True That!: Characters and Keepin’ it Real

Okay, so I’ve been talking about characters a lot lately. Or so it feels. (Maybe it’s all just actually swirling in my head and isn’t coming out all over the place like I think it might be.) Anyway, today I was getting blood work done and was chatting with the lab lady while she was prepping and drawing blood. As I was leaving she wished me and the kids a good day and I wished her the same. I added, “I hope nobody passes out in your chair and falls out!” (Thinking of how someone I know happened to do that once.) Because really, when you’ve been talking about how you and the kids are going swimming and going to have a lovely day and she’s saying she’s stuck at work all day… what do you say to wish her a good one?

Funny enough… she was actually kind of appreciative of my comment and said, “Thanks. It’s actually been a really bad month for that. All the lab techs have been noticing that, even in the next town over.” Huh.

I was so surprised I didn’t quite know what to say. And, of course, I was burning with curiosity. (As usual.) Why are people passing out? Is it the weather? Fasting? Rushed lab techs who give too sharp a jab with the ol’ needle? (Mine was amazing actually, hardly felt the needle go in.) Are they looking at the vials fill with blood and getting woozy? (Really, you shouldn’t do that! Watching vital life fluid drain from your body is never a good idea.)

And being a writer, I, of course, turned this juicy tidbit back to my writing. Hmmm. My characters… what would constitute a good day or bad day at work? What would be strange for them? What leads to a good day, a bad day, a busy day, an interesting day, boring day, etc.? And how do I find that out? Research! Imagination! And chatting with people in the profession. Speaking of which, I think I’d better go make one of my characters into a lab tech….
Have a good one and may your keyboard’s keys resist the urge to pop off!

On Backstory: Part 3

I was yammering on about backstory this week, which was kind of fun, actually. (See Part 1 here and Part 2 here.) It’s much more fun than cleaning the house and all those other things I’ve been meaning to do. I realized afterwards that I should probably toss out some examples on what I think are some stellar displays of weaving in a character’s backstory. These examples are a form of ‘telling’, yes, but it is done in such a simple and straight forward way that it does not slow down the story, is a nice little tidbit where we need it/want it in the story and it gives the reader more than one might realize at first glance.
Here are two examples that I like:

“It didn’t spill over so that he could relax, and instead he grew angry at his mother for crashing her car, at the doctors for not saving her, at his father for being his father, at himself for drinking, at Ming for being scared.” (From Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lamb. Fitzgerald is a pre-med student and Ming is his love interest. She has rejected him, and he is getting drunk.)

A bit on what is important here. The orange bit, to me, says why he wants to become a doctor. It speaks to his motivations as a character and where he is mentally and physically as well as speaks to an event that has shaped his life and continues to shape it. Lamb could have gone on for a few paragraphs about Fitzgerald’s motivations and how his mother’s death affected him and that he aspires to be that doctor who doesn’t let moms die, etc, etc. Or, he could have done like he did. Simple. To the point. And for me, so much more effective.

The second example is trickier to show. It is from Meg Cabot’s Size 14 Is Not Fat Either. It is a sequel to Size 12 is Not Fat and it covers a lot of ground in the first 2-3 pages in terms of catching new readers up on who this Heather Wells person is. Yet, it is still entertaining for those readers who are already familiar with Heather Wells and what she stands for. In the second paragraph we are already discovering that she is a musician when she is getting a coffee on the way to work. She slips it in with comments referring to the barista and back to herself like so: “I bet he plays the guitar. I bet he stays up way too late at night, strumming, the way I do.” And later in the paragraph: “No time to shower before work, because he was up so late practicing. Just like me.” So, by having the main character comparing herself to another character, we learn a lot about her. A few paragraphs later we learn that she is a former popstar, she is overweight, she has a new job, she doubts her song writing talents, and on and on. But the important thing here is that we discover this all in an entertaining way that pulls us deeper into the story, gets us feeling those same emotions as Heather and keeps tugging that story forward. We are so interested in finding out if this cute 20-something barista is going to ask her out (he did check her out after all), that we breeze right past all these backstory tidbits, right up to the burn at the end of the scene. Ouch! That rejection totally stung!

