Creating Interesting Characters · 2018. 3. 6. · POV Examples: Third Limited • “A sudden roar startled Francis Bacon out of his thoughts, making him jump, his shoes actually

Creating Interesting Characters

Anna Castle

www.annacastle.com

http://www.annacastle.com/

Viewpoint, aka POV

Who’s telling this story?• Third person, omniscient: Knows all, sees all.

• Distancing for the reader.• Third person, limited: One person’s thoughts & perceptions.

• Can be very close or a little distant. (Be careful about vocabulary!)• Easy to shift POVs from scene to scene to give the reader greater access to the story.

• First person: “I” POV, also one person’s thoughts & perceptions. • Awkward to shift to other POVs.• The closest of all in terms of reader identification.

Anna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

POV Examples: Third Omniscient

“When Mr. and Mrs. Dursley woke up on the dull, gray Tuesday our story starts, there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mr. Dursley hummed as he picked out his most boring tie for work, and Mrs. Dursley gossiped happily as she wrestled a screaming Dudley into his high chair.”

-- Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone, J. K. Rowling


POV Examples: Third Limited

• “A sudden roar startled Francis Bacon out of his thoughts, making him jump, his shoes actually leaving the ground. He glanced to either side, hoping no one had seen him. Of course, the street was empty. The roar came from the cheers rising from the tiltyard where all of London celebrated Queen's Day with jousting and pageants. The world and its wife were there today, including everyone who mattered at court. Everyone, therefore, except him.”

• -- Murder by Misrule, Anna Castle


POV Examples: First Person

• “It was about eleven o’clock in the morning, mid October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard wet rain in the clearness of the foothills. I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handkerchief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark blue clocks on them. I was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and I didn’t care who knew it. I was everything the well-dressed private detective ought to be. I was calling on four million dollars.”

• -- The Big Sleep, by Raymond ChandlerAnna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

POV Examples: Second Person

“You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning. But here you are, and you cannot say the terrain is entirely unfamiliar, although the details are fuzzy. You are at a nightclub talking to a girl with a shaved head. The club is either Heartbreak or the Lizard Lounge. All might become clear if you could just slip into the bathroom and do a little more Bolivian Marching Powder. Then again, it might not. A small voice inside you insists that this epidemic lack of clarity is a result of too much of that already.”-- Bright Lights, Big City, Bret Easton Ellison


Choosing a point of view

• Omniscient is no longer fashionable, with a few exceptions.• Genres have traditions, aka reader expectations.• First person: cozy mysteries, noir, horror.

• NOT romance – typically balances hero & heroine POVs throughout.

• Third person: romance, most other genres, including literary.• Second person: a tour de force for very stylish literary readers only.


Finding your protagonist in Theme

• What sort of person is most affected by the psycho-socio-cultural-political situation you’re exploring?

• Who best exemplifies the problem that interests you?• OR, who can best interpret what’s happening for the reader?• Ex: 1984, by George Orwell. About totalitarianism. Protagonist Winston

Smith is an Everyman – a typical victim of the dystopian world.


Finding your protagonist in Setting

• Who is central to your setting? A queen, a pirate, a revolutionary…• Ex. Karen Harper’s Queen Elizabeth mystery series

• Who exemplifies your setting? A renaissance man, a street-smart detective…• Ex. Anna Castle’s Francis Bacon mystery series

• Who can best interpret events for the reader?• Ex. Tolkein’s hobbits. Most of the LotR is about Aragorn and Gandalf.

• Historical fiction are fantasy are often built up from the setting.


Finding your protagonist in Genre

• Westerns: cowboys, ranchers, school marms…• Romance: hero, heroine, whoever’s keeping them apart

• H&H are often opposites at the start• Science fiction: scientists, engineers, pilots, aliens• Fantasy: humans with/without powers, magical beings, other creatures• Mystery: sleuths, villains, sidekicks, law enforcement, suspects• Sub-genres have conventions (reader expectations) too. Use them!Anna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

Building a character: Models

• Yourself: Ultimately, in some sense, they’re all you.• People you know: Take a trait from Susie and an attitude from Sam.• Historical figures: Biographies leave plenty of room for the imagination.• Famous fictional characters

• **** Make sure they’re in the public domain!!!!!!


Building a character: Schemes

• Personality type schemes can be useful, if taken with plenty of salt.• Especially good for secondary characters, to be sure they contrast.

• Myers-Briggs• Enneagrams• Astrology• Medieval humors (melancholic, sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic)• My favorite source for antagonists: Albert J. Bernstein’s Emotional Vampires.Anna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

Building a character: Checklists

• Guide for using checklists: Skip anything that doesn’t inspire you.• Most of them won’t apply to your story AT ALL. But you could use them as

an inspiration to make your own character checklist, which could be very useful. Who has what skills, what offices, what powers…

• http://www.writersdigest.com/writing-articles/by-writing-goal/improve-my-writing/developing-your-hero-and-heroine


http://www.writersdigest.com/writing-articles/by-writing-goal/improve-my-writing/developing-your-hero-and-heroine

Character essentials

• Add these things to your character bible so you can keep it all straight.• Appearance: age, gender, eye & hair color, height & weight, body type, shape

of face, nose, ears, fingers, style of walk…• Behavior: nervous, calm, athletic, phlegmatic…• Mental qualities: quick-witted, dull, slow-thinking, impulsive, aggressive…• Characteristic dress, skills, talents, magical powers… • NAMES! Put quality time into choosing all the names.Anna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

Capsule biographies

• Lots of fun, so don’t spend much time on these! Sit down and rattle it off.• They can help you make choices down the road.• They can help you reach into the character’s past for those telling details.

