creating characters is to use personality traits of people you know, or work with. There are an infinite number of quirks and mannerisms that you can add to a character, but understanding how they tick is the first thing you need to know. What they love, why they do the things they do, what they're scared of, etc. Study the people around you, learn to enjoy the differences between people, and savour the little things that they do that make them who they are. |
Make sure you give them lots of problems right away and also make them desperate for something. If you do both of these things they are likely to be interesting. |
I wouldn't have too many characters in one story. Make sure they are clearly distinct from each other - and don't give them similar names. Try to think of something they would say or do that really captures who they are. Then instead of just describing your character to the reader you can show the character in action and speech. |
Needs to be believable - narrators must make the reader care about their story. Give them personalities, quirks, histories. Try to think like them when you write. This applies to all characters and what do they look like/wear/eat/speak like? Badly drawn characters can ruin good stories. |
Just like plots, characters have to be believable and consistent. They have to seem like real people. If they do not, then the reader ceases to believe, and your story will fail. So think about them as if they were real. |
Make sure the main characters lead the story. When people first start writing fiction they often make the mistake of coming up with a brilliant plot and then having the characters act it out. In my opinion a story never works unless the characters come to life. |
These are my favourite things. I get so involved with my characters that I can picture them as real people and imagine what they would say or do in any circumstance. I think you have to believe in your characters and feel passionately about them if you don’t you cannot expect a reader to engage with them. I love creating new characters and find it difficult to limit myself to one character’s voice in my books, which is why I end up with more than one person telling the story. |
Make them real. The best way to do this is to get to know them yourself. Make sure you know more about them than you put in your stories. Think about what they might have been like when they were younger; how they got where they are now; what motivates them; how they would behave in different circumstances etc. |
|
 |
|
| SFW 7 - 11 Area | Staff Login | SFW Stay Safe Area |
Logout from SFWstoriesfromtheweb@birmingham.gov.uk 'Stories from the Web' is a Reader Development Programme managed by Birmingham Libraries Click here for Subscribing Partner Authorities Web site hosted by UKOLN at: COPYRIGHT © Stories from the Web
|
