Crafting Characters

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: every author I've ever met or read about has their own way of getting from Idea to Book. However, although I am still developing my own methods, I have to say that I learned a lot from exploring how others do what they do. There is no one author whose approach I have copied exactly, but through the others' experiences, I have been inspired to try many different things, some of which even seem to work pretty darn well.

In this post I'm going to discuss some of the ways I craft characters for my fantasy and sci-fi YA and MG books in the hopes that it will help other aspiring authors find their own way forward.

Note: I don't use all of these methods in every single book. Some of my characters are clear in my mind from the moment I begin while others need to be chiseled from nothing at all (and therefore require way more thought). And, inevitably, each and every character gets to a point where they make their own decisions, regardless of what you think you know about them. Treat these ideas as a way to get started. Just like real people can change and grow, so too can your characters.

People You Know

Now. I will say. You need to be careful about this one. I hope it comes as a surprise to my friends and family that I frequently base characters on people that I know. The reason it should be a surprise is that I can only see a person's most outward, obvious character traits, which I can then take to the extreme to create a compelling character. I take this approach when:

1. A scene needs a character, but I don't have any ideas for one. Using someone I already know will allow me to add in a side (or perhaps even a main) character that comes pre-populated (as it were) with a personality.
2. I need to be 100% clear what a character will do in any given moment. Choosing someone I know makes this easier. I often say out loud things like, "What would [REAL PERSON] do if faced with [SITUATION] and how can I apply that to [CHARACTER]?"
3. The setting is very specific, and therefore characters need to behave in a certain way. For example, the story is set at school, so I think back to actual situations and people from my own school days to dream up a believable character.

THE PERSON IS NOT THE CHARACTER. They are simply a jumping off point, a quick way to build a realistic picture in my head. By the time I'm done writing, they are completely different from the person I first thought to compare them to.

And no one is safe. If you know me, even distantly, you might have inspired one of my characters. I used this method in The Reality Warper quite a lot, if you feel like doing some digging to find yourself. . .

Characters You Like

This is almost exactly the same as the first one except that instead of using real people, you are using characters from other works. I don't need to tell you to be careful about copyright (I hope), but this usually doesn't end up being a problem. You're not using the same name as the inspiring character, just the idea of who they are. Your story is going to be different than any they've appeared in before, so they will behave in different ways. They might even end up looking different if the world you are writing about demands it. Again, it's simply a shortcut to creating a character whose basic reactions and motivations are clear from the beginning. My work-in-progress, Awake!, uses a mix of this method and the People You Know method mentioned above.

World-based Characterization

All the stories I write take place in new worlds with their own rules and weird little quirks. Sometimes, this helps with character outlines.

For example, in the new version of Awake! that I am working on, characters can belong to one of five different species and possess several magical abilities taken from a clearly defined list. (Originally, there were way more species and abilities to choose from, but in the interests of simplifying the story to make it more meaningful, I am cutting back on this a lot.)

In conjunction with the other methods, a structure like the above can be helpful in defining a character. For example, a mermaid who has to go swimming frequently to avoid drying out will react to the idea of a desert-based adventure very differently to a nymph who draws their power directly from the earth. If they have a magical ability that other people think is silly, you can ask yourself, "How would this character react to mockery?" which will result in a better understanding of your character (and, if you're lucky, a brand new plot point to throw into the mix).

In Earthquake House, another work-in-progress, characters are given very specific names at birth, such as Joy or Grace. They are then expected to act accordingly (e.g., always being joyful, always behaving gracefully, etc.) no matter what. Thinking about how each character would react to this rather limiting way of life was very helpful in creating nuances in my Earthquake House characters.

Personality Tests

Something else that was very helpful when planning Earthquake House was taking a personality test as each of my characters. Not every single one, of course, just the core cast. Generating a report for each of them helped me work out what their exact role in the story would be in the first draft. I didn't look at the tests again after that, but it gave my characters depth that I was missing in some of my other stories.

Don't answer the test questions as yourself, but rather as your character. Sometimes this can be hard, because your character is the exact opposite of who you are in real life, but mostly it's just a lot of fun. And some of the stuff that came out of the tests inspired me to add in little nuances and character flaws that made my characters a whole lot more interesting.

Notebook of Ideas

I carry a notebook with me for the express purpose of writing down any ideas I have that might, one day, form part of a story. I have more ideas than I'll ever be able to write (in fact, I've started sharing writing prompts on my Facebook page in the hope that someone will write the stories, even if I can't). Basically, I write down anything that makes my brain go, "Oh. How interesting/unique/hilarious." Sometimes these ideas grow into plots or sub-plots; sometimes they grow into entire characters.

But most often, they grow into character nuances.

To be believable, characters need to be unique in some way. The personality tests help with inspiration for this, but so does my notebook.

Let's say I want to write about a vampire. Everyone knows how vampires work, and once I've decided if mine is going to be the sparkly kind or the normal kind, I could call it a day. But maybe I want to take a little extra time to make my vampire stand out, be different.

I grab my notebook. I flick through it, stopping on random pages, until I find the following hastily scribbled notes:

• not-romantic vampire: Omnomnomnom!
• Vegetarian Vampire
• The reason you should also look out your back window when backing up is so you don't accidentally hit a (non-reflective) vampire
• Data vampires?

Yes, I do have a lot of vampire-related ideas, why do you ask? Those are all real, by the way. I rewrote them exactly as they are in my notebook.

One or more of these notes could allow me to take my vampire in a very clear, focused direction. Any one of these ideas could result in hundreds of completely different vampiric characters in the hands of different authors, and the best part is that incorporating these ideas doesn't need to affect your overall plot in any way--it just provides some direction for how your character exists within that plot.

In Conclusion

Characters are made up of a bunch of little inspirations that all decide to play together nicely. I spend ages and ages designing characters (as well as my plot and world-specific concepts) before I ever dare to write 'Chapter 1' on a page. And it's totally worth it. If you know exactly who you're writing about before you start writing, it makes everything so much easier.