Speed Dating your Characters

I do most of my story planning once I've already written my first draft. Kind of backwards, right? As a pantser (as in, I write by-the-seat-of-my-pants, a very technical term) I really only have a vague idea of where my story is going when I embark on the journey with my characters. So, in my second round of edits, I'm forcing myself to sit down and flesh out the minor characters (major characters got their own one-on-one time with me already). So I figure it's appropriate to share my procedure with you kind folks. Everyone has a different system so who knows, you might like something about mine :)

Inspiration from Postsecret.com

Without the supporting characters, the main character in your story is just wandering around alone talking to him/herself. Even in a movie like Cast Away, where Tom Hanks is stranded on a deserted island for almost the entire movie, there are supporting characters that make him more relateable and further the plot (namely Wilson).

He's more than a little creepy.

So, when I'm trying to figure out my characters, I go speed dating.

1. Main Character (1)

2. Major Characters (3-5)

3. Minor Characters (3-10)

4. Two-Sceners (2-3)

5. Everyone else mentioned by name

Wait, what? Speed dating? Yes, speed dating. I use the categories above and work from the bottom up. Check it:

5. Everyone mentioned by name gets a brief, one-sentence summary of motivation and relevance to the story. Like the first few crummy dates at a speed dating table (or what I assume they're like). "Yeesh, get me out of here."

4. Two-Sceners are the characters that appear in only one or two scenes but are still important to the whole story (i.e. the sympathetic cop who gives the hardened criminal a break that gives the criminal the opportunity to do x or z). They get 2 sentences. "You're kind of interesting, but I'm still not into you."

3. Minor characters are usually a part of a major event in the story or are in the story for a significant period of time. They tend to be more in the background, but still interact with the MC enough that they're not just Two-Sceners. They get a whole paragraph about motivation, significant personality traits, and relevance to the story.

2. Major characters are the buddies. The best friend of the MC, the enemy of the MC, the guy who follows the MC around the entire book until he just becomes useful. These are the characters that can make or break a story. As a result, they get 3-5 paragraphs on personality, appearance, motivation, brief background (usually not included in the story but helpful to the author), and anything else that seems important. 

1. MC - obviously take all of the time in the world for this guy/girl.

Everyone has a different process, this is just the way I get to know my characters. The main point is to not forget them. The supporting characters in someone's life story are the ones that help to move the life story along or change the life for better or for worse. They make a huge impact on the story either way so please, no cardboard friends.


How do you get to know your supporting characters?

The Obligatory Dark Part

How many times have you watched a movie (specifically comedies/romantic comedies) and reached the point where you think "Ugh, I know they're going to get back together, but now they're pretending to hate each other. I hate this part" ?

Love the movie, but come on. If anyone didn't see Kat getting mad that 

Patrick was paid to take her they were not thinking.

There are a lot of movies I like that have this, and I realize that it's necessary to move on to the ending of the story and make for a more satisfying conclusion. Still, it's the part of the movie that I get up to refill my popcorn/drink/etc. Books, likewise, have this part. It looks like the hero is never going to get to his/her goal and yet you know that they'll make it there in the end.

The trick in writing is to make me not want to skip a bunch of pages or to make my butt glued to that couch until the very end. Even if I know that the hero gets the girl, make me question it. Too often, writers get attached to their characters and put them through necessary evils, but by making these evils completely atrocious and painful it often creates a better story.

Literary Agent Donald Maass (@DonMaass) tweets writing prompts designed to make your story better. While I personally don't believe that every single one of the prompts should be included in every story (personal preference) they are all ridiculously useful ways to make a story better. For example: "What’s the emotion or experience you’re most afraid to put your MC through? Go there. Do it. Now."

That prompt (number 29 out of 40-something) acknowledges that it's often the writer that's holding the story back. I'm guilty of it, I know I am. I love making my characters sweat, but I hate actually putting them in the fire. They're my little creations. But think of it this way: if your reader gets as attached to your character as you do, they'll be rooting for him/her even more if they have to overcome enormous odds to succeed. I'd rather watch someone climb a treacherous mountain than skip over a hill.


How do you get past putting your characters through hell?

Did I really write that? A guide to metaphors and similes

Okay, it's not looking good for Sunday check-ins for ROW80 so I think I'm just going to stick to Wednesday updates instead. Now, on to my Monday post:

Last Thursday former literary agent/current author Nathan Bransford critiqued a writer's page with his main takeaway being "Avoid being writerly. "

As he explains it: "When you're being writerly, your writing is making things less clear with clever word play."

Now, as a part of an online critique group, I find that I can pick out the "writerly" and point it out to other writers. Surely I am not guilty of this, right?

WRONG.

I was editing a story that I'd written and found this line:

She ducked her head, her hair catching on a rusted nail that stuck out from the wood like a fishing pole over the ocean, trying to catch...

Guess where that sentence ended up

Apparently I'd stopped there and continued, I'm guessing because even while writing it my subconscious was trying to get my attention and pull me from that train of thought. Seriously, a fishing pole over the ocean? What the heck?

I don't remember writing this, but I know that I did and I can even guess at my train of thought. It probably had something to do with "Oh, this scene doesn't have enough descriptive imagery" or "I sound too telly, I need to do some more showing." Blech.


Metaphors and similies definitely add to writing, but are a main symptoms to the "writerly" disease.  So how do you self-diagnose? There are a few things that I do while editing:

1. Look at the similes, metaphors, and descriptions in your work and ask yourself if they are necessary. In my example, I was just describing a nail. Totally inconsequential and never mentioned again in the story. The "fishing rod over the ocean" doesn't convey any more imagery than "nail jutting out from the wood" would. The MC didn't even see the nail until after the fact, so the description is totally and completely unnecessary. Similes and metaphors are important descriptive tools when you can make them work.

2. Look at the frequency of similies, metaphors, and descriptions in your work. If you have a metaphor appearing every two lines, chances are high that the reader is going to notice them and become more distant from the story. The metaphors should flow within the words so that you barely notice them while you read instead of feeling like a forced writerly tool.

3. Look at the length of your similies, metaphors, and descriptions. My example could work if I adjusted it a bit and the MC had some knowledge of fishing rods over the ocean. However, it is getting too long. Part of the reason I probably cut it off was because it was just trailing along with no end in sight. 

Here's an example of a simile done well:

From The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger

"The ride was actually over in six and a half minutes, and I had no choice but to hobble like an off-balance giraffe on my one flat, one four-inch heel arrangement."

The simile describes how the protagonist looks so that the reader can envision the scene (1) and is short and to the point (3).  

How do you self-diagnose writing ailments?