3 Easy Tips for Creating Strong Characters

We’re halfway through Camp NaNoWriMo! Today, NaNoWriMo  participant Abigail Falanga shares some powerful insight into character building and how those characters inform the structure of your story:

Characters are story.

They reveal unexpected themes, tug in new directions, propel plot-arcs, and create dialogue through opposing positions. They texture scene and setting, making your written world seem real. They draw you in and make you care. The key to creating strong characters is observation.

1. Observe Real People

People-watching is helpful (and fun!)

I mean taking note of how people act, think, talk, react, even look and smell. Then, recombine details and see what happens. Every detail makes a whole, distinct personality.

Accents and regionalisms tell where a guy is from, about a woman’s friends, about books and music they like. This hints at their taste in food, and sometimes if they’ll go in for a hug. It also sets up certain stereotypes: down-to-business woman from NYC, laid-back dude from SoCal. Then it’s interesting to watch how they meet or defy these expectations.

Quirks and idiosyncrasies are both irritating and lovable, and make up who we are as individuals. So, note those who can never remember a name, or zone out when you’re talking to them, or habits like cracking knuckles.

Sometimes, you even get glimpses of traits or insecurities this way. A friend detailing her party three times may feel you aren’t paying attention to what’s important to her. The girl always checking her phone may have difficulty maintaining eye contact.

Appearance is influenced by peer groups as much as personal taste, but also regional and occupational fashions, pop-culture, and sometimes deliberate artistic choices. A sudden change might indicate a new relationship or job. Also, since appearances are deceptive, note the contradictions between someone’s outside and their story.

Contradictions are the best! If someone looks one way and behaves another, it tells so much about them. That funny guy with a sarcastic comeback for everything might be hiding anger or powerlessness. The older lady who snaps at you in line could be the sweetest grandma in the world, just wanting to get back in time for the birthday party.

People have so many facets! Notice and remember details about strangers you encounter—and those closest to you.

2. Observe Fictional People

Almost as worthwhile: Pay attention to well-written characters in favorite books, movies, and TV.

What do you love about a character? How did the author craft someone as real to you as anyone you know?

A well-loved protagonist such as Sherlock Holmes combines good traits (observational skills, scientific knowledge) with bad habits (up all night, playing loud music).

Secondary characters are just as important. Mrs. Elton in Jane Austen’s Emma is convinced she’s high society and charming, but is so full of herself that she thinks every party is for her.

Humorous or heroic, excellent authors create iconic characters using methods worth emulating: Both Mr. Holmes and Mrs. Elton, for instance, have consistent voices, good intentions, and quirks which you are likely to encounter in the real world.

3. Let Your Characters Shape Your Story

Taking a physical trait here, a contradiction and a turn of speech there, you can blend strong characters. Then comes the part I think of as: “poking them with a stick to see what happens!”

You want to know where they come from, and how did they get here? Appearance shows how they feel, and how they want the world to see them. Inconsistencies show what they want, how they’re trying to get it, and how they’re failing or succeeding.

And before you know it… your main character’s best friend is supportive, but also dealing with depression after a breakup. The kid got a black eye after the classmate he was bullying fought back.

And you have story!

Abigail Falanga is an incorrigible fantasist and inveterate science-fiction writer who believes in using long words freighted with meaning. She lives in New Mexico, alternately inspired and distracted by her family and extremely large black lab mix. A NaNoWriMo winner since 2007 and Camp NaNoWriMo participant since its beginning, Abigail is currently venturing into the thrilling, maddening world of platform-building and publishing.

Top photo by Zhen Hu on Unsplash.