In a nutshell: brilliant.

Tell The Truth

…and nothing but the truth when it comes to your characters.

I’m working my way through Ray Bradbury’s Zen and the Art of Writing and every few pages I come across something that goes *ping* in my writer’s brain. Last night, he described how a character he never intended to write about came to him and said, “Tell the truth about me.” (Page 113) And because he is a writer who listens, he had to. The result? An honest and acclaimed piece.

Every day when a writer sits down at their paper or keyboard, their characters ask us to do this. In our best work we not only listen, but we comply. We relax our minds and shut the doors to thinking and we bring forth something honest and true. (And sometimes discover something so shocking it jolts us, such as our beloved character is having an extramarital affair.)

When we don’t listen, when we don’t comply, when we push and shove our ideas of story onto our characters, that is when we fall apart, get writers block, and create stilted stories that don’t work, that don’t speak.

I’ve been procrastinating on my work in progress because I am at a point where I have to sit back and think. Or so I thought. Maybe all I need to do is sit back, relax, and channel my characters’ inner truths and those character arcs will place themselves on the page, weaving and tying themselves to the other characters in a way that wouldn’t happen if I pushed it.

How about you? Do your characters force you to tell the truth?

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When Characters Do Bad Things

I was peacefully writing away yesterday afternoon.

La, la, la.

That was me. I began a new chapter with a new character. He carefully slipped out of the house in the morning, being extra careful not to wake his wife who didn’t need to get up for a few more hours. Off he went to work, the ever-so safety conscious employee. All day he works alongside his longtime buddy. Then he shocks me. As he is driving away from the plant, he drives downtown and meets his buddy’s wife for a long-standing affair! They even have a hotel room booked for every Wednesday from 3:30 to 5:30. I was shocked. So shocked I almost stopped writing. Seriously. My fingers paused. My brain leapt scrambled against the brick wall it had been flung against and my jaw dropped.

I stuttered. I blinked. I couldn’t believe it. Sure, in the past my characters have done some pretty zany stuff. But they have never, NEVER done anything that I would disapprove of. And this guy did. I created a cheater and I didn’t know. I’m really quite choked at him. Why would he do this? He’s a good guy with good relationships. Or, at least, so I thought.

I had to stop writing. I left him at the hotel room door. It was hard writing about this as it came so out of left field. The character will stay. The affair will stay. And I will get over it.

What surprised me the most was maybe not his affair, but how shocked I was. I started jumping on what was flowing from my fingers onto the screen. I was getting in the way when I was in the groove and the right, honest words were hitting the page.

I honour the groove, and yet, my brain was stuttering at my fingers, so I had to quit. I was afraid I was going to spoil it. That I was going to get in the way of the story.

Has that ever happened to you? Have your characters shocked you so thoroughly you had to put down the story and compose yourself?

The Problem of Bobbing Heads

Lately, I’ve come to realize that I use ‘nod’, ‘nodded’ and ‘nodding’ too often. In a way, it is lazy writing. In another way, it is a character mood-check shortcut for the reader. But either way, with 57 instances of the word in my manuscript, am I running the risk of having bobbing head characters?

I am leaning towards, yes. It is too many nods. (I have cut some out before that count, if you can believe it.) The question is, where do you need a nod, and where would a different action work better?

Men tend to nod to show they agree with what someone is saying. Women tend to nod to show they are listening and to encourage the speaker to keep talking.

In my manuscripts they nod because…well, I’ll share a few examples–some that work and some that don’t.

First ‘nod’ in my manuscript. Page 12:

“Beth.” He gave a sharp nod and glanced at the chart in his hands, even though she was sure he’d already committed its details to memory.

I like this nod as it characterizes this uptight doctor. It can stay.

