You don’t start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it’s good stuff, and then gradually you get better at it.
That’s why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence.
- Octavia E. Butler
Showing posts with label traits. Show all posts
Showing posts with label traits. Show all posts
Thursday, December 31, 2015
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By:
The Write Way Cafe
Writing Great Characters
The Write Way Café welcomes Augustina Van Hoven, who shares tips for making characters as real as the neighbors.
The heart of any story is its characters. No matter how interesting or compelling the plot, if the reader doesn’t connect with your characters, they will stop reading your book.
To be a memorable character your creation needs to feel like a real person, someone your reader wants to get to know and care about. I have found that creating a well-rounded character is a lot like building a house, the first thing you need is a good frame.
I like to begin by casting an actor or actress in the role of the character I need for my story. This person becomes the basic frame of my character. The handy thing about actors and actresses is that there are usually lots of pictures of them in various roles available on the internet. This way you get to see your characters different facial expressions and gestures. An actor, unless he is playing a character with a physical handicap, will walk a certain way; have a special set to his shoulders, a unique smile. These are all characteristics I can use to create the physical appearance of my character. An actor can dye his hair, wear makeup or contacts, and as a writer you can change or adjust any feature of your character. Remember the actor is merely a starting point. Any features or changes you make need to be carefully recorded on your character sheets. Readers notice when your hero’s eyes suddenly go from brown to blue.
The next part of a house is the walls and roof. For a character it is their personality traits and quirks. A good way to create this part of your character is to assign him or her a birthday and look up the personality traits associated with that day in horoscope books. This gives you a great list of traits like autocratic, passionate, fiery temper, introverted, sympathetic, a bully, respectful, etc. You get the idea. Add to this, skills and talents the character will need to survive in the world where your story takes place and you have a good foundation for his personality. Don’t forget to add flaws to your characters. No one is perfect; your character shouldn’t be either. A real person makes mistakes, has a temper, says something stupid or makes bad choices. Your characters need to do the same to be believable.
Finally, finishing the interior of the house, for a character, this is backstory. What needs to happen to your character in the past in order to turn them into the person they are at the beginning of your book? Each of us has a history of life experiences that have shaped us into the people we are today. It is the same for your character. The loss of a parent at a young age, surviving a house fire, being mugged, winning the lottery, major occurrences can shape a person in a positive or negative way. The events don’t necessarily need to be traumatic; they can be small like being the quiet one or the smart one in class. Regardless of what you decide to use, you need to record it on your character sheet and figure out how this will affect your characters actions and decisions in your book. Unless the back story is significant to the plot, it shouldn’t appear in the book, but you as an author need to know it.
The more you know about your character before you begin writing the easier it is to anticipate how they will react to the twists and stumbling blocks you put in their way. This also helps keep the story flowing in the right direction and eliminates major edits and rewrites.
A great character is a fictional person who is as real to the reader as the neighbor across the street. Someone she will cheer for, cry with, worry over and want to read about again and again.
Augustina Van Hoven
Proving Love is Strange
Website
Blog
Twitter: @augustinavhoven
FaceBook
Augustina Van Hoven was born in The Netherlands and currently resides in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, two dogs and three cats. She is an avid reader of romance, science fiction and fantasy. When she’s not writing she likes to work in her garden or in the winter months crochet and knit on her knitting machines.
The heart of any story is its characters. No matter how interesting or compelling the plot, if the reader doesn’t connect with your characters, they will stop reading your book.
To be a memorable character your creation needs to feel like a real person, someone your reader wants to get to know and care about. I have found that creating a well-rounded character is a lot like building a house, the first thing you need is a good frame.
I like to begin by casting an actor or actress in the role of the character I need for my story. This person becomes the basic frame of my character. The handy thing about actors and actresses is that there are usually lots of pictures of them in various roles available on the internet. This way you get to see your characters different facial expressions and gestures. An actor, unless he is playing a character with a physical handicap, will walk a certain way; have a special set to his shoulders, a unique smile. These are all characteristics I can use to create the physical appearance of my character. An actor can dye his hair, wear makeup or contacts, and as a writer you can change or adjust any feature of your character. Remember the actor is merely a starting point. Any features or changes you make need to be carefully recorded on your character sheets. Readers notice when your hero’s eyes suddenly go from brown to blue.
The next part of a house is the walls and roof. For a character it is their personality traits and quirks. A good way to create this part of your character is to assign him or her a birthday and look up the personality traits associated with that day in horoscope books. This gives you a great list of traits like autocratic, passionate, fiery temper, introverted, sympathetic, a bully, respectful, etc. You get the idea. Add to this, skills and talents the character will need to survive in the world where your story takes place and you have a good foundation for his personality. Don’t forget to add flaws to your characters. No one is perfect; your character shouldn’t be either. A real person makes mistakes, has a temper, says something stupid or makes bad choices. Your characters need to do the same to be believable.
Finally, finishing the interior of the house, for a character, this is backstory. What needs to happen to your character in the past in order to turn them into the person they are at the beginning of your book? Each of us has a history of life experiences that have shaped us into the people we are today. It is the same for your character. The loss of a parent at a young age, surviving a house fire, being mugged, winning the lottery, major occurrences can shape a person in a positive or negative way. The events don’t necessarily need to be traumatic; they can be small like being the quiet one or the smart one in class. Regardless of what you decide to use, you need to record it on your character sheet and figure out how this will affect your characters actions and decisions in your book. Unless the back story is significant to the plot, it shouldn’t appear in the book, but you as an author need to know it.
The more you know about your character before you begin writing the easier it is to anticipate how they will react to the twists and stumbling blocks you put in their way. This also helps keep the story flowing in the right direction and eliminates major edits and rewrites.
