Layering in Depth of Character
By Barbara O'Neal | April 28, 2010 |
I’m about to dig into the revisions my editor and agent have suggested for my next book, (How To Bake A Perfect Life, out in January). It’s a complex story with a fairly large cast of characters and a complicated time structure. The tale is set in a bakery, more specifically a boulangerie, which is breads rather than pastries, so I spent the entire winter growing and testing various methods of sourdough starters, Old World and New, and testing the recipes I will include. Two other threads required tremendous amounts of research in areas I sort of thought I understood, meth addition (horrific) and the journey of a wounded soldier from Afghanistan to home.
90% of all that worked pretty well. The giant color-coded post-it notes seem to have done their job, as well as the giant pieces of butcher paper stuck to every wall and door available.
What does need work is a thread that I should have been able to write in my sleep: the characterization of one main character. Because I’ve spent the past few days rereading the (bland) arc of her character and deciding how to layer in her true journey, it seemed a good discussion topic for the day.
Most of the arc is there, buried or only mentioned or simply still in my head instead of on the page. (That can happen when you’ve lived with a book for a year or better—you think you wrote something that isn’t there.) My job is to uncover and bring forward the things that will make this character as compelling for you as she is for me.
I’ll begin with a character bio, third person, interviewing her, but not in the usual ways. Alison Hart (Jennifer Greene) once posted a trick she uses, which is to look inside the purse or glove box of a character, or both. I do both. I also like to see the inside of the car—is it messy or tidy? My car usually looks like someone is moving—books and canvas grocery bags and change scattered all over the floors. My partner has tools and running clothes of various weights and dog clutter from his side business.
Next, with this character who is so tangled with her family, I’ll ask her to talk about her relationship with each family member. Mother, father, sisters, brother, aunts, grandmother, etc. I’ll ask for a memory of each person.
When that is finished, I’ll write her timeline—what are the 5 most important events in her life? The five that should have been important but turned out not to be? If nothing new is revealed, I’ll ask for the next five most important moments and memories.
Then I will ask her what her secret is—I can’t remember where Jenny Crusie picked this up, but I took it from a craft post she put somewhere: What is your secret? No, what is your real secret? And then again, No, what is your REAL secret?
When I have all these notes written, I’ll go for a long walk and let it all simmer, then come back and consult my battered copy of 45 Master Characters by Victoria Lynn Schmidt. I like the female archetypes, the suggestions she makes for each type, and the model of the 9 Step Female Journey (which I taught at Pikes Peak Writers Conference last weekend, if any of you were there) to see how to fit my vision of my character into an arc that makes sense.
I will ask, at some point, “What does she want? Why can’t she have it?” but that’s usually a culminating question, to help me pull it all together.
Detail is everything in depth of character. What I will really be doing on this pass is living like my character, in a version of method acting. Method character development. When I fix a meal, I’ll ask myself how she would do it. What would she have for lunch? When I pick up a magazine, I’ll know what she chooses.
So, when I make this pass, I will be thinking about her routines and what she wears and what she likes to eat and what is in her cupboards and medicine chest and drawers. Maybe 1% of that information will be on the page, but I will know, and it will give her the depth she currently lacks.
Building memorable characters is both an art and a craft. Do you have tricks for building good characters? Tell us about them.
Creative Commons Photo by Christi Nielson
Barbara O’Neal is the author of more than a dozen award-winning, bestselling novels, including the runaway bestseller, When We Believed in Mermaids, which has been published in more than 20 countries and spent many months on the Amazon Charts, as well as the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Washington Post bestseller lists. Barbara lives on the beach in rugged Oregon with her husband, a British endurance athlete who vows he’ll never lose his accent and their zoo of cats and dogs. You can find more information on her newsletter and where to find her on social media at barbaraoneal.com.
I really like ‘talking’ to my characters, usually by staging imaginary interviews at various stages of the story, often with the same questions, to see what has changed and what has not – or what should change.
