This week: Who Is Your Character? Edited by: Legerdemain  
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Who Is Your Character?
In reading about developing characters in my story, I came across some great advice:
"Character and plot are inseparable because a person is what happens to them." Your characters are real, what happens to them in your story needs to be real. Your reader needs to know what is important to your character.
"Develop a Protagonist" The protagonist will struggle, will have flaws, and sometimes even make errors in judgment. Give them a good character arc and let them develop throughout the story.
"Develop an Antagonist" The antagonist should create a crisis for the protagonist. Make them strong and force the protagonist to struggle and acquire skills to defeat the antagonist.
"Reveal your character's world through details." Show how they move through their world and relate to it.
"Make your character memorable." Give the character a title, or something quirky / a quality that helps the reader remember who they are.
"Give access to your character's inner conflict." Help the reader relate to the character, care about them. Internal thoughts or monologues can reveal a lot.
As you develop your story and characters, write down important facts so you can refer to the list and maintain the character's qualities. YOU have to know and develop your characters before your readers can know them.
I felt much of the advice was helpful in thinking about how much or little development each character needs and how to create their arc to help the story arc, not detract from it. I hope this advice will help you too.
As always, Write On!
This month's question: What questions do you ask your character to get to know them? Send in your answer below!  Editors love feedback!
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Excerpt: No, it can’t end like this. It can’t!
Brother Ellis bows his head, bunches his shoulders, and strains. The tight bonds around his wrists remain just as cruelly unyielding as the past dozen times he’s attempted to break them. Even the blood coating his lacerated wrists doesn’t help them slip free. After several futile seconds, he sags back against the wooden post to which he’s chained. The post which, likewise, has resisted all his efforts to break free.
Excerpt: I guess I must have been about nine years old that one particular summer when Grandma Sary Holloway came to visit. Grandma smelled like spearmint. I always liked that smell, and me and Grandma got along just fine. She had her a cane she used to walk with, all bright and shiny, and made of hickory wood. Grandma had her a sense of humor a boy such as myself liked mighty fine.
Excerpt: As I sat waiting to meet my oldest friend, a man with a thick grey beard approached. He said, “What trouble are you in now?”
“Excuse me?” I sat up straight. “You must have me mista-“
He interrupted, “No, Samuel. I don’t make mistakes.” He sat down across from me and waved the serving girl over. “I help clean up yours.”
Then I recognized the twinkle in my friend’s eyes. “Tollack!” I stood to embrace him. “Five years and I almost didn’t recognize you, man. We mustn’t go this long.”
“No, I suppose not. You need someone around to keep you in check.” He turned and scanned the room. “Ah, come, let’s duck into the room there to talk without open ears.”
Excerpt: My mother always knew. She always saw me for what I truly was.
All the jests and the foibles, the laughter created by a preposterous situation culminating in drunkenness. But funny thing, I never drank. Not really. Just enough in measure to keep my breath in par with all these others. Spent enough time around my father. Hell, my father and my mother both remained in such a state over various weekends and vacations, I keyed upon the habits, the exhibitions, the loss of structure and vocabulary. Always seemed that way. Like I was drunk. But I wasn't.
Excerpt: Ada’s hands clenched into fists when she peered through the sliver of open door at the two men standing on her front porch. She had never seen these men before, but she recognized the badge one of them held out to her.
Not again!
Excerpt: He grumbled when he got out of bed. He grumbled while he made his coffee. He grumbled when he went to get his paper.
He grumbled in the shower, he grumbled on his walk to the corner store to pick up fresh bread. He grumbled on his way to Marge’s house and he grumbled on the way back again.
He grumbled as he changed into his pajamas and night robe and he grumbled as he got into bed.
He, quite probably, grumbled in his dreams.
Excerpt: After they made several rounds with assorted items, a plate of big chicken feet showed up. Those had to have been off of roosters. They had a kind of orange colored liquid on them. Both the legs and claws were still attached. I couldn't help thinking of Big Bird.
Excerpt: "I'm sorry, William; truly, I am," Jen said to her husband of twelve years, even as she made yet another meandering line from left to right across her chosen canvas. "I just can't take it any longer. This is the only way out for me; please don't hate me for it." She bent to inspect her latest stroke, then continued.
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Excerpt: Santi was not a man given to undue worries. He was confident he could explain why he wants to marry someone like Amelia, who's neither a Hindu nor an Indian. She was an Espanol with a rigid Mexican background. Her folks gave up the prospect of marriage for her because she was above the age of 25. Her relatives concluded that she would stay a spinster for life.
Then, Santi happened to love her carrying courage and confidence.
Excerpt: Catherine wished she hadn't slammed the door of the cottage as she had stormed out of their little place. But she had definitely slammed it. When she went back, maybe she could claim to Patrick it had been the wind which had pushed the door shut, the wind which now seemed to push against her too as she climbed the steep hill just outside of the village. But she could have not stayed in that room with him for another minute.
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This month's question: What questions do you ask your character to get to know them? Send in your answer below! Editors love feedback!
Last "Short Stories Newsletter (December 8, 2021)" question: How do you keep your stress level down??
GaelicQueen  : I take my dog for a walk or go to the gym, listen to soothing music or find a comedy channel for laughs.
tybo777: I pray or take a break.
Prosperous Snow celebrating  : I cope through prayer, meditation, and writing poetry.
Kåre Enga in Udon Thani  : Busy for some, boring for others. This is the time of year I escape this gloomy dead town. In December 2019 I was in Costa Rica and then in Taiwan for February 2020. Haven't left town since... literally.
Too many people assume that their personal story is like every else's. I see it here as people assume that I'm celebrating Santa-Commercialism or it's secondary holiday, formally know as Christmas.
Maybe more people could ask before assuming? Beyond holidays... with no family locally and with covid-restrictions and closures (two out-of-business, one moved... just in my block) I live in an increasingly ghost-like place.
Busy doesn't apply to me. Depression? Yep. Anxiety? More general than specific. When one does nothing there's nothing to talk about. Hard for me to connect with people with "First World Problems".
Rhymer Reisen  : Boundaries.
s : To paraphrase Bruce Banner in The Avengers - I'm always stressed...
Elfin Dragon-finally published : It's a difficult one since I don't think I've succeeded this year. On the outside, I may seem calm, cool, and collected. But on the inside, my whole self is moving like a whirling dervish.
Vaishali : By praying to God or by listening to songs.
Bagel Delivery  : By not being stressed.
cwarren: Drinking tea, and meditation. Just keep on keeping on. Outside interference only creates stress.
TheBusmanPoet : Being with someone for 39 years and being totally opposite, you will learn to compromise. But when you both need to lower them levels, you learn when "not talking [minimal]" is the right thing to do.
Not sure if that makes any sense to me when re-reading it? Oh that's my story and I'm sticking with it! 
elephantsealer : I keep my stress level down by keeping my head/concentration on to what I am doing. There are times when all I want to do is scream; however, I get to a point when I try and re-think what it is that is giving me all the stress; then I calm down and carry on...
Anna Marie Carlson : Take the three s's out of stress, then you won't have any stress.
keyisfake : I hang with my children.
Bearclaw : I read a book or write on one of my stories.
tj ~ endeavors to persevere!  : Bourbon!
jdennis  : I cope with copious amounts of liquor, followed by a nap, and then more copiousness.
🌕 HuntersMoon  :
Thank you for all your feedback, it is much appreciated! |
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Short Stories: February 02, 2022 Issue [#11195]
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