Some readers happily ride an action story to its climax even when its heroes and villains are cardboard cutouts. To reach a wider audience, though, it helps immensely when authors populate their stories with sympathetic, complex people, bringing them to vivid life on the page.
But how? A good start is remembering that characters--just like real people--can live or die on a strong first impression. Showing who a fictional person is in just a few paragraphs is critical.
Readers develop an interior portrait of each character based on:
- Their actions
- What they say about themselves
- What other characters say about them
- What the author tells us directly
As you introduce each character to a story, consider which aspect of their personality is most prominent. Suppose your protagonist is kindhearted. You could, of course, just say so:
"Frances was kindhearted."
But can you find an action that expresses the same idea?
Frances fished out his last coin without hesitating, giving it to the beggar.
Look again at the sentence. Are there any other bits of information about Frances that can be slid in gracefully?
Brother Frances fished with a withered left hand for his last coin; without hesitating, he passed it to the beggar.
Now your reader knows that Frances is a member of a religious order, mildly disabled, and generous.
Reader Sympathy
Frances is a kind-hearted monk, chances are your readers will be prepared to like him. But not everyone is a saint. Ways to get readers on the side of more gritty characters include:
- Showing their good qualities first, and then revealing their flaws
- Giving them a saving grace--your bank robber anti-heroine is kind to horses, never shoots anyone in the back, and robs banks to support her virtuoso sister at school
- Making them the victim of an undeserved misfortune
- Giving them a sense of humor--readers love to hate an ironic and witty anti-hero
Details, Details
Other elements to consider when creating a character include:
- The Physical: Don't merely focus on skin, eye or hair color here. Consider dress, manner of speech, gait, scent, and anything that is specific to the character's physical being.
- Personality: What is her cultural background? Her emotional strengths and weaknesses? What are her fears, and what makes her angry? Stories are full of conflict, remember: how does she react to stress? What emotional state is the character in when the story begins... and how will it have changed by the ending?
- Backstory: It usually always necessary to work out a detailed biography of the character's whole life, but you should know the basics. Is he rich or poor? Educated? What are his skills? Does he have a job, a family?
Novel-length fiction offers writers a lot of room to explore at least some of their characters' life stories, education, and formative childhood experiences. Even in a longer book, though, there will be smaller roles, people who must be sketched into the action quickly--and not without depth. By making a strong first impression when each character first appears, and then building on that initial impact, you can populate your fiction with strong, nuanced, and memorable individuals.
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