I also like figuring out little vignettes of their past lives, memories that haunt them or that they’ve blocked out, or those that make them smile (which is pretty much what you do with the five most important moments, I guess).
Finding out what their favourite scents, sounds and colours are is strangely important to me, personally – I don’t know, it just makes them seem more alive to me. For example, the main character in the story I’m working on has a thing for sandalwood and freshly mown grass. It also links in with childhood memories.
I also have them tell me about the first time they met their best friend and their worst enemy, what they did just before and what happened just after the meeting.
So really, this isn’t very different from what you do (I really like the idea with the real REAL secret, will have to try that)…
On the fun side, sometimes the characters seem almost too alive to me, with a mind of their own…one that sometimes doesn’t agree with my plotting their lives… that usually leads to some interesting arguments! ; )
ps. as I haven’t been published (yet), you should probably take any advice of mine with a grain of salt… : P
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Your post has got me thinking. My manuscript is multiple-POV, one woman and two men. I have been thinking for awhile now that I am inadvertently holding the female POV back a bit, she is not as flushed out as the two male main characters. The reason? Because I was so worried about developing thin male characters and not truly capturing their voices, that I spent all my time on them and not her! These are some great tips. Thanks!
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I love creating characters. (And I loved your workshop and panel at PPWC–especially the 9 step journey–which I recapped on my blog Monday. Hope you don’t mind.)
I find I have to get to know my characters slowly. I can’t sit down and fill out a detailed character sheet. Early on, as situations arise, I’ll figure out what kind of response I want my character to have–and then I kind of work backward, asking why he/she’d respond that way, and fill in their histories. The back story builds, and so does the character.
I love your suggestions. I’ve done character interviews, but they’re job interviews, where they come into my office and apply for the job of a character in my book.
I love method character development! I use it on a micro scale: when I’m working on a scene, I often say the dialogue out loud or make the faces/gestures that the characters are making, to be sure that they’re accurate or that I’m describing them well.
Also LOVE this: “What is your secret? No, what is your real secret? And then again, No, what is your REAL secret?”
Going to have to ask that of all my characters now. I have a feeling I will get some surprising answers… ;)
.-= Kristan´s last blog ..“Maybe” never sounded so good =-.
Tessa, publication is not required to have great writing tips!
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Terry,
I’m with you. I didn’t really “know” the characters in my novel until I’d written 100 pages of backstory. All of it was scrapped, but it helped me figure out their voices, what the relationship was between two of my main characters, etc. If you had had me interview my characters prior to writing, I would have come up with stuff that simply wasn’t “true”.
I’m going through a similar issue with my second, not quite started, novel. I have had to think–dream–ponder 24/7 to figure out what makes each of them tick. I’ve found that when I name a character, it helps me pin down who they are. Strange, but names do have definite connotations to them, and can convey a sense of personality.
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The idea of layering in character is fascinating to me. It’s similar to actors studying the backstory of characters they’re playing even when it’s never going to be part of any scene in the movie; it just gives them a feeling for how the character interprets and processes the events that do get shown.
It’s seems a lot of work to go through when nobody’s going to read it but it definitely makes a difference in the quality of the finished product.
I think it can actually help speed the writing process along as well since the writer doesn’t have to think in each crisis, how would this character react and is that consistent with their past behavior? They just “know” their characters well enough to see clearly how they would handle the situation.
Thanks for all the good information.
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Yes! This is excellent. I totally want and need this for one of my characters. She’s gone from being poignant to whitewashed and this is exactly what I need to flesh her out. I am going to go interview her now, to snoop through her dresser drawers, to ask her who she loves, who she hates, who she fears.
Thanks for this article!
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These are all great ideas. Thanks for the information!
Because I ghostwrite, as well as write my own books, I listen for the character’s voice.
There are so many dialects and nuances in Black vernacular, I try to capture each character’s speech pattern, particularly when writing in first person.
I try to channel the character’s personality. What is the character’s agenda? What is his or her particular attitude or take on life?
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