R.M. Archer's Blog, page 54

Roleplaying and Character Development

First, an explanation of roleplaying

Roleplaying, in short, is when usually when you and another author (or other authors) put your characters together in a situation and see what happens and how the characters react and interact. There are two main ways that roleplaying is done. One is more like you’re writing a story together; it’s written like a story and you simply take turns writing out scenes from your character’s POV (in third person, so it doesn’t get confusing). The other way, which I personally prefer because it’s looser, is to write it more like the character interviews I do here on the blog, where things are written in a more conversational style with the character indicated by their name before an action or piece of dialogue and actions within asterisks.

To show these more clearly, a line from Roleplay Type A would look like this:

Bren walked up to Orian, punching him in the nose. “How dare you! My parents did nothing wrong! You darn faeries are the problem, with all your stuffy rules and intolerance of anyone else. You’re in no position to demean me or my family.”

While Roleplay Type B would look like this:

Bren: *walks up to Orian and punches him in the nose* How dare you! My parents did nothing wrong! You darn faeries are the problem, with all your stuffy rules and intolerance of anyone else. You’re in no position to demean me or my family.

And usually Type B has more dialogue and less description, while Type A has roughly the same balance as a novel. Like I said, I prefer Type B because it’s looser and there’s not usually an ongoing story that you’re going to mess up if you don’t have time to RP a lot or have to go in the middle of a scene, you can simply make your character vanish and you’re good to go. Given that this is the style I’m more accustomed to, this is the one I’ll be using in this post.

How roleplaying helps character development.

I used to roleplay more than I do now, as several of the members of my NaNoWriMo writing group can tell you. I’ve pegged it as a time-suck (which, to some extent, it is) and decided that “real writing” is more important. But given the fact that A) it’s more useful than you might think and B) I procrastinate like heck on my writing anyway, I should probably get back into it at least for briefer spans of time, because it’s great for character development. How is that?

When you roleplay, you’re throwing your characters into a (usually fairly random) scenario, sometimes in a type of setting they’ve never even seen before, much less interacted with. For instance, throwing a high fantasy character into a modern-day mall. Culture shock much? Since there are so few limitations, you can see how your characters interact in various places and learn about their character through that. Plus, they may find that they love cream soda or jellybean burritos.

In addition to a new setting, your roleplay characters interact with a myriad of new characters, which is always interesting. Some of them decide they want to kill each other, some fall in love, some become good friends… It’s really interesting to see the interplay between the characters, and it gives you a lot of insight into your own characters when you find out that, “Oh, that one character who doesn’t show a like or dislike of anyone is a lot looser when she’s only with a pet,” or “Oh, that character can actually flirt. (Who knew?)” Plus, sometimes your characters become looser with other roleplay characters than they are with you, and then you find out how tragic their backstory really is, or that they’re actually a huge softie under all that calculating logic, or that they like to tinker with watches.

Roleplaying just overall brings out a lot of character that would otherwise be hidden, and you can learn a lot of fun stuff about your characters. So see if you can find a friend to RP with and have fun letting your characters surprise you. :) (P.S. It’s even more fun if you can RP with characters you aren’t familiar with, because then you learn about those characters at the same time, and you’re less likely to let your knowledge of them decide how your characters react.)

Character Interview: Solem Anders

Solem Anders is the main character of my short story collection The Mirror-Hunter Chronicles, which I describe as Disney meets A Series of Unfortunate Events, which I plan to publish a week from today. (But so far my plans haven’t gone according to plan, so we’ll see.) The first story can be read here. I hope you enjoy his interview. :)

 

Solem: *comes in and sits down*

Interviewer: Good morning. How are you today?

Solem: I could be better, but such is often the case.

Interviewer: I suppose that’s true. What is your name?

Solem: Solem Maran Anders.

Interviewer: How old are you?

Solem: I’m thirty-two.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Solem: No. Just a cousin. I was once close to him like a brother, but I haven’t seen him in twelve years.

