Sunday, January 24, 2010

Characters

Characters are important. Without characters, we have no people doing things. It's hard to tell a story when there's no one in it.

Who are these people? What do they do? Where do they go after work? Are they happy? I find it easiest to write when I really know my character. I tend to think of situations that people get into, and then think of how my character would get out of them. It doesn't matter if the character would never actually be in that situation, just what would happen if he or she was in it.

We want to know, who are your characters? What brings them to life? What aspect of your characters do you wish you knew more about?

I'll start. At the moment, I'm working most closely with a teen-aged girl who's great-grand uncle (perhaps great grandfather, no one's entirely sure) founded the town in which she lives. She's frustrated at being a tour guide for everyone, and with her mother (though, what teenager isn't?). She's easily excited, though tries very hard to play it cool. And she wants desperately to be left alone.

I wish I knew where her father is; why he's missing. And why her mom is so bitter. I imagine the latter has something to do with the former, but I don't know.

What about you? Leave us some comments about your characters.

5 comments:

Miriam Forster said...

My new one is a 12-year-old Inuit boy who's trying to deal with the absence of his father and the new mining city that's just sprung up. It's a voice and a perspective that's totally different then anything I've done, but I'm having fun with it.

Anonymous said...

Millie is a young adult. She left her hometown at eighteen and vowed never to come back. She visits a psychiatrist once a month and has since she was fifteen. She had a rough childhood and is dealing with issues on a daily basis, although not successfully.

Sam Justice said...

My current main character? An ex-priest (betrayed by his gods). Context of the story aside its an interesting phychology to explore.

Unknown said...

My main character is a borderline paranoid schizophrenic falling in love with a covert-ops soldier. I love pairing characters together that have instant conflict.

Megan Justice said...

These are great characters. Keep em coming!

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