18 Days of Writing and Publishing Tips – Day 14 Don’t let these types of characters sneak into your story

Sometimes when a writer is so focused on developing their main characters, keeping the plot going and polishing the writing, they slip up and don’t spend enough time on making their secondary characters memorable enough, so that those characters end up as cardboard stereotypes. Writers often don’t even realize they’ve fallen into that trap, because the characters are so much a part of popular culture that they seem to fit the story. But fitting into expectations leads to average, and in today’s competitive publishing world, writing an average story is going to lessen your chances of getting published.

(I couldn’t think of the right kind of cat picture to go with this post, so a cat hunting out something to get rid of (a stereotype!) is as close as I could get.)

When I read one of those stereotypical characters, they really lessen the story for me. For example, I can’t stand when the mean girl in a high school setting is the beautiful blond cheerleader with a ponytail. I want a better villain than that. Granted, there is a reason those types show up in stories, because too many authors either remember those girls from high school or have seen too many tv shows and movies that also rely on the stereotype.

If it’s a high school villain who must be a popular cheerleader, make her a little quirky in her own way. Maybe she helps her father do taxidermy or she is a genius at math, anything that will surprise a reader. Quirky villains are more memorable and seem more real.

Another example that makes me groan is the computer nerd stereotype, either a skinny guy with ugly glasses or a heavy-set guy who also wears ugly glasses. For example, Jurassic Park does so many things so well in the storytelling, but I hate that they made the bad guy a nerdy slob who won’t stop eating. Again, there are people in the real world who fit the stereotype, but there are plenty of other real people who don’t.

And we can’t forget the jock who is a handsome jerk. If you’ve got one of these characters, you have to work harder to round them out so the reader will be able to remember long after they’ve finished the book.

I don’t have a handsome jock in my sci fi trilogy but I do have a character that somewhat fits that category. Quinn is the main character and Decker is his nemesis at the beginning of the story. Decker is bigger, stronger and older and likes to order Quinn around. The quirk that saves Decker from being a stereotype is that he is a musician, and wears a tiny musical instrument on a cord around his neck all the time, something like an ocarina. I also made the character not be a jerk around children, so that Quinn’s younger sister likes Decker.

Publishing is so competitive that anything you can do to make your stories more memorable will help, so look over your secondary characters and see how you can make them stand out.

Here’s my sci fi trilogy that started this series of posts. If you haven’t read any of the earlier ones on writing and publishing tips, Post 1 is here.