Interviewer: What happened to him?

Solem: He moved away. He needed an escape from Ambrel.

Interviewer: Why is that?

Solem: Because a magic mirror is quite unhealthy to live around for a long time. I would never recommend it. Nasty things, magic mirrors.

Interviewer: You’ve done research, then?

Solem: You could say that. Two years of in-depth study, along with having one in my basement for another ten… You could call that research, I suppose. At present, however, I’m hunting one down to ensure that it doesn’t do any more damage than it already has.

Interviewer: Is that your job, then, at present?

Solem: I was a part-time merchant, but after the mirror was stolen I had to give that up entirely. I may come back to it once this whole mess is over and the mirror has been destroyed. *winces at that last word*

Interviewer: What is your favorite book?

Solem: Anything without a magic mirror.

Interviewer: Favorite animal?

Solem: Griffins. They’re quite useful when it comes to expedient travel.

Interviewer: Do you have any time for hobbies?

Solem: Not at this point.

Interviewer: Which is most important to you: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Solem: Intelligence. If you don’t have that you may find yourself stealing a magic mirror that could very well kill you.

Interviewer: And honesty or selflessness?

Solem: Selflessness. Although neither is particularly appealing. Sometimes you have to be dishonest to take care of someone, so clearly not honesty, but selflessness is far too taxing. I’d be content to complete this one mirror-hunting task and then return home and lock myself away from the world for all time, never having to deal with another human being again.

Interviewer: What’s something you can’t leave the house without?

Solem: A small axe. Self-defense is important, plus I might be needed to cut down a giant beanstalk again or shatter a mirror into a million pieces.

Interviewer: That was the last question. Thank you for your time.

Solem: *nods and leaves*

A Quick Blog Update

So there are a few new things happening lately. Obviously I changed my blog theme a week ago, and I’ve been working since at updating all of my post images to match that new theme (I’m getting close to finished with that). I really like the new theme, I think it fits a lot better and looks a lot nicer, and apparently it’s bringing in a lot of new traffic from Pinterest. Thank you Pinterest and everyone who’s reading my blog.

In other blog-related news, I’m sorry I haven’t been able to put up short stories the past two weeks. Because I’m so consistently having trouble with Short Story Sundays, and short stories in general, I’ve decided to cancel those – unless on a certain week I really want to do a short story – and replace them with Story Snippet Sundays (sorry, I had to keep the alliteration) and share excerpts from my novel. Thoughts on that change? Do you like the excerpt idea or would you rather I just let it go altogether?

In book-related news… I’m published! As of Thursday, my Short Story Collection Vol. 1 became available on Amazon in paperback for $8.99. It will be available for Kindle in the near future (I don’t have a set date yet), but for now it’s only available in paperback. Stay tuned and I’ll let you know when it’s available for Kindle, too. Buy in paperback here.

How to Write Families & Siblings

When writing families and siblings, there’s a certain dynamic to the relationships. It’s teasing, mean, loving, protective… it’s about a million things all wrapped up at once. Those of you with siblings will know what I mean. Keep in mind that the tips below might not fit quite all the families that populate your stories, so use your judgement, but they’ll fit the vast majority.

They Fight

Yes, family members fight. All the time. Some of them fight more often than others, which tends to be proportionate to how much they’re around each other. How well personalities mesh or don’t has as much affect in families as it does in other relationships.

I fight with my mom more than my dad (waaaay more), and I fight with my closest younger sister more than any of my other siblings. With my mom it’s because we don’t get each other. We have serious issues seeing from the other person’s point of view or even just listening to each other in an argument. My dad is something of a translator when we get into spats. Think about who in your fictional family fights more, why, and who steps in to help.

Another thing to keep in mind is that arguments often repeat themselves. By this I mean both that the argument itself is often repeated on numerous occasions, and also that people arguing tend to repeat themselves, sometimes in subtly different ways, either to twist the meaning of their words or to try to be more clearly understood by the opposite party. But it’ll likely be more pertinent to your story to think about what the recurring arguments are among family members and why they haven’t been resolved yet.

