When I think of revision, I think about cutting back – deleting sentences, shortening word count, streamlining the plot, making the story as tight as possible. But revision isn't only about cutting. It's about consistency, language, conflict, character, and congruency. And many of these qualities involved adding to the story in addition to taking away.
This is what I've been working on this week: adding to my story. Writing new bits of dialogue, new scenes, new details. And so far, it hasn't been too bad. But that's because I've left the hardest parts for last. See, I have this big, long checklist of revisions I have to make to my novel. It's nine pages long actually. But after about a week of work, I am very happy to say I have successfully crossed off at least half of those bullets. Perhaps more like two-thirds even. But the remaining third holds the harder bullets. The things that my brain hasn't quite come up with a solution for yet.
One of my problems is that I need to introduce one of my characters earlier — the king. The reader knows about him from the beginning, and gathers lot of information about him along the way through the dialogue of others and general exposition (for if a story has a king, he is inevitably known about on some level). But these methods are more indirect. The reader doesn't get to see the king directly; she's not forming a judgment based on her experience of watching the king, but only through the perspective of others characters.
So I need to insert the king into earlier scenes. I need to allow the reader to see who he is, so that later, when he plays a pivotal role in the action, my readers have a strong background that will contribute to the reading of his actions. The reader needs a foundation; a preparedness of sorts for the moment when the king becomes important.
This has not been the easiest of tasks for me, hence why I've left it for the end of this revision cycle. But it's something I must tackle this week, for sure. And here are some of the ways I plan on doing so:
• Making a timeline. Having a succint visual of all that happens in the story allows me to see a map of the storyline that isn't spread out over almost three hundred pages. Viewing scenes side by side, I then have a better idea of the gaps that exist, the breaks in the action, and the scenes where I can insert key moment to expand my reader's understanding of my character.
• Character maps. I am sure this could be a called a wide array of things, and that this term might actually mean different things to different people. But basically, I am going to track all the scenes where he appears throughout my novel, and what he reveals in those scene, or how each of his appearances function. Then, I came see a collective picture of what I have revealed to the reader, helping me see both the strengths and weakness of his presentation within the narrative.
• Establishing character goals. What do I want the reader to know about the king? What expectations have I inherently established through the indirect descriptions of him, and how does his presence deliver (or not deliver) on these? Knowing how I want him to appear is half the battle. Then I actually have something to compare the represented character against the intended character.
In the end, revision isn't just about cutting. I know my strategy for dealing with the king may leave me with more work to do in the end, but coming up with a game plan is half the battle, and it brings me that much closer to the polished work I am hoping to achieve.
Revision is about looking at the big picture and seeing how each little details fits, making sure that everything within the story adds to the quality rather than subtracts. And revision looks as different from day to day as it does from project to project. So as I cut and add and map out characters, I am going to continue to take it step by step, and try remember that in the end, thinking and mapping and planning and adding all have their place. All of the work matters.
Showing posts with label Characters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Characters. Show all posts
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Sunday, April 7, 2013
Visualizing — Seeing and Creating A World, And the Fun You Can Have Doing That
Last week, my friend Richard asked me a really good question. He said, " When you're writing, how much do you visualize? Do you see the things happening in your mind, and how much do you know about what your characters look like?" This was a really great question, because even though I definitely do this, I hadn't really spent to much time contemplating how or why I visualize. So I started thinking about this, and of course, here's my blog post about it!
My answer to Richard was the I visualize differently for different things. For example, I know I pay a lot of attention to the way characters move and what they express in their body language. So I often find myself acting out hand movements or different expressions in my room, trying to break down just how to catpure that head tilt or hand gesture or facial expression in my text. But when it comes to the faces of the characters themselves, meaning what they look like exactly, it isn't quite the same for me.
Explaining this to Richard, I realized that while of course I know what my characters look like in terms of basic characteristics, general size, key descriptive markers, and all of their mannerisms, I don't have a crystal clear image of their face in my head. Mostly I know how they move. I see them acting out these situations, and in my mind I am often even looking at them head on, rather than just through their eyes. But still, the face isn't perfectly clear. Funny, right? I'm not sure. My characters aren't modeled after someone I know, and I don't work from a picture or prototype of sorts. So if I had to cast a person to play my character in a movie, I think I'd know when I found her. But right now, I am not quite positive exactly what she looks like.
Another thing I spend a lot of time visualizing is the surroundings. Not every detail of every part of the world, but all the immediate places that my character resides. For my current project, I have put a lot of time and description into making the library a real, tangible place for the reader, because as my characters go there again and again, I want the reader to feel as if he is right there with them — sitting on the seat cushion, climbing the stairs, admiring the enormous bookshelves with heavy, fancy books on them. Similarly, the city square becomes an important locale in my novel. So of course, I spent a lot of time visualizing just what it would look like, but beyond that also what it felt like. The smells, the sounds, how fast people walk, the feel of the cobblestones, the layout of the plaza. I guess I spend the most time visualizing place (in addition to body language), because to me, as a reader walks beside my character, I want him to feel as though he is actually beside her, understanding and taking in each new detail as she does.
