Ask An Author: "How do you create realistic-feeling characters?"

Each week, a new author will serve as your Camp Counselor, answering your writing questions. Marivi Soliven, our second counselor, has taught writing workshops at the University of California, San Diego and at the University of the Philippines. Her most recent novel, The Mango Bride , is about two Filipina women, and the unexpected collision that reveals a life changing secret.

How do you create realistic-feeling characters? — Jennifer M.

I watch people all the time for odd mannerisms and unique gestures. I file those away in memory until a likely character comes along who can use it. Following the same logic, I sometimes imagine an actor playing the characters in my novel. Many of the female protagonists were drawn from images of my mother and her sisters in the ‘60s, with their Jackie Kennedy bouffants, shift dresses and chain-smoking, hard-drinking ways.

Anytime I couldn’t move forward in a scene I would ask, “Well, what would the actor do? How would my mom respond to that argument?”

Revealing physical details via physical gestures or through the eyes of another character also helps make a character more three-dimensional. In one scene, my character Lydell scratches his hairy nape; when he grins at Beverly she notices that his teeth are the color of weak tea.

Use all your senses in the description of your characters, too. Señora Concha is a chain smoker who loves exported perfume so she’s described as smelling like a smokestack in the Garden of Eden. When Beverly first touches Josiah’s forearm, she marvels at the amount of hair covering his freckled skin. 

Finally, add some softness or vulnerability to your villains because that makes them more like folks you come across in real life. In The Mango Bride, Josiah is cruel to his wife, but he is exceptionally tender around their young daughter. When you think of your characters as actual people you know and can converse with rather than images in your head, they really do come alive in the story.

Next week’s Camp Counselor will be the great Patricia Wrede, author of fantasy novels such as the The Enchanted Forest Chronicles.

Ask her your questions here!