Character descriptions

Like most writers who started young, I went through a phase of giving my characters eyes and hair of dramatic hues. Gems and precious metals were particularly common: "amethyst" or "silver" or the ever-popular color-changing gaze.

Clearly this tendency toward rainbows isn't limited to folks who grow up in homogeneous populations, but as someone raised in Korea, I might have been trying to escape the straight black hair and brown eyes that pretty much everyone had.

Now I hate providing physical descriptions, perhaps after reading a few too many tales where the heroine wakes up in the morning and looks at herself in the mirror, providing a tidy catalogue of all her features. Also, I'm horrible at visualizing from text; as a reader, I never play the casting game (where you pick actors and actresses you think would fit characters' appearances).

These days I reckon that the most important traits actually give a clue as to the person's livelihood or personality: callused hands, prematurely graying hair, that sort of thing. Let's say all your characters do have the same colored hair and same colored eyes. What would you fall back on? Their mannerisms, perhaps. If the first time I encounter a character, all I hear is that she has a wicked smile, I know so much more about her that matters than I would if you gave me her driver's license.

Brought to you by the letter K and curiosity as to whether the tiny scraps of physical description I provide to my cover artists is freeing or frustrating. (That said, they do incredible work! I can't wait to share my next cover.)

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