Currently, as I am in the last stretch of writing my novel, my character has finally embarked on the journey the whole narrative has been leading up to (Yay!). As of last night, she's in the woods. Literally. So again, to evoke feeling, I want to spend a lot of time visualizing just what the woods looks like. Not necessarily every aspect of the woods, but the immediate details of how she visualizes
It's funny. Much like I don't exactly know what my character's faces look like, I don't fully know
It's like I'm in a tunnel, and all I can see is what is immediately around me. But that's okay. Those are the things I need. The sensory description that will put you right there with her.
Of course, I can jump out of said tunnel to look down over the landscape and know where everything is in relation to each other and how large the wood is (which I have done because I made extensive maps for this project before I started), but what I visualize, what I see when I am writing are only the details of the present moment.
And this can be fun. It's engrossing. The way my reader would be feeling present in the moment, so am I. Though I often change my mind and swap details that can perhaps change the setting substantially, I am still right there in it. Only now, instead of tall, looming trees, I am seeing shorter ones, with branches that stick out and pull your hair. Or, in the new town she's about to arrive in, the houses are clustered in a flat open area. They're actually situated right among the trees.
But that's okay. Because visualizing helped me realize what the most interesting setting looks like and the problems inherent in movement and place that I might not otherwise realize. Visualization is a key tool for novel writing, or any writing really. It may look different for you and me, or it may look different even within my own process. But it is important, and beyond that, it allows you the experience of being a reader to your own writing — throwing yourself so deeply into the world that it is almost as if you are just a traveller, there to take some pictures, and record your findings.
My answer to Richard was the I visualize differently for different things. For example, I know I pay a lot of attention to the way characters move and what they express in their body language. So I often find myself acting out hand movements or different expressions in my room, trying to break down just how to catpure that head tilt or hand gesture or facial expression in my text. But when it comes to the faces of the characters themselves, meaning what they look like exactly, it isn't quite the same for me.
Explaining this to Richard, I realized that while of course I know what my characters look like in terms of basic characteristics, general size, key descriptive markers, and all of their mannerisms, I don't have a crystal clear image of their face in my head. Mostly I know how they move. I see them acting out these situations, and in my mind I am often even looking at them head on, rather than just through their eyes. But still, the face isn't perfectly clear. Funny, right? I'm not sure. My characters aren't modeled after someone I know, and I don't work from a picture or prototype of sorts. So if I had to cast a person to play my character in a movie, I think I'd know when I found her. But right now, I am not quite positive exactly what she looks like.
Another thing I spend a lot of time visualizing is the surroundings. Not every detail of every part of the world, but all the immediate places that my character resides. For my current project, I have put a lot of time and description into making the library a real, tangible place for the reader, because as my characters go there again and again, I want the reader to feel as if he is right there with them — sitting on the seat cushion, climbing the stairs, admiring the enormous bookshelves with heavy, fancy books on them. Similarly, the city square becomes an important locale in my novel. So of course, I spent a lot of time visualizing just what it would look like, but beyond that also what it felt like. The smells, the sounds, how fast people walk, the feel of the cobblestones, the layout of the plaza. I guess I spend the most time visualizing place (in addition to body language), because to me, as a reader walks beside my character, I want him to feel as though he is actually beside her, understanding and taking in each new detail as she does.
Currently, as I am in the last stretch of writing my novel, my character has finally embarked on the journey the whole narrative has been leading up to (Yay!). As of last night, she's in the woods. Literally. So again, to evoke feeling, I want to spend a lot of time visualizing just what the woods looks like. Not necessarily every aspect of the woods, but the immediate details of how she visualizes
It's funny. Much like I don't exactly know what my character's faces look like, I don't fully know
It's like I'm in a tunnel, and all I can see is what is immediately around me. But that's okay. Those are the things I need. The sensory description that will put you right there with her.
Of course, I can jump out of said tunnel to look down over the landscape and know where everything is in relation to each other and how large the wood is (which I have done because I made extensive maps for this project before I started), but what I visualize, what I see when I am writing are only the details of the present moment.
And this can be fun. It's engrossing. The way my reader would be feeling present in the moment, so am I. Though I often change my mind and swap details that can perhaps change the setting substantially, I am still right there in it. Only now, instead of tall, looming trees, I am seeing shorter ones, with branches that stick out and pull your hair. Or, in the new town she's about to arrive in, the houses are clustered in a flat open area. They're actually situated right among the trees.
But that's okay. Because visualizing helped me realize what the most interesting setting looks like and the problems inherent in movement and place that I might not otherwise realize. Visualization is a key tool for novel writing, or any writing really. It may look different for you and me, or it may look different even within my own process. But it is important, and beyond that, it allows you the experience of being a reader to your own writing — throwing yourself so deeply into the world that it is almost as if you are just a traveller, there to take some pictures, and record your findings.
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Finding the Belief Systems Within Your Fiction World
Today is Easter, and for those who celebrate it, I wish you the most joyful of days. This has been a big week for two of the major world religions. For the Jewish community, Passover was commemorated, and for the Christian community, Holy Week culminates in the celebration of Easter today. Each of these religious holidays have a large impact on our society at large. With school often canceled for Good Friday, and various rituals and traditons practiced by families and friends across the nation, this week served as a reminder for such how deeply these holidays are woven into the fabric of our society; of just how greatly these ideologies shape our lives.