Second instance. Also page 12:

After a brief silence, he asked, “Are you doing okay?”
Beth nodded numbly. What else was could she do? Fall into the perfect doctor’s arms and cry so hard, snot flew from her nostrils?

Okay, I think this one works too. Because she is distraught (fiance in a coma) and basically, doesn’t want to speak and is in shock.

Third instance. A page later:

“Oz’s father, Barney, was not as lucky as Oz.”
Beth nodded and blinked.
“He didn’t survive his injuries from being thrown from the car. The medics were able to revive him on scene, but a heart rate could not be sustained.”

Would she really nod? Probably not. I cut a whole bunch of ‘reaction’ out of here, leaving the blinkin and noddin. (Winkin was cut, in case you were wondering what happened to him.) Looking at this snippet, I think it would flow better without anything from her. Just him talking.

A random instance:

She paused to glare at Katie. “Are you trying to get my goat?”
Katie laughed and nodded. “A little.”

Does she really need to nod here? No. A laugh combined with her words gives us what we need to know–she’s copping up to teasing the lady.

Here’s an example of a nod where one woman is encouraging the other to keep speaking:

Katie leaned forward and spoke softly, “I’ve changed my mind about getting married.”
Mrs. Wilkinson nodded, her eyes bright.
“I know Will’s going to propose. And it’s all good.”

The nod can stay.

And here is one that could be switched for a better action:

“Will you do it?” Katie asked.
“Of course, I will. So tell us, was it cheesy?” She nodded towards the oak. “Gran said you had worries.”

Is she really nodding to the tree, or is she tilting her head towards the tree, or gesturing to the tree with her chin? Probably the latter. It takes more words, but creates a better picture.

How many nods do you have? Do you fall back on certain gestures? (My characters used to ‘look’ everywhere and at everyone.)

UPDATE: I went through looking for ‘nod’s and removed over 20 of them. I doubt they will be missed.

Highlighting Characteristics

So you have a character. You know this person better than anyone, yet you aren’t sure you are getting it across to your readers. What do you do? Give them a nice little list of characteristics that make up this person you have created and sneak it in the first few pages of your story?

You could. But you may bore them, plus the chances are your reader is going to whizz through the list and not absorbing your carefully selected laundry list of characteristics.

What if you highlighted one thing? Just one important detail?

Easy!

Hang on. One thing? Just one thing? One thing that makes this character so unique that if he/she was pushed into a pile of fictional characters a reader could identify and yank your dude out of the pile?

For one of my stories, the fact that the main character, Allie, is always losing thing is a defining characteristic. She is brainy and winning awards, yet very absentminded and thus loses things. A lot. How is this important? Well, outside the story it really isn’t. Everyone can probably think of someone they know or times where they have lost things due to preoccupation. Yet, this characteristic is key within the story. People are stealing Allie’s work from under her nose. It isn’t particularly noted or even noticed seeing as she is always losing things. Therefore it is easy to discount missing documents, purses, keys, etc. This causes problems and conveniently becomes a vital plot point.

Once you have your key feature/characteristic, think of a way to highlight that feature for your readers. Take a lone paragraph and fill it with 2-3 sentences on that key feature. The chances are the reader is going to take note. (But don’t overdo it.)

If I had to describe Allie in a few sentences to highlight her absent-mindedness, I might say something like this:

The expression ‘she’d lose her head if it wasn’t attached’ could have been made with Allie in mind. The woman lost three purses in four months. She was losing documents so often she didn’t just fear losing her job, but her sanity as well.

What sort of things might be key to your character and hence become an important part of your story’s plot?

Chewing gum? The fact that your character walks like they’ve been stuck on a horse for days? A severe dislike for dill pickles? Whatever you choose, make it work for you.

Enjoy!

New Year Writing Workout #3: Discovering Your Character’s Culture

Okay, today’s exercise is a fun one. You get to sit back and use your imagination. Are you ready? Let’s go!

You’re going to need a partner for this one. So either grab an existing character who needs some fleshing out or create/fill out a new character who’s hanging out in a work in progress and needs some help.