A great character is a fictional person who is as real to the reader as the neighbor across the street. Someone she will cheer for, cry with, worry over and want to read about again and again.
Augustina Van Hoven
Proving Love is Strange
WebsiteBlog
Twitter: @augustinavhoven
Augustina Van Hoven was born in The Netherlands and currently resides in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, two dogs and three cats. She is an avid reader of romance, science fiction and fantasy. When she’s not writing she likes to work in her garden or in the winter months crochet and knit on her knitting machines.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
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By:
HiDee
First Born Writer Mentality
I've always believed in WHEN I am published, not IF I am published. Although it's taking me longer to get there than I had anticipated, I am determined to make it. But what drives me?
I am the oldest – the first born, the "boss cow" of my family. Responsibilities and expectations (both real and probably imagined) sit on my shoulders like two little devils, pushing and pulling me in different directions. It's no wonder I hear voices in my head, but writing provides an outlet for them.
A Google search of first born personality traits turned up characteristics like confident, determined, born leader, organized, eager to please, peace-keeper, law abiding and conservative. On the opposite side? First borns tend to be self critical and bad at delegating. Yep, that pretty much describes me.
I believe in my writing ability, but I acknowledge that reaching my goal will take hard work. I'm determined to be like a sponge and soak up all the knowledge I can about writing. I read for the enjoyment of reading, but I also read to absorb techniques, to study how authors build their stories. What works and doesn't work for me as a reader? I can apply those lessons to my own writing.
As a writer, I can be the peace-keeper that I sometimes struggle to be in my daily life. I can write people into my stories and fix them. If someone is driving me crazy, I can make them a villain and direct all my anger and frustrations at them. If someone is just mixed up and needing a little nudge, I can help them overcome their problems and see the way to their future as either heroes and heroines or as secondary characters. Writing through issues that bug me can be very satisfying!
One down-side to being a first born is living the with the self-critical and bad at delegating traits, two traits I haven't been able to outgrow. I am often critical of myself, although I think it's honest criticism. I procrastinate by reading books and magazines, and I take writing workshops. I follow other writers on social media, and surfing the internet under the guise of research. I'm not good at delegating, either. Who was it that said if you want it done right, do it yourself? I get so caught up in wanting to do it right that I don't always get around to just DOING it, and that could be my downfall.
I'm stubborn. I tend to think I can do it all, without help from anybody. Stupid, I know, but such is the mentality of this first born. I like being capable. I like being a go-to person. Well, most of the time... It's hard to put aside that mentality and focus on doing what I need to do in order to reach that goal of becoming published.
How can I use these first born traits to better juggle daily responsibilities and expectations, and still reconcile them with living my busy life? Stacy Wiebe (Tips for Women Who Juggle Too Much) writes that our real need is to learn to live more effectively within our busy lives. She offers suggestions for organizing your life, setting goals, and figuring out what you value most. Says Wiebe, "But we always have a choice. We can run frantically all day, every day, and end up with a bag of used kitty litter or a parcel of unmerited panic. Or we can enjoy our life's journey, realizing there's a place on the path to run, to walk, to play…and to stand still."
I want to choose to enjoy life's journey. How about you?
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I am the oldest – the first born, the "boss cow" of my family. Responsibilities and expectations (both real and probably imagined) sit on my shoulders like two little devils, pushing and pulling me in different directions. It's no wonder I hear voices in my head, but writing provides an outlet for them.
A Google search of first born personality traits turned up characteristics like confident, determined, born leader, organized, eager to please, peace-keeper, law abiding and conservative. On the opposite side? First borns tend to be self critical and bad at delegating. Yep, that pretty much describes me.
I believe in my writing ability, but I acknowledge that reaching my goal will take hard work. I'm determined to be like a sponge and soak up all the knowledge I can about writing. I read for the enjoyment of reading, but I also read to absorb techniques, to study how authors build their stories. What works and doesn't work for me as a reader? I can apply those lessons to my own writing.
As a writer, I can be the peace-keeper that I sometimes struggle to be in my daily life. I can write people into my stories and fix them. If someone is driving me crazy, I can make them a villain and direct all my anger and frustrations at them. If someone is just mixed up and needing a little nudge, I can help them overcome their problems and see the way to their future as either heroes and heroines or as secondary characters. Writing through issues that bug me can be very satisfying!
One down-side to being a first born is living the with the self-critical and bad at delegating traits, two traits I haven't been able to outgrow. I am often critical of myself, although I think it's honest criticism. I procrastinate by reading books and magazines, and I take writing workshops. I follow other writers on social media, and surfing the internet under the guise of research. I'm not good at delegating, either. Who was it that said if you want it done right, do it yourself? I get so caught up in wanting to do it right that I don't always get around to just DOING it, and that could be my downfall.
I'm stubborn. I tend to think I can do it all, without help from anybody. Stupid, I know, but such is the mentality of this first born. I like being capable. I like being a go-to person. Well, most of the time... It's hard to put aside that mentality and focus on doing what I need to do in order to reach that goal of becoming published.
How can I use these first born traits to better juggle daily responsibilities and expectations, and still reconcile them with living my busy life? Stacy Wiebe (Tips for Women Who Juggle Too Much) writes that our real need is to learn to live more effectively within our busy lives. She offers suggestions for organizing your life, setting goals, and figuring out what you value most. Says Wiebe, "But we always have a choice. We can run frantically all day, every day, and end up with a bag of used kitty litter or a parcel of unmerited panic. Or we can enjoy our life's journey, realizing there's a place on the path to run, to walk, to play…and to stand still."
I want to choose to enjoy life's journey. How about you?
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