They Work It Out

There’s always some resolution to an argument. They may end up storming out to cool down first, but then they come back, it’s put to rest (at least for a bit; it may be one of those recurring arguments), and all is good again. Particularly if an argument is merely a misunderstanding, it’s easy to forgive once the kinks have been sorted out.

Now, there are some arguments (particularly if they’re recurring) that may be harder to resolve than others. One person may not want to budge on their argument, and may have to be pushed to forgive or apologize. Think about which fights would be easier or harder to resolve and who would be more or less stubborn in the situations. Also think about how they might resolve it. Would they simply stop talking and let that be the end of it? Would they hug the other person to sort of prove that they’re forgiven?

If a Non-Family Member Tries to Pick on a Sibling, They’re There in a Heartbeat

Siblings. We pick on each other, we tease, sometimes we’re even kind of mean. But if another person picks on our sibling? We’re there in an instant ready to defend them to our last breath. We are the only ones allowed to pick on our siblings. Aside from maybe really close friends who are like siblings, because they’re just special.

We had a friend a while back who would constantly pick on my little sister (she comments as Siberia on here). Now, Siberia and I rarely get along (unless it’s the middle of the night and we’re supposed to be asleep but instead we’re chatting up a storm), but when said friend would pick on her and was mean to her, I would fight for her and sometimes even make sure she or both of us left so it didn’t happen any more.

Siblings are weird.

Families are Often Dysfunctional

No matter how perfect a family may seem from the outside, if you go and live with them for a week I guarantee you’ll see issues. No family is perfect. Some of us are downright dysfunctional and feel like we’re always a mess and aren’t doing anything right. But a dysfunctional family is not necessarily a broken family or a bad family. We love each other, even when it doesn’t seem like it. We all have our faults and flaws, and we all know exactly how to push each other’s buttons, but we get through all the fights, all the disagreements, all the mess. Because we’re a family. Don’t forget to give a family flaws and errors. Unless they’ve been doing this for a really long time, they haven’t figured everything out. Maybe they haven’t figured out anywhere close to everything. But don’t let that alone make them worthless.

Family Doesn’t Have to Be Blood

I’ve been talking about and using examples from my blood family up to this point, but a family doesn’t have to be blood, and sometimes blood isn’t family. Using Catessa from The Last Assassin as a prime example, her family for the majority of her life was a ragtag bunch of assassins. She was orphaned as a baby, and finally at age six the leader of the Cron Hatal assassins’ guild took her in and added her to his family there. Now, some of the members really were related – there were brothers who were the leader’s nephews, and the other girl had a son – but they weren’t family for their blood relations, they were family for the way they took care of each other and were always there for each other and saw all the faults and flaws and still loved each other. Catessa’s birth family never became family to her, even after she found them. She finally became friends with her half-brother, but she was never as close to him as to the assassins. Her birth family may have been related to her by blood, but they never became her family. Her family was always that hobbled-together group of assassins.

“Ohana means family, and family means no one gets left behind.” I feel like that’s a pretty good motto for this post. What do you think? Is there anything I missed? Who’s your favorite fictional family? Let me know down in the comments.

Book Review: Colors of Fear by Hannah Heath

Okay, so it took me way too long to finally get around to reading any of Hannah’s books (I’ve been meaning to read Skies of Dripping Gold for ages. I’ve actually scheduled that one now, lol.), but she is one of my favorite bloggers and when her newest short story came out (February 2) I jumped on it, lol. I bought it, read it, and then was super bummed when it ended. But anyway, review…

This is a short story, so there’s not a whole lot to it as far as words go, but it’s a really rich story despite how brief it is. I was immediate invested in the main character and his family, and the portrayal of his emotions was incredibly well-written. The orange-haired elf also fascinated me, and I really wanted to see more of her.