Generally, when people think of characters, they first think of their outside appearance. Are they blonde, brunette? Eyes blue, green, brown, grey? Etc, etc. That’s all fine and dandy, but what about the aspects of what makes them real? (Case in point, New York Times Bestselling author, Sophie Kinsella, never actually described her character Becky Bloomwood in the Shopaholic series. Yet, she is so real that readers want to reach through the pages and slap her, hug her or simply meet her for coffee.) So, once we’ve got the appearance down, what can we do to flesh these ‘character’ people out?

Please note that if you don’t know the plot, it’s okay. You can build plot first or character first, or even build them simultaneously. Whichever you choose, try and ensure that the plot and character work together in terms of believability, firing up motivations and the like. Right now, we’ll put our finger on who exactly this character is:

First of all, we need to do some digging.

What is the cultural background of your character? Are they of German decent, Finnish, English, Italian? Small things like this can influence the way they feel about food, family, even physical proximity to others. Personally, I find this one tricky seeing as I pretty much see everyone as part of that big melting pot called Canada and think we’re all fairly similar. However, when I’m creating a fictional character these ‘stereotypes’ can be helpful for filling out small details in the character’s behaviour and personality.

Next up, how does their family background affect their behaviours, attitudes, philosophies as well as how they express themselves? You can move these questions along to the effects of their social background (where they grew up, education, wealth or lack of it) as well as religious background and emotional background.

Once you have some of the bones of who they are and how they were raised and their inner core, we can put some meat on those bones:

• What was your character’s most embarrassing moment?
• Who was their first boyfriend/girlfriend? How did the relationship end? How does it influence future relationships?
• How do they feel about animals?
• What is their occupation?
• What are their friends like?
• What are their dreams?
• What are their relationship like with their parents and siblings?
• What is their biggest weakness? This can be anything from chocolate to sappy movies to the inability to say ‘no’ to the urge to run away any time things get difficult in their life.
• What does their home look like?
• Do they collect anything?
• What are their hobbies?
• What movies do they like?

I’ve built a few worksheets you are welcome to use if you want to help organize yourself in this activity. Context and Character (pdf) Context and Character (Word) (scroll to bottom of page) as well as Character Core (the sample) and Character Core (Word version to fill out at bottom of page).

Enjoy getting to know your characters. It’s time well spent when you hit the pages of your manuscript.

Secondary Characters

A few weeks ago I took out a scene that I felt wasn’t sitting right in my story. It felt purposeless and that it wasn’t progressing the story and was rather catty–basically not being true to the story nor the characters.

Then I sent the chapters surrounding the missing scene to my critique partners and they were all up in arms with comments that were along the lines of what the heck happened? Why did you lead up to this scene, skip over it all together and then sum in up in a sentence later on? How did this rift happen between these two characters? What? What? What?

Ah crap. It wasan important scene! So, I dig through old versions and pulled the scene back out and plunked it back in, adding another three pages to my already big manuscript. And reading it afresh, I realised that it was important to the story and it was true to it–whether I liked it or not. The scene showed the rift begin between the heroine and her boyfriend as well as the beginning of the heroine identifying her inner strength and pulling on it in a time of need.

So, the scene is back and everything makes more sense again. Strangely enough, I learned something about myself as a writer with this scene. I think the real reason I originally took this scene out is that it has a secondary character being mean to my heroine–who I loved dearly. I came to this conclusion when I did an edit when I was plunking the hated scene back in, because when I was done, I was a little pissed. I was grumpy! So I sat back and thought, why is this? It can’t be the peanut butter cookies I just ate. Well, it is because I HATE the secondary character that I created. Seriously. She is a mean, conniving bitch that ensures that she illustrates how my heroine doesn’t fit in at a party. I disliked her somuch and the way that she made my heroine feel, that I eliminated her without realising what I was doing to the story. So now, The Bitch is back and is as mean as ever. Well, for her one scene…then I give her the awful boyfriend back. Ma-ha-ha. The rest, as they say, is history.