I’ve hit 20k+ words today! It’s more than I wrote last year but let’s not talk about last year. Ah, it feel so good. Plus, I didn’t have to make up petty arguments like yest…
Source: Stories Thrive In Conflict
Tag: characters
A night out and some progress
I feel like I’m repeating information. Or that all my writing is a word vomit. I hope this feeling goes away. It doesn’t help that I was out tonight and by “out” I mean more…
Source: A night out and some progress
Character Motivation
I have talked about having motivation to write but there’s an even bigger motivation that you have to keep in mind. Hence, the title. A few months ago I was told that one of my characters was lacking motivation. My reader couldn’t tell why (let’s call her Person A) she was putting herself in danger. Since Person A is the lead in this story, I knew that this was a very serious problem. How can I engage with the reader if they don’t know why my characters acts the way she does?
It’s not like I didn’t interrogate Person A until her ears bled. I knew all about her childhood trauma and even took step to mention that in the story. I even wrote a short story about her childhood trauma. That information ended up lacking and I’m very glad that someone pointed it out to me. An extra pair of eyes is always helpful.
The way I fixed this situation was by typing some lines that literally said why my character was putting her life in danger. I made it seem like she was also having her own moments of doubts before realizing her motivation. This might seem like the easiest – in my humble opinion- route to take but sometimes you can’t get away with it. Sometimes you just have to rethink your character or your plot. Actually, I hope this works out. If not, I have to go back and write an write a scene that gives more information about Person’s A motivation.
Don’t get me wrong. There are a lot of types of motivation; inner and outer motivation, villain motivation, etc. Not only does motivation give a deeper sense of who the character is but it also helps move the plot forward. If the character has a clear goal then most of the plot should fall in. Motivation and plot go hand in hand.
So if your character’s motivation doesn’t come across, it’s best to take a step back and dig a bit deeper and ask why. I found this cool link here that has a lot of other links for character development and questionnaires. Enjoy.
Magazine Shopping
Have you ever browsed through a magazine and cut out images because they’re your favorite though you can’t afford them? Or your teacher asked you to cut out your future goals for a grade. Either way, at one point or another, we all have looked through a magazine.
But Kassandra, what does that have to do with writing? Here’s my answer: everything.
I used to collect lot of old magazines from school and bring them home. Every day I would go through them and cut out images that I liked and what I wanted to have. However, it was only after that I started cutting out images for my characters. I would glue the images to a sheet a paper under a specific name. What would so and so wardrobe look like? What about their homes? What could they buy? What do they wish they could buy?
All these questions helped me build my characters economic background. The way a character dresses, where they buy, etc. reveals a lot to a reader without telling them. With those images, I created a life for my characters that I could see and describe in my writing. That way, not only could I use the magazines after I finished looking through them but that activity allowed me to expand the way I create characters. It’s a fun and creative process to bring back the enjoyment – in my opinion- to creating characters.
While there are many articles and websites about character development, I like to believe that playing dress-up and house with your character is just as helpful.
Do you know any other non traditional ways to build our characters? What process do you use? Leave your answers in the section below. Thanks for reading.
Until next time.
What’s in a name?
For the past week or so, I’ve been working on a short story for one of my writing classes. This story is part of a fantasy series that I want to write in the future. It is, however, the back story of my main male protagonist. I knew, in general, what happened to my character and I had no problem starting the story.
However, I made a mistake. I knew his name but I didn’t know anybody else’s and that was a problem. I stopped writing and was completely stumped. Like most writers, I went online and used name generators, specifically for fantasy, and spent almost half an hour generating names. Some didn’t feel right and they didn’t sound right. The names and the characters didn’t click. There was no chemistry between the two.
If we take an example from the real world, so to speak, we use names for almost everything. We name our toys, our teddy bears, family members. Names are important and we wouldn’t pick a bad name for the people and things that we value and love. Characters are no different. As writers (even if you’re not a writer), we spend a lot of time thinking about the perfect name.
Personally, I think of my characters as my children and that’s why I couldn’t name my secondary characters by any name. They hold value to me and the story. Maybe it’s because I’ve been editing lately and haven’t been “creating” anything but this made me realize that, just because secondary characters aren’t the main attraction, they need love as well. They need as much attention as your main characters.
A lesson I learned in my my writing life is to not create characters that you’re not going to use. Not only do they seem flat and waste space in your story, it makes for ‘bad’ writing. As writers, we want to stay away from elements that affect our writing negatively. With that mind, don’t rush naming your characters. Sometimes they name themselves.
Has there ever been a time when you’ve antagonize over your characters’ names? What’s your process? Does it get any easier?
Dabbling in the Art of Writing 