The world was just as enthralling as the characters. Even though you see only a tiny piece of the world in this story, you can tell how deep and rich the world is, and how different it is from most fantasy worlds. Even tiny things like the scars bring so much depth and realism. The use of color, almost like synesthesia, was also really intriguing.

I was disappointed when this ended because I absolutely loved the world and characters, and I can’t wait for The Stump of the Terabinth Tree to come out.

Character Interview: Tristan Wickersham

Tristan Wickersham is the main character of This Is His Story, a short story which I’m set to publish on the 14th. He’s a hopeless romantic, a singer, and a widower.

Tristan: *enters the room and sits down, a bit stiff*

Interviewer: Hello, Tristan. How are you today?

Tristan: *smiles a bit* I’m doing all right. How are you?

Interviewer: I’m fine. Shall we begin?

Tristan: *nods*

Interviewer: What is your name?

Tristan: Tristan Nobel Wickersham.

Interviewer: How old are you?

Tristan: I’m seventy-one.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Tristan: My younger sister Scarlett passed away two years ago, and my older brother Gabriel seven years ago. *he maintains his expression, mostly, but you can see pain in his eyes and his lower lip trembles slightly*

Interviewer: I’m sorry to hear that.

Tristan: *nods*

Interviewer: *pauses, waiting until Tristan’s ready*

Tristan:*only allows a short pause before speaking* We can move on, if you’d like.

Interviewer: Do you have a job?

Tristan: Not at present. I retired a few years ago.

Interviewer: What did you do before that?

Tristan: I worked at a bookstore.

Interviewer: That sounds like an interesting job. You like to read, then?

Tristan: I love it. *smiles*

Interviewer: Do you have a favorite book?

Tristan: Oh, it’s so hard to choose.*chuckles* Perhaps The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. It’s a very old book, but a good one.

Interviewer: I agree. How old is it for you?

Tristan: About 3,700 years.

Interviewer: Wow. Did you enjoy the movies?

Tristan: *nods* They were well done.

Interviewer: Do you have a favorite movie?

Tristan: From The Lord of the Rings or in general?

Interviewer: In general.

Tristan: The Princess Bride.

Interviewer: What are some of your hobbies?

Tristan: Singing, composing, reading… Those are the main things.

Interviewer: Which of these is most important to you: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Tristan: Kindness. Bravery comes in close second.

Interviewer: And honesty or selflessness?

Tristan: Selflessness. Honesty will fall into place if you have selflessness.

Interviewer: What’s something you can’t leave the house without?

Tristan: My MP3 player. I love listening to music wherever I go.

Interviewer: All right. That’s the last question. Thank you for your time. *smiles*

Tristan: Thank you for having me. *shakes the interviewer’s hand before leaving*

How to Write Grief, Stress, and Overwhelm

We’ve all experienced something like it. The loss of a friend or family member, a tough day at work, too much to do all in one day… There are many things in life that stress us out or make us feel overwhelmed. But how do you write characters feeling these things in your books?

Draw from your own experiences

Start with what you know. Think about how you react to grief, stress, and overwhelm. Jot down notes and reference this when you’re having trouble. However…

Everyone reacts differently

Keep this in mind when writing. Everyone reacts somewhat differently. You might have one character who cries when they’re stressed, one who simply secludes himself, one who snaps at people who are trying to help him, and one who simply tries to work through it. (If it’s the latter, I applaud said character. I could never do that.)

So to expand your list of reactions, maybe ask friends how they react to these feelings, and then fill in the gaps with imagination. And don’t feel limited to the list. Sometimes what you’ve listed just doesn’t fit a character, and in those cases you kind of have to go with your gut. Or you could just throw out the list entirely and work entirely spontaneously like I do. Whatever works. The main thing to keep in mind is that no one reacts exactly the same way, so if you have a lot of characters going through similar issues (like all my poor suffering characters in The Dark War Trilogy), don’t let their responses be cookie-cutter images of each other.

