Character Motivations
Hmmmm…I’ve noticed that my protagonist’s best friends tend to be a bit…well snippy. And a bit mean. I wonder what that says about me? Maybe it is some anger I have towards an old friend or something–or the fact that I find many women to have a snippy edge to them–or the fact that I am trying to add an interesting edge to my character dynamics.
Character foils? Maybe? Maybe not.
I think I need to work more on my character motivations. They have them, they are spurring them on, but they aren’t all that obvious to the reader. Which is fine in some regards, I don’t want to be obvious and boring. At the same time, I don’t want it to be so challenging or disjointed that the reader tosses down my work in frustration.
For example, in ‘The 15 Date Rule’, I am trying to illustrate that a lot of women find my main character, who is smart and beautiful, intimidating. But how do you show that? Well, through their actions, which are not going to be favourable. But how do you show that it is intimidation or jealousy that is making them act that way? A little trickier–unless you make them really mean and again, obvious.
So, I suppose this is my puzzle of the week. A tricky, tricky puzzle seeing as I figure these things out in real life based on a feeling I get from a person rather than the words that they speak.