Likewise, our fictional worlds must have these ideologies as well. While such traditions don't always have to be overt or a tremendously large part of our stories, it is undeniably important to understand just what beliefs lie behind the everyday life of our characters' worlds.
Ideologies, religious beliefs, superstitions, or whatever else you'd like to call them all inform the way our characters act. Although we may not spend virtually any of our story's real estate discussing the long standing history behind these beliefs, or even include a direct practice of a belief itself, the ideas that govern the greater society matter to the quality of your narrative. Your readers may not notice, particularly within contemporary, realistic stories in which the world you explain closely matches the culture of your reader's world, but regardless, you do have to have some kind of ideology within the story itself.
Beliefs are the back drop of every society. They dictate what characters do — and what they don't do. For example, religious traditions or areligious superstition might inform the gender norms of your story. Practices surrounding food might play a significant role, and even contribute to the conflict of your plot. Your character might meet a friend whose beliefs are different than there own. She might even explore a new system of beliefs herself. Even for contemporary worlds like our own, communicating the tradtions remains important, because all of these things can be both character building and contribute to your plot.
Here are some questions to consider about when thinking about the beliefs of your fictional world:
• What holidays does the society celebrate? Do any of these holidays come into play within the narrative?
• Do superstitions play any role in the lives of your characters?
• Regardless of whether your character personally believes or not, are their religious beliefs held within the society that mandate certain behaviors, practices, or traditions in your character's society?
• How do your characters view nature? Are there any spiritual associations with the natural world?
• Are there various ideologies within the culture? Are they at odds or do they coexist peacefully?
• What does your protagonist personally believe? What do the characters around her belief?
Examine these questions within your current project. Perhaps contemplating belifs may open up a way to deepen characterization and complicate your plot. Also, think about these questions for a potential new project. Maybe you can even develop a whole new story idea from these questions!
Likewise, our fictional worlds must have these ideologies as well. While such traditions don't always have to be overt or a tremendously large part of our stories, it is undeniably important to understand just what beliefs lie behind the everyday life of our characters' worlds.
Ideologies, religious beliefs, superstitions, or whatever else you'd like to call them all inform the way our characters act. Although we may not spend virtually any of our story's real estate discussing the long standing history behind these beliefs, or even include a direct practice of a belief itself, the ideas that govern the greater society matter to the quality of your narrative. Your readers may not notice, particularly within contemporary, realistic stories in which the world you explain closely matches the culture of your reader's world, but regardless, you do have to have some kind of ideology within the story itself.
Beliefs are the back drop of every society. They dictate what characters do — and what they don't do. For example, religious traditions or areligious superstition might inform the gender norms of your story. Practices surrounding food might play a significant role, and even contribute to the conflict of your plot. Your character might meet a friend whose beliefs are different than there own. She might even explore a new system of beliefs herself. Even for contemporary worlds like our own, communicating the tradtions remains important, because all of these things can be both character building and contribute to your plot.
Here are some questions to consider about when thinking about the beliefs of your fictional world:
• What holidays does the society celebrate? Do any of these holidays come into play within the narrative?
• Do superstitions play any role in the lives of your characters?
• Regardless of whether your character personally believes or not, are their religious beliefs held within the society that mandate certain behaviors, practices, or traditions in your character's society?
• How do your characters view nature? Are there any spiritual associations with the natural world?
• Are there various ideologies within the culture? Are they at odds or do they coexist peacefully?
• What does your protagonist personally believe? What do the characters around her belief?
Examine these questions within your current project. Perhaps contemplating belifs may open up a way to deepen characterization and complicate your plot. Also, think about these questions for a potential new project. Maybe you can even develop a whole new story idea from these questions!
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Speak Up! — Avoiding Hesitant Characters and Using Your Words to Assert Meaning
Receiving my pages back from my mentor this weekend, one thing that jumped out at me through her insightful comments was the occasional and sometimes not so occasional slip from a strong, assertive voice to a more tentative, hesitant one. Instead of my character saying something in a strong, positive manner, the language I chose made it seem almost as if they didn't really want to speak of their feelings, or they weren't quite sure what they thought. But certainly, this is not a good way for my characters to come across, and not an effective manner for establishing a strong, engaging story for the reader.
When reading a story, it is important for the characters to come across as people who have a consistent voice, know who they are (to some extent), and convey their emotions in a clear manner. Of course, this does not mean that all characters always know how they feel or what they want, or that a character can't be inconsistent if that is what an author intends. But even so, creating characters who only half-way say what they mean or never fully say what they are trying to convey doesn't make for a strong reading experience, or for a character who will last well beyond the last page turn of the book.