I hope this post was helpful. :)

Hi, I’m R.M. Archer

My goal here at Scribes & Archers is to inspire young authors to hone their craft and develop their writing. So have a look around, check out some of the popular posts listed on the “About” page, and have fun!

Farewell to January

We’re already a full month into 2018. Wow.

January’s Writing

The first half of my month was swallowed by procrastination because I limited myself to finishing the last five short stories for my collection. I finished one of those, and then a few days ago I decided to let go of the last four and I feel so much better for doing so. I do plan to finish those last four and publish them as a part two to this collection, but for now I’m happy to have let them go.

After letting those go I went back to The Last Assassin and I’ve been so much happier working on that. It’s really interesting writing dialogue when the majority of your characters only tell partial truths – if that – the majority of the time. It’s actually rather amusing.

I wrote about 31k last month, which isn’t too bad.

January’s Reading

I’ve been really slacking on reading the past several months. I’ve been “reading” the same half a dozen books for, like, half a year. It’s sad. I don’t know how I read all I read last July. O-o I wish I could get back to that pace.

I was able in January, however, to finish Echoes by Miranda Marie (see my review here) and finally (after five months. Yeesh.) finish North! Or Be Eaten by Andrew Peterson.

You know what I need to do? Take all my procrastinating time and apply it to reading time instead. At that rate I’d get a lot more reading done.

What I’m looking forward to in February

Sometime early this month I get to find out if While I Was Sleeping was accepted for the third Brave New Girls anthology to be published in July. I’m really proud of this story, and I hope it’s accepted. :)

I’ll also be publishing the short story collection I’ve been talking about early this month (It’s almost done. I’m finally so close… It just needs some more formatting and a finished cover.), and then This Is His Story will be published on its own on the 14th and The Mirror-Hunter Chronicles series of short stories will be published on the 21st if all goes according to plan. Keep an eye out for announcements on all of those launches.

How has your 2018 been so far? Do you have any big goals for February?

Guest Character Interview: Emmet Tuteur

Emmet is a character from my friend Sal’s currently untitled fantasy novel. He’s sweet, a lover of food, and he managed to throw the interviewer off a little bit, which was fun. (The art above was drawn by Sal herself.) I hope you enjoy his interview. :)

 

Emmet: *walks into a room, wearing a gray heather long-sleeve shirt under black overalls, and he is barefoot. His curly dark brown hair flops in his bluish-forest green eyes and he frowns at it a little; his skin is caramel colored and he is 14, though small for his age, barely reaching 5’5* *looks around the room, wondering why he’s been placed here*

Interviewer: Hello. *smiles* Would you like to have a seat? *nods to a chair across from him*

Emmet: *looks a little surprised, but slowly walks over and takes the seat, looking at the interviewer curiously*

Interviewer: How are you?

Emmet: Good…? I think? *smiles a little, tilting his head as he says the words, a bit unsure sounding, and a French accent is prominent*

Interviewer: That’s good. Are you ready to get started on the interview?

Emmet: *nods, sitting up straight* Yes, Monsieur.

Interviewer: *smiles* Excellent. What is your name?

Emmet: M-my name is Emmet.

Interviewer: And how old are you?

Emmet: *straightens up even more* I’ve just turned 14.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Emmet: *kinda deflates, looking a bit pale, and looks at the ground* Y-Yes…….

Interviewer: I’m sorry. Was that a bad question to ask?

Emmet: *swallows hard, looking up at the interviewer sadly* Uh… I had an older sister… and brother… *tears come into his eyes as he looks back at the ground*

Interviewer: We can move on if you’d rather not talk about it… I didn’t mean to bring up a painful subject.

Emmet: *nods slowly, trying to dry his tears inconspicuously*

Interviewer: Um… Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Emmet: *looks really confused ;D* …what are those…?

Interviewer: Do you prefer being alone or spending time with people?