• Character history timeline: useful reminder of what happened when.• Relevant family members: Parents? Siblings? Aunts & uncles?• Education• Work historyAnna Castle, Creating Interesting Characters, Pflugerville Book Pfestival, Apr. 29, 2017

Motivation is a must

• Stories are about someone trying to achieve or prevent something – to make something happen that changes their lives and possibly their world.

• We don’t want to read about passive people! We want protagonists who make plans and execute them.

• Even if your hero has been dragged reluctantly into the story, she/he/it/they must be active players once the game is afoot.

• And don’t make us wait too long for that, please!


Motivation motors• A long (sometimes funny) list of TV Motivation Tropes:

• http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MotivationIndex

• Childhood trauma, angst, deepest fears.• These characters are motivated by avoidance. “I shall never go hungry again!”• Make sure the trauma fits your drama! (Genre-appropriate.)

• Goals, dreams, desires• All my characters have important dreams that animate their lives.• Scale to your story (open a shop, conquer the galaxy).

• Moral imperatives: code of honor, an oath, a calling…


Antagonists

• Story is conflict. Could be the weather, but it’s usually an Opponent.• Just like protags in terms of basics (hair color), bios, personality types.• Bad guys are SELFISH. It’s not so much what they do, but why.• Make sure your Antagonist is worthy of your Protagonist.• My Holmes catches bad guys, but for ego: intellectual curiosity & grandiosity.• My Moriarty breaks the law, but only to help people who have no other way.


Supporting cast: Love interests

• Optional, but highly desirable.• Audience expects everyone to want love, so at least think of a way to touch base

with your protagonist’s libido. Is your nun frustrated? Relieved? Sadder but wiser owing to a long-ago love affair?

• LI can be an ally, an enemy, a character that takes things sideways…• Connect the LI to a goal or fear of the protagonist. If he aspires to be a gentleman,

maybe she’s a lady. If she fears humiliation, maybe he’s the sharpest wit in town.

• Love Interest often drives a sub-plot that shows another side of our protagonist.


Supporting cast: Allies

• Friends: moral support, tough love, truth…• Experts: forensic scientists, senior witches, engineers…

• Someone to explain the essentials of your story world to your protagonist.

• Sidekicks: sergeants, siblings, talking pets…• Someone to be the protagonist’s sounding board.

• Mentors: crucial advice at the critical moment.


Supporting cast: Opponents

• Henchpersons: the minions of the antagonist or minion wannabes.• Limiters: parents, administrators, senior officers…• Gatekeepers: all roads to success have tolls and thus toll-collectors.

• Galadriel tested your will to proceed. Shelob wanted to eat you.

• Accidental obstacles: bunglers, meddlers, fools… • … who may think they’re perfectly competent and in fact, indispensable.


Mix & Maximize

• Castle’s Law of the Conservation of Characters: • Don’t add more than you need. No set number, but make each one earn their keep.• Introduce them a few at a time, like the dwarves in The Hobbit.

• Combine functions: friends who are experts, lovers who are obstacles…• Rhett Butler is Scarlet’s Love Interest and also her opponent.• Ron knows the wizarding world; Hermione knows all the book lore.


Everyone’s a star

• Every character has their own motivations: fears, dreams, moral imperatives.• Every character has their own agenda – even if they’re ostensibly there to

serve the protagonist. (Why are they willing? What do they get out of it?)

• Every character is the star of their own story (which you’re not writing.)• The Chaos Character: a friend (maybe) who has a driving agenda of their

own which disrupts the main plot. Can be funny or dark.• Saruman turned out to be building his own evil empire, not helping fight Sauron.


Scale to Fit

• Stories have an emotional tenor: dark-------------------------------------light.• Stories have a scope: galactic----------------------------------------------domestic.• Make sure your characters and their motivations fit those scales.

• Your cozy protagonist might have a snarky ex-boyfriend, but she was never raped in a dark alley. But your unstoppable thriller hero should be driven by something a lot worse than a few cutting remarks in high school!

Thanks, y’all! Send your questions to [email protected]


mailto:[email protected]://www.annacastle.com/

Creating Interesting CharactersViewpoint, aka POVPOV Examples: Third Omniscient�POV Examples: Third LimitedPOV Examples: First PersonPOV Examples: Second PersonChoosing a point of viewFinding your protagonist in ThemeFinding your protagonist in SettingFinding your protagonist in GenreBuilding a character: ModelsBuilding a character: SchemesBuilding a character: ChecklistsCharacter essentialsCapsule biographiesMotivation is a mustMotivation motorsAntagonistsSupporting cast: Love interestsSupporting cast: AlliesSupporting cast: OpponentsMix & MaximizeEveryone’s a starScale to Fit

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Creating Interesting Characters · 2018. 3. 6. · POV Examples: Third Limited • “A sudden roar startled Francis Bacon out of his thoughts, making him jump, his shoes actually