I think part of this tendency comes from our own hesitation as writers sometimes. I know that in working through this first draft of my current novel, I'm not always sure exactly what I want to say or how I want to say it for every line. But we don't want the characters to reveal whatever hesitation we have as writers. We want them to stand strong, defined on the page, and confidently owning who they are. Even if you have a character who is completely lacking self-confidence or is desperately unsure of who she is, you still need her to assert herself as unconfident, perhaps not by saying so, but by simply using the words she speaks to convey a decisive point. This may sound a bit confusing as we are getting into the line between us writers (or creators) creating and controlling these characters and the characters sometimes creating and dictating their own paths, but still — the point is that each of our characters need to assert something. Whether its fear, joy, trepidation, anger, or insecurity, no character can do this half way. At least not an effective character.
When reading a story, it is important for the characters to come across as people who have a consistent voice, know who they are (to some extent), and convey their emotions in a clear manner. Of course, this does not mean that all characters always know how they feel or what they want, or that a character can't be inconsistent if that is what an author intends. But even so, creating characters who only half-way say what they mean or never fully say what they are trying to convey doesn't make for a strong reading experience, or for a character who will last well beyond the last page turn of the book.
I think part of this tendency comes from our own hesitation as writers sometimes. I know that in working through this first draft of my current novel, I'm not always sure exactly what I want to say or how I want to say it for every line. But we don't want the characters to reveal whatever hesitation we have as writers. We want them to stand strong, defined on the page, and confidently owning who they are. Even if you have a character who is completely lacking self-confidence or is desperately unsure of who she is, you still need her to assert herself as unconfident, perhaps not by saying so, but by simply using the words she speaks to convey a decisive point. This may sound a bit confusing as we are getting into the line between us writers (or creators) creating and controlling these characters and the characters sometimes creating and dictating their own paths, but still — the point is that each of our characters need to assert something. Whether its fear, joy, trepidation, anger, or insecurity, no character can do this half way. At least not an effective character.
Words like "probably" and "possible", the passive voice, and phrases like "she could feel" instead of "she felt"are all good indicators that perhaps a sentence needs to be reevaluated and made stronger. Having another person read through your work and look for these things is a helpful tool for identifying your own hesitant writing since we all know that we miss things when we read our own work. And, remembering that this will be something you can make better again and again as you work through your revisions is something to keep in mind. We all struggle with making our words convey exactly what we want them, too. So it's certainly not just you, and it's not just me.
But when I think about the books that affected me the most, or the books for which I admire the prose or the strength of character, all of them have this same element in common. Their words assert meaning. And their characters' words clearly convey who they are, uniquely, consistently, and with no shame. So as we work through our prose, and develop our characters, let's keep this in mind: write characters who are not hesitant to reveal who they are, even if they are only revealing insecurities. And don't be afraid to rework that sentence over and over again, until the right words shine and are just as powerful as you had hoped.
Sunday, January 13, 2013
Loving Your Characters: Writerly Love vs. Emotional Love
Working on my manuscript this week, I've found that I really enjoy my time with the story. Of course, I'm not exactly just hanging out with it, and there are plenty of moments of frustration with sentences or uncertainty about how a scene should go, but I just have truly enjoyed both how the story is turning out and the actual process of writing itself. So this got me thinking why? Why is this project seeming so fun (at least for now!)? What exactly is so different about it?
Well, I think a large part of the answer could be that after coming off of 3+ months of intensive revising, it feels nice to be writing again. Creating, exploring, describing, experimenting — that's sometimes a lot more fun than cutting and rewording and staring at the same sentence that you could rewriting five different ways but still you don't know which one is best. So there's that reason!
But I think the truth is also that sometimes, some characters are just more fun to work with than others, and in this project, I find my character to be really likable and fun to write. I like spending time discovery her more. I like the ways she responds to life around her and the things she seeks. Maybe I find more of myself in her, or perhaps even the person I want to be. But after realizing just how much I enjoy my current protagonist, I started worrying about my past projects. Is it bad that I didn't enjoy my previous book's protagonist quite as much, or in quite the same way? And does that say anything about the quality of my story or my characters themselves?
I think the answer to both questions is 'no'. Writing a good character is not dictated by your feeling toward that character. You don't need to love them all the same way. And perhaps with villains, you might not even need to love them at all. But when I say "love", I am talking more about how you, the person, feel about your characters rather than the way that you, the writer, acts toward them. Perhaps your feeling toward a characters depends on your stage in life, how you feel one day, or the fact that their story is so much different than yours. I mean, it's no secret that I am not a boy, or never was one. So maybe I do not feel as much connection to my last protagonist Carter as I do with my current one, simply because she's a girl. But, at the same time, I could tell you that I do love another boy character I've written, so really, it could all just be about who the character is and how you connect with them from the standpoint of a person rather than a writer.
So, all of this to say, it's really not a bad thing to love your characters unequally (*gasp*), because they are not real and they are not your children, even if you might feel like they are most day. However, there is a caveat. It doesn't matter that you love your characters differently in the emotional sense, as long as you give them the same amount of love and concern. Ultimately, as long as you develop them to the best of your ability and work with them until they shine with emotion and can get some, and hopefully most, people to connect with them, then it is totally fine!
