Hearts Unbroken: Writing Well-Rounded Secondary Characters

Writing is rewriting.By Cynthia Leitich Smith
for Cynsations

The third in a series of four posts celebrating the Oct. 9 release of my realistic contemporary YA novel, Hearts Unbroken (Candlewick).

We’re all the heroes of our own stories.

The same is true of our fictional friends and foes.

In responding to my new YA novel, Hearts Unbroken, an early manuscript reader mentioned that all the significant characters—except Karishma—had their own story arc.

Not that they all had fully flushed-out storie...