Smaller characters of the story

[Bets]

Unless a character is in one scene or less--in other words if they have any sort of supporting role in the cast, I give them the full, insane character creating treatment I talked about for the main. The characters that have known the character a long time, it's esp. important b/c you have to go through and match up the entire relationship with the main character. Things they did together. How they feel about each other. How what they bring to the table creates what relationship they have.

Because they don't get as much facetime as the main, and still have to make an impression, I've often heard it is good to give a supporting character some sort of memorable quirk. Not like everyone has twitchy eyes or whatever, but maybe they have an odd way of walking. Maybe it is something physical--a prominant nose. Maybe they constantly rub their hands together while thinking.

[[deleted user]]

As with main characters, I think supporting characters should be built on their role in the story and their relationship with other characters, perhaps here most prominently with the main ones. Hypothetical example, let's say, is a mother of the protagonist giving him his backpack before he heads off to school. That's the only time we'll see her, for whatever reason. Her role is a simple one: she needs to give him a backpack. Her relationship, however, is one built over the span of the protagonist's lifetime. You may not need to know where she went to school, her relationship with her tupperware club, or anything like that, but you need to know her relationship with the protagonist in order to give her character. Other aspects of her may come out through this. She has cooked him every meal of his life, so we establish her love of food, perhaps health. If the protagonist's father has died, it may not be necessary to mention that in this scene, but remember this woman is a single mother, so you can reflect on her duties both to her son and as a the money maker of the house, how hard she works, what she does. Maybe she is dressed in a suit and dropping him off at work, or maybe she works from home. Again, you don't necessarily need to know exactly what it is she does, but it's little things that give her a sense of character for the brief time she is there.