Emotions are necessarily a good indicator of how good the story is. Emotions are really just telling you about yourself. And, making a good story isn't all about emotion — not your own at least. Do we have to make the reader feel for your character and enter into their journey? Absolutely. But do we have to be fully in love with that character? Not necessarily. See, I think there is a fine line between loving our character as if they were real and we wanted to be there friend, and loving your character in the way a writer needs to — with concern and careful detail to their needs and actions and thoughts and struggles. Just because I might not want to hang out with one of my characters as much I would like to hang out with another one doesn't mean I do not have a love for him. It might just be less emotional in terms of my personal self, and more objective on the part of my writing self.
Every project will bring a new feeling with it. But a project, just like a character, is not made only by your personal response to it. It's made from hard work and the love a writer brings to their characters. Certainly it can be a plus to want to be best friends with your character, but not a prerequisite to making a great novel. Objectivity can even benefit your characters. So while I am greatly enjoying my character right now, I don't need to have insecurity about my other characters, and neither do you. As long as you work with your characters equally, you don't need to love them equally. But of course we hope our readers will love them all!
Well, I think a large part of the answer could be that after coming off of 3+ months of intensive revising, it feels nice to be writing again. Creating, exploring, describing, experimenting — that's sometimes a lot more fun than cutting and rewording and staring at the same sentence that you could rewriting five different ways but still you don't know which one is best. So there's that reason!
But I think the truth is also that sometimes, some characters are just more fun to work with than others, and in this project, I find my character to be really likable and fun to write. I like spending time discovery her more. I like the ways she responds to life around her and the things she seeks. Maybe I find more of myself in her, or perhaps even the person I want to be. But after realizing just how much I enjoy my current protagonist, I started worrying about my past projects. Is it bad that I didn't enjoy my previous book's protagonist quite as much, or in quite the same way? And does that say anything about the quality of my story or my characters themselves?
I think the answer to both questions is 'no'. Writing a good character is not dictated by your feeling toward that character. You don't need to love them all the same way. And perhaps with villains, you might not even need to love them at all. But when I say "love", I am talking more about how you, the person, feel about your characters rather than the way that you, the writer, acts toward them. Perhaps your feeling toward a characters depends on your stage in life, how you feel one day, or the fact that their story is so much different than yours. I mean, it's no secret that I am not a boy, or never was one. So maybe I do not feel as much connection to my last protagonist Carter as I do with my current one, simply because she's a girl. But, at the same time, I could tell you that I do love another boy character I've written, so really, it could all just be about who the character is and how you connect with them from the standpoint of a person rather than a writer.
So, all of this to say, it's really not a bad thing to love your characters unequally (*gasp*), because they are not real and they are not your children, even if you might feel like they are most day. However, there is a caveat. It doesn't matter that you love your characters differently in the emotional sense, as long as you give them the same amount of love and concern. Ultimately, as long as you develop them to the best of your ability and work with them until they shine with emotion and can get some, and hopefully most, people to connect with them, then it is totally fine!
Emotions are necessarily a good indicator of how good the story is. Emotions are really just telling you about yourself. And, making a good story isn't all about emotion — not your own at least. Do we have to make the reader feel for your character and enter into their journey? Absolutely. But do we have to be fully in love with that character? Not necessarily. See, I think there is a fine line between loving our character as if they were real and we wanted to be there friend, and loving your character in the way a writer needs to — with concern and careful detail to their needs and actions and thoughts and struggles. Just because I might not want to hang out with one of my characters as much I would like to hang out with another one doesn't mean I do not have a love for him. It might just be less emotional in terms of my personal self, and more objective on the part of my writing self.
Every project will bring a new feeling with it. But a project, just like a character, is not made only by your personal response to it. It's made from hard work and the love a writer brings to their characters. Certainly it can be a plus to want to be best friends with your character, but not a prerequisite to making a great novel. Objectivity can even benefit your characters. So while I am greatly enjoying my character right now, I don't need to have insecurity about my other characters, and neither do you. As long as you work with your characters equally, you don't need to love them equally. But of course we hope our readers will love them all!
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Tracing the Emotions — Keeping Your Reader Emotionally Involved
As of this past week, I have completed my third round of revision on my manuscript and am about to begin my fourth. It's amazing to see just how much the novel has come along. It's definitely been a lot of hard work, especially with each revision is on such a tight schedule. But, while I am slightly exhausted to be sure, it's nice to be able to see the fruits of the work paying off!
This week, in my letter from my editor, one element that he highlighted for the next revision is to make sure to track the reader's emotional involvement with certain characters. In essence, I need to take a careful look at the emotional progression of certain characters, but also begin to consider the way in which readers will respond to those characters.
For instance, one of my characters, Tate, is the best friend of my protagonist. For the majority of the novel, however, Tate is angry at Carter for something he's done, and struggles to believe Carter's professed reason for why he did it. Now, I know this doesn't give you lots of insight into the greater situation or the dynamic between the characters, but it provides a good example this type of revision. Throughout the novel, Tate's anger manifests itself in a variety of ways. So as the novel progresses, and his anger changes, I need to make sure that his emotions are consistent and relative to the situations playing out around him.
Going through the scenes in which he appears, cataloging a list of his actions, and listing his emotional responses are all part of creating the emotional map for any character. Of course, I know people do this in a variety of different ways, including color coding, using index cards, or creating extensive outlines. But really whatever works for you is great, as long as you are making sure to carefully go through all of the places in which your character appears since even the smallest of actions can convey a world of emotion. You want to gather as full a picture as you can of the emotional life of your character.
