Tagged: character development
I’ve been honing my eavesdropping skills as of late, in the spirit that each of our fictional characters speak in a different voice. Whereas one character may sound like a grumbly religious naysayer, another may have the vocal inflections and vocabulary of a “valley girl”. Each character not only uses different verbiage, none speak alike in inflection or tone as well. I pondered this fact of good character development for some time before I decided the best way for me personally to get the “hang” of that was to eavesdrop on other people’s conversations in order to keep all of my characters from sounding exactly like me.
This is an article is part of an occasional series on planning your novel. Our June course on planning your novel is happening now. You can still join us. I first published this article...
“Trevor’s only wanted to raise her girls and fight for her community nursing program. She didn’t have time to be distracted by the hot fireman she burned years ago by refusing his marriage proposal. If she could just remind herself of her desires each day, it wouldn’t be so hard working closely with him to help his father recover from a stroke.” Take Harte a novel by Carol Malone.
Welcome back to monthly columnist, Wyatt Bessing. A writing coach and teacher, author, Wyatt Bessing shares his fun take on games, play, and how they help our writing. This month Wyatt makes a game out of character...
Let’s welcome back Kay Keppler for another month with Writer’s Fun Zone! In today’s article, Kay discusses the importance of giving your characters tough goals to achieve, and the impact tough goals have on...
Imagine the power of objects: we covet them, store them, save them from generation to generation, and allow them to fill our living spaces with emotion and memory.
Who hasn’t had a delicate question that burned to be asked? Who hasn’t been ashamed to do so? For many years, Dear Abby was at the center of American consciousness and she fielded all sorts of questions—from etiquette to morality to good taste—that baffled us in this modern American world that was constantly changing, morphing, evolving.
When authors work with me, some of their challenges surround how to help the sagging middle of their novel. That sagging middle is often due to not knowing their characters well enough. All good...
Do people truly change? Other than lightbulbs, I mean. People constantly change their superficial appearances—hair color, weight, corrective lenses, clothing styles—but do they, can they, change their fundamental behavior? This is your job as a writer to explore.
This post on craft is the first of several monthly posts by new monthly guest columnist, Kay Keppler, that we’ll be publishing here on the Writer’s Fun Zone. Today she’ll share with us how to build characters with action and motivation.
Welcome to Indie Author Mondays, where I feature articles and interviews about the exciting field of independent author publishing. This week I feature an author interview with Cheryl Shireman; she’s spunky, she’s independent and she’s full of vim and vigor. I’m inspired just interviewing her. Enjoy!
When you feel that your characters aren’t jumping off the page, apply this nifty NLP tool to enrich the scene, make your characters come alive and create a compelling and memorable story. NLP is...
The character we love to hate. I write fantasy and paranormal, so yeah, the villain, is kind of important. I did some fancy footwork to not have a huge villain in the first book...
Welcome to Q & A Wednesdays by Book Mentor, Ezra Barany. This week Ezra plays with the bus metaphor for character development. Good news this week’s winner of a 30-minute complimentary consultation of your novel with...
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