By Andrea Merrell
Photo courtesy of profimagem from Pixabay
There are few artistic bones in my body when it comes to sketching and drawing. When first asked to draw a simple box—many moons ago—it consisted of four lines to make a square. I was surprised when the teacher said, “That’s a good start, but your box is flat. Lifeless. It needs dimension.”
I stared at my paper, confused. It looked fine to me. Then she added a few simple lines, and the results were amazing. She made my box come to life.
And that’s exactly what we need to do with our characters. Give them depth. Dimension. Make them come to life.
When we create characters, we want them to be memorable. We might first concentrate on their age, appearance, and occupation, but there is so much more.
Since we’re not perfect, we don’t want to read about characters who are. We love to see their strengths, but we also want to see their weaknesses. When the characters’ flaws are exposed, readers can better relate and connect with them.
Here are some questions to ask yourself when creating your protag’s profile:
Fleshing out your characters can be a lot of fun. Think about the people you come in contact with, and be creative. They might turn out to be funny, loveable, irritating, charming, evil, mysterious, predictable, arrogant, or just plain quirky. When your readers connect with your characters, they will remember them long after they read the last page of your story.
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