Emmet: Oh. Ummm… *looks slightly less confused, but can’t seem to decide* I… don’t know…

Interviewer: Okay. What’s your favorite food?

Emmet: *grins widely* Oh…! I love macaroni and cheese… sometimes in chocolate… Ali showed me that. *frowns* But no green.

Interviewer: Macaroni and cheese in chocolate sounds like an interesting combination. I’ll have to try that out sometime. Do you have a favorite color?

Emmet: *frowns a little* Umm… what’s that..?

Interviewer: *tries to think of a way to explain and gives up after a minute* Never mind… Do you like to read?

Emmet: *thinks hard* …I wasn’t…*searching for the word ‘taught’*

Interviewer: Taught? You didn’t learn to read?

Emmet: *lights up, almost jumping out of his chair* Yes! *then becoming sad again* Can’t read…

Interviewer: I’m sorry. *frowns a bit* I hope you’re able to find someone to teach you.

Emmet: *nods a bit and sits up straight again, then starts forward excitedly* Wait! Colors like a Rainbow?

Interviewer: *nods, smiling* That’s right.

Emmet: *grins widely* Ohhh. So like Poppyseed? Hmm… *thinks this over* I like a lot of colors…

Interviewer: *smiles* So do I.

Emmet: *looks down at his hands, grinning a little* I guess… blue… and green.

Interviewer: I like those, too. *smiles* Do you have a favorite animal?

Emmet: *looks a little surprised at this, but thinks hard* Umm… like… being a bear…?

Interviewer: Being one? I suppose that would work… I mostly meant one you like… um… Yeah, being one works.

Emmet: But…being a bird, you can fly…*stops, looking a bit green* But not high up. That is scary.

Interviewer: Flying would be cool. You could get everywhere a lot faster.

Emmet: *shivers* Is scary.

Interviewer: What are some things you like to do?

Emmet: Eat food… and see my friends…? *like unsure if those are good answers*

Interviewer: *laughs a little at ‘eating food’* Those are good. Now I have a couple of trickier questions. Which of these is most important: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Emmet: *eyes widen, then almost close as he thinks* uh… kindness…?

Interviewer: And how about honesty or selflessness?

Emmet: Selflessness…?

Interviewer: One last question. *smiles* What’s one thing you can’t leave home without?

Emmet: *takes a moment to answer, thinking about how he doesn’t exactly have a home* …me? *looks a little confused and sorry at the same time*

Interviewer: *laughs* Well, it is pretty hard to leave without yourself. *grins* Thanks for your time, buddy. *grin fades into a softer smile*

Emmet: *grins back,widely* Yeah! That was fun! *pauses looking at the Interviewer* do you have a name…?

Interviewer: I’m David. *smiles* I’m glad you had fun.

Emmet: *eyes widen a bit at his name, but he nods and stands up* Thanks David!!! *then his voice drops to a whisper* Wanna see me turn into a bear?

David: *looks surprised* You can do that?

Emmet: *nods excitedly, but then stops* …Are you afraid of bears…? *kinda worriedly* I can do a squirrel instead! Or a bird… or that other one…

David: *laughs* No. Go ahead and do the bear. *smiles*

Emmet: *grins, stepping back, his hands glowing bluish-green* *a flash of bluish-green light and a big black bear appears in place of Emmet ;D*

David: Wow! That’s pretty cool!

Emmet-bear: *grunts loudly, but happily, standing up a bit clumsily*

David: Careful. *smiles*

Emmet-bear: *grunts and sits back down, putting a paw out to him*

David: *takes the paw*

Emmet-bear: *grins, however a bear grins, and “shakes” David’s hand, grunting a little*

David: Should you be getting back? It’s getting a bit late.

Emmet-bear: *nods slowly, and stands up on his back two feet* *a flash of light like earlier and Emmet is back to normal* Thanks again Monsieur David. *bows his head a little and grins, while making a wide circle with his glowing hands which creates a portal* *he steps through and both he and the portal disappear*