But tracking a character emotionally is not only about following their emotions, but also being aware of how the reader responds to their emotional progression. One of the things my mentor said about Tate was that in a few instances, he has begun to come across as mean. And if he comes across as mean, then the reader loses sympathy for him, which in turn, lessens their sympathy toward my protagonist. Evaluating reader response to your character's emotional lives is just as important as the character's emotions themselves. Of course, it is not always about making your character likable, but instead, about remembering their emotions go beyond just the characters themselves.
Sometimes we become so caught up in moving the plot along and ensuring the value of each scene, and even each sentence, it can become easy to forget your reader's response. For my character, I didn't necessarily have a problem with Tate acting mean, but I do want to make sure to protect the reader's connection with him, and thus don't want his meanness to break the bond that has hopefully formed.
Because this type of revision shifts some of the focus away from the story itself as it exists on the page and onto the response of the reader, it is definitely a revision that should come later in your process. In the case of flat characters, who never really change or only make a cameo in one scene, there role doesn't merit this type of scrutiny. But all the other characters who play a main role in the action or even in the development of your protagonist can be evaluated in this way.
Secondary characters' emotions can often be just as important as the emotions of your protagonist. Like the real world, all of our characters exist in an interpersonal web of relationships. And, this web includes your readers' relationship with the characters. One of the best parts of the reading experience is that you get to lose yourself in a whole new world of friends and action and fantasy. So you want to make sure to keep your reader connected. Their emotions matter, too!
This week, in my letter from my editor, one element that he highlighted for the next revision is to make sure to track the reader's emotional involvement with certain characters. In essence, I need to take a careful look at the emotional progression of certain characters, but also begin to consider the way in which readers will respond to those characters.
For instance, one of my characters, Tate, is the best friend of my protagonist. For the majority of the novel, however, Tate is angry at Carter for something he's done, and struggles to believe Carter's professed reason for why he did it. Now, I know this doesn't give you lots of insight into the greater situation or the dynamic between the characters, but it provides a good example this type of revision. Throughout the novel, Tate's anger manifests itself in a variety of ways. So as the novel progresses, and his anger changes, I need to make sure that his emotions are consistent and relative to the situations playing out around him.
Going through the scenes in which he appears, cataloging a list of his actions, and listing his emotional responses are all part of creating the emotional map for any character. Of course, I know people do this in a variety of different ways, including color coding, using index cards, or creating extensive outlines. But really whatever works for you is great, as long as you are making sure to carefully go through all of the places in which your character appears since even the smallest of actions can convey a world of emotion. You want to gather as full a picture as you can of the emotional life of your character.
But tracking a character emotionally is not only about following their emotions, but also being aware of how the reader responds to their emotional progression. One of the things my mentor said about Tate was that in a few instances, he has begun to come across as mean. And if he comes across as mean, then the reader loses sympathy for him, which in turn, lessens their sympathy toward my protagonist. Evaluating reader response to your character's emotional lives is just as important as the character's emotions themselves. Of course, it is not always about making your character likable, but instead, about remembering their emotions go beyond just the characters themselves.
Sometimes we become so caught up in moving the plot along and ensuring the value of each scene, and even each sentence, it can become easy to forget your reader's response. For my character, I didn't necessarily have a problem with Tate acting mean, but I do want to make sure to protect the reader's connection with him, and thus don't want his meanness to break the bond that has hopefully formed.
Because this type of revision shifts some of the focus away from the story itself as it exists on the page and onto the response of the reader, it is definitely a revision that should come later in your process. In the case of flat characters, who never really change or only make a cameo in one scene, there role doesn't merit this type of scrutiny. But all the other characters who play a main role in the action or even in the development of your protagonist can be evaluated in this way.
Secondary characters' emotions can often be just as important as the emotions of your protagonist. Like the real world, all of our characters exist in an interpersonal web of relationships. And, this web includes your readers' relationship with the characters. One of the best parts of the reading experience is that you get to lose yourself in a whole new world of friends and action and fantasy. So you want to make sure to keep your reader connected. Their emotions matter, too!
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Keeping Your Character's Secrets —What to Say, and What Not to Say
Just like real, everyday people, each and every character has an internal world and an external world. One of the great qualities of the novel is that the wall between the internal and external can be broken down, and we, the readers, get to peek inside the internal world of a character in the way that we can never do in real life: we actually get to see inside their heads. We feel like we are getting to know all their thoughts, but really, we are only seeing all the thoughts that the author allows us to see.
This is where my blog post picks up this week: thinking about the question what thoughts of my protagonist should I allow the reader to have access to, and what thoughts should be kept secret? The weight of this question is also augmented by the fact that at the start of my novel, my protagonist is also keeping a secret from those around him. And not only is he keeping a secret, but he is also trying to resist the truth himself.
