How I Met My Characters

I tend to meet my characters the way you would meet a stranger on the streets. There are things you can tell just by looking. And these features in their own right tell you a bit about a person. There is evidence of where they came from and who they are in the way they speak, the way they look, the way they hold themselves. Peeking through the cracks of the masks we show the world, you can start to see the true person who lies beneath.

Then, you get to know them and you become their friend and confidante. They let you into their own little world and little by little the mask starts to ease off, until they are as comfortable with you as they would be with someone they’ve known their whole life. Here is where you learn of their past, confirm or rethink what you assumed when they first showed up, and discover interests, idiosyncrasies, habits, and sometimes, but not always, their secrets.

Writing characters for me is not the act of playing god, but more the role of a scribe. I listen, I watch them in my mind, and I take dictation. Hopefully it is a well enough job to do them justice, because otherwise they won’t let me get some sleep.

There are certainly elements that are borrowed or inspired by other things, whether it’s real people or other fictional characters in other stories and forms of storytelling. However, the characters are no more planned than the plot. They are not built upon like legos, though connections can be made. They appear as they are and then they leave with each new reader.