As I've continued my revision this week, I've run into many sections within the manuscript where I've thought, "He doesn't need to say this," and deleted a sentence or two. Mostly because these thoughts have been 1) obvious and something the reader can glean from the exposition and/or his actions, or 2) too mature/analytical for the narrative moment that he finds himself in. I think I should pause for a moment here and say that my story is also being told in the first person voice. This POV greatly informs my questions of what to reveal and what to keep secret because it is ultimately my character who is talking about himself. There is no omniscient or close third narrator who has some level of detachment or even investment in getting or protecting the whole truth of the story. This is Carter's story, being told by Carter. And much like you and I are very selective in the truths we tell, or perhaps more accurately, how we frame those truths, it becomes a significant concern for me as the author to achieve an authenticity in the voice and revelations of my character.
It's not so much that he wouldn't or doesn't think a specific thought, but it becomes a question of what should be said and when a thought should be said. A thought he might reveal at the end of my book, when he is more self-aware and coming to accept more of his limitations might feel very out of place at the beginning of the novel. Similarly, while he reveals his feelings to one of his friends, I need to make sure that the spoken words are an appropriate reflection of a thirteen-to-fourteen year old boy's emotional depth, instead of perhaps something deeply profound that I would love to have my character say.
Finding the appropriate balance between expressed and unstated thoughts begins with an awareness of just who your character is, and also, how your character's secrets affect the overall arch of the story. I know that my novel would be vastly different if Carter were willing to proclaim his secret to the world on page one. Secrets are often very important to the plot and the motivations of your character, and they can be a great way to keep your reader turning the page. But in keeping secrets from your reader, however big or small, you want to make sure to give them enough of an emotional connection with your character so that they care about him, and want him to achieve whatever he is after.
When working around secrets and your character's hidden thoughts, you also want to make sure to keep your character believable. So while you must always remember that your characters have secrets and needs and fears and desires, you always want to remind yourself that they're not always going to be talking about them. Walking the line between providing some sense of that protective self-awareness as well as a willingness to be open thus becomes even more important, particularly when working with a first person narration.
We all have certain things that we want to hide, or a desire to say other things that might not reflect the whole, complete truth. This is an important aspect of developing compelling characters. But as the author, it is your job to figure out exactly what needs to be said and what should be kept behind the curtain. And like most other things in the revision process, there is no formula for exactly how to do this. But one good tip to remember: just like the rest of us real-life characters, your characters aren't as self-aware as you'd like them to be.
This is where my blog post picks up this week: thinking about the question what thoughts of my protagonist should I allow the reader to have access to, and what thoughts should be kept secret? The weight of this question is also augmented by the fact that at the start of my novel, my protagonist is also keeping a secret from those around him. And not only is he keeping a secret, but he is also trying to resist the truth himself.
As I've continued my revision this week, I've run into many sections within the manuscript where I've thought, "He doesn't need to say this," and deleted a sentence or two. Mostly because these thoughts have been 1) obvious and something the reader can glean from the exposition and/or his actions, or 2) too mature/analytical for the narrative moment that he finds himself in. I think I should pause for a moment here and say that my story is also being told in the first person voice. This POV greatly informs my questions of what to reveal and what to keep secret because it is ultimately my character who is talking about himself. There is no omniscient or close third narrator who has some level of detachment or even investment in getting or protecting the whole truth of the story. This is Carter's story, being told by Carter. And much like you and I are very selective in the truths we tell, or perhaps more accurately, how we frame those truths, it becomes a significant concern for me as the author to achieve an authenticity in the voice and revelations of my character.
It's not so much that he wouldn't or doesn't think a specific thought, but it becomes a question of what should be said and when a thought should be said. A thought he might reveal at the end of my book, when he is more self-aware and coming to accept more of his limitations might feel very out of place at the beginning of the novel. Similarly, while he reveals his feelings to one of his friends, I need to make sure that the spoken words are an appropriate reflection of a thirteen-to-fourteen year old boy's emotional depth, instead of perhaps something deeply profound that I would love to have my character say.
Finding the appropriate balance between expressed and unstated thoughts begins with an awareness of just who your character is, and also, how your character's secrets affect the overall arch of the story. I know that my novel would be vastly different if Carter were willing to proclaim his secret to the world on page one. Secrets are often very important to the plot and the motivations of your character, and they can be a great way to keep your reader turning the page. But in keeping secrets from your reader, however big or small, you want to make sure to give them enough of an emotional connection with your character so that they care about him, and want him to achieve whatever he is after.
When working around secrets and your character's hidden thoughts, you also want to make sure to keep your character believable. So while you must always remember that your characters have secrets and needs and fears and desires, you always want to remind yourself that they're not always going to be talking about them. Walking the line between providing some sense of that protective self-awareness as well as a willingness to be open thus becomes even more important, particularly when working with a first person narration.
We all have certain things that we want to hide, or a desire to say other things that might not reflect the whole, complete truth. This is an important aspect of developing compelling characters. But as the author, it is your job to figure out exactly what needs to be said and what should be kept behind the curtain. And like most other things in the revision process, there is no formula for exactly how to do this. But one good tip to remember: just like the rest of us real-life characters, your characters aren't as self-aware as you'd like them to be.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Naming Your Characters
At the beginning of any novel, or more likely, in the earliest stages of the novel's conception, one of the key elements is choosing names for your cast of characters. Naming your characters is an important decision, as not only will you be writing this name over and over and thinking about your character for quite some time, but naming also should be a deliberate choice on the part of the author.
Of course, some initial thoughts about naming are simply that you don't want to choose a name that is too common or too strange; or a name a character after someone in your life (as that can be come potentially problematic); or a name that really means nothing to you. Like real life people, names become part of the fictional character's identity. So although a name may not actually tell you all that much about the character herself, it does need to be true to your character.
Additionally— and in my mind, most importantly— a character's name also creates an initial impression in the reader. And that impression is where names really start to matter. The name of the character often serves as your first bridge of connection with a reader. Imagine someone picking up your book and reading the jacket copy. What do you want them to think when they first read the character's name? Is the character meant to be a relatable, everyman type of guy who lives in the reader's reality-based world? Is the character from a distant planet where surnames follow an entirely different convention or rule? What can the reader immediately gather from the name - and more specifically, what do you want the reader to gather from that name?
For my new novel, tentatively titled Blinding and not yet appearing on my book page, I put some real thought into my protagonist's name. Set in a contemporary setting, I wanted him — the boy protagonist who is thirteen years old in his current stage of fictional life — to have name that reflected our culture's move towards more non-traditional names, but yet a name that wasn't so shocking or rare that it would be hard for the reader to accept. Therefore, I strayed away from the Matthew's and James' but didn't move quite so far as choosing a name like Blue or Moroccan. For a previous work, in which my girl protagonist had both an adopted, American name, and a name native to her Chinese heritage, I needed to find a pair of names that worked together as I wanted to establish a tangible link between her two seemingly disparate cultures. I therefore chose a set of American and Chinese names that were both the names for two flowers within the same species.
Some people seem to obsess over selecting the right names, while others simply seem to know. And it can certainly vary from project to project. But what happens when you don't have the predestined feeling that your character was simply meant to be named Luke, or Hamlet, or Marie, or Dolly? Choosing a name for characters can be difficult. My best advice is to spend some time really thinking about it, throwing a few names back and forth, and cruising through the online naming websites or baby naming book. I find the websites to be particularly helpful because you can search by categories like popular names of a certain decade, or a name's language of origin. You can also isolate names for countries, meanings, and thematic groupings.
Naming characters is an important choice, and while you don't have to slave away choosing the name for every character who appears in the ensemble of your novel, making sure to select a deliberate, and intentional name that both reflects a protagonist's identity and connects to the reader is something you want to spend some time considering. But, if you get into the novel and find it isn't working for you, changing the name is always an option, too! You have the power. You can change it anytime (and no one even has to know). Just make sure that in the end, it is a name you feel good about, for the character and for your future readers.
Of course, some initial thoughts about naming are simply that you don't want to choose a name that is too common or too strange; or a name a character after someone in your life (as that can be come potentially problematic); or a name that really means nothing to you. Like real life people, names become part of the fictional character's identity. So although a name may not actually tell you all that much about the character herself, it does need to be true to your character.
Additionally— and in my mind, most importantly— a character's name also creates an initial impression in the reader. And that impression is where names really start to matter. The name of the character often serves as your first bridge of connection with a reader. Imagine someone picking up your book and reading the jacket copy. What do you want them to think when they first read the character's name? Is the character meant to be a relatable, everyman type of guy who lives in the reader's reality-based world? Is the character from a distant planet where surnames follow an entirely different convention or rule? What can the reader immediately gather from the name - and more specifically, what do you want the reader to gather from that name?
For my new novel, tentatively titled Blinding and not yet appearing on my book page, I put some real thought into my protagonist's name. Set in a contemporary setting, I wanted him — the boy protagonist who is thirteen years old in his current stage of fictional life — to have name that reflected our culture's move towards more non-traditional names, but yet a name that wasn't so shocking or rare that it would be hard for the reader to accept. Therefore, I strayed away from the Matthew's and James' but didn't move quite so far as choosing a name like Blue or Moroccan. For a previous work, in which my girl protagonist had both an adopted, American name, and a name native to her Chinese heritage, I needed to find a pair of names that worked together as I wanted to establish a tangible link between her two seemingly disparate cultures. I therefore chose a set of American and Chinese names that were both the names for two flowers within the same species.
Some people seem to obsess over selecting the right names, while others simply seem to know. And it can certainly vary from project to project. But what happens when you don't have the predestined feeling that your character was simply meant to be named Luke, or Hamlet, or Marie, or Dolly? Choosing a name for characters can be difficult. My best advice is to spend some time really thinking about it, throwing a few names back and forth, and cruising through the online naming websites or baby naming book. I find the websites to be particularly helpful because you can search by categories like popular names of a certain decade, or a name's language of origin. You can also isolate names for countries, meanings, and thematic groupings.
Naming characters is an important choice, and while you don't have to slave away choosing the name for every character who appears in the ensemble of your novel, making sure to select a deliberate, and intentional name that both reflects a protagonist's identity and connects to the reader is something you want to spend some time considering. But, if you get into the novel and find it isn't working for you, changing the name is always an option, too! You have the power. You can change it anytime (and no one even has to know). Just make sure that in the end, it is a name you feel good about, for the character and for your future readers.
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