Tag Archives: characterisation

Character Confabulation

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I was recently reflecting on an email I received some years back from “Blaine Colton”. Ha, ha, bots. Good one. Like I’m falling for that. Designate message to <spam>. Awkward moment when a month or two later I was checking the junk box and accidentally clicked on this email, only to realise it actually WAS from Blaine Colton! Whoops.

This Blaine Colton had discovered their namesake as the hero of my trilogy and written to share this fun fact. Red-faced and sheepish, I replied with profuse apologies for the misdirected assumption and consequential delay in reciprocating their email contact. Thankfully, they took it in goodwill and we were able to laugh it off. But this got me thinking …

How would an email from my fictional characters read?

Take Blaine. Do you think he rocks his curly hair or is he like most of us and thinks any other hair would be better than his own? His lithe form? Would he rather the sculpted muscle bulk of his best mate, Jett? (I am NOT having the Jett conversation here!) There’s mitochondrial disease and the cure that nearly killed him—before a bunch of nasty folk from the nether regions of an international crime syndicate wanted to kill him too, and had a pretty good go at it … What about his love life? Didn’t make that easy on him or Sophie, did I? And the whole adoption and family complications …

Hmmm, maybe a message from Blaine could be … erm … emotionally intense … Another character perhaps?

I mean, there’s Blaine’s half-brother, Rennie. He kind of clams up in new situations, but he’s a pretty cool guy. And it makes sense, after those run-ins with the law and his family not doing great—like, totally dysfunctional. Then there were those cyborg creeps that kidnapped him and stripped his mind, mining memories like files from a digital database. Sure he’s got some rejection and trauma baggage, but he’s … he’s … yeah, he’s got a heap to sort through … Maybe an email from him wouldn’t be so straightforward either … At least, not until Anna gets involved.

Anna! Of course. Her voice is out of this world! Gives me goosebumps every time. Mind, she’s not one-hundred-percent happy with her body image, but which of us are? All she’s got to figure out is that Chase, the risk-taking American hunk in her senior class, isn’t the only guy on the planet. That goes for her bestie, Cassidy, too. (That girl can dance.) I think a letter from Anna would be pretty upbeat. And hey, she gets to wear a gorgeous bridesmaid dress for most of the book. Nothing to complain about there. So long as she doesn’t get uptight about being retraumatised and ruining her perfect night out, and then literally smudging her out of existence … Yeeeah … Moving on.

Thinking I’ll leave Vivia and Kyal, with their dystopian realities, out of this. (You’ll get to meet Kyal soon. 😉) So maybe the safest communication would be a good old-fashioned letter from Patrick and Kitty—our favourite steampunk adventurers … Yes, that would do.

I have many other characters I could defer to, but you’ve not met all of them yet. I suppose the advice given to writers on character development really does ring true. Create engaging, well-loved characters, then do mean things to them! The truth is, whatever my characters have faced, I always want their stories to be hopeful. Were they to ever write me a message, it would me my hope they are walking towards the light of an ever-brightening future, irrespective of whatever challenges they’ve faced.

What about you? Have you written a character that might have a few things to say about your handling of their life, if they could send you a message? Maybe you’re a reader, not a writer. What might your favourite character say if they were to write you a letter about the author who created them? Which character would you like to hear from most? I would love for you to let me know in the comments below. 😊

Core Strength

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Redwood2_AdjA character’s quest lies at the heart of any story, with their journey of change driving the plot as they face obstacles to achieving their ultimate desire. One thing that will undermine any character we write is a lack of consistency and a lack of believability. But ever since a recent family holiday in the ‘Land of the Long White Cloud’, there’s something else I’ve been considering relating to character development.

I think most of us are aware that people don’t behave in the way they do for no reason. We all have a history that predisposes us to certain behavioural patterns, deeply embedded in our thought processes and emotions. For example, children who’ve experienced trauma often, in turn, behave in ways that are unhealthy. Trauma makes as much of a wound on the brain as a physical injury. Even experiences that, to an adult, might seem inconsequential, can profoundly affected a child’s (and ultimately adult’s) behaviour and way of perceiving life. It stands to reason that these types of pain-based behaviours can be difficult to manage, but once identified, the brain can be ‘rewired’ over time by making different choices. Each positive choice makes a small change in the brain. And small changes, over time, make big ones.

Something I find frustrating as a reader is when a character whose entire life has been dictated by negative behaviours, suddenly changes, and then the story is resolved. Now, I’m not denying people can experience profound shifts in thinking over short periods of time, or even significant emotional healing, but more often than not, there’s a dogged grappling with pain-based patterns over time, before the positive choices outweigh the negative wiring of the past.

Just as a child can be damaged emotionally or mentally by being forced to grow up too fast, whether that be through exposure to adult concepts too early or, as mentioned above, through trauma, so our characters can come across as weak and untrustworthy if they change too fast, or without appropriate context and conditions justifying that change.Redwood

But how does this relate to our holiday in NZ? While touring, we visited a Redwood forest. The redwood seed had been brought over from America to grow trees to produce wood for use in construction and other such applications. Unfortunately, the NZ climate wasn’t the same as that from which the trees were brought. The trees grew too fast, leaving the inner core soft and unusable for the purpose it was intended.

Like those magnificent redwood trees, a character can be fleshed out to look every bit the part they’ve been developed to play in a story, but if they don’t go through challenge- or condition-appropriate growth, a reader won’t buy it. I think you’ll agree, there’s something about a character’s inner struggle that builds convincing inner strength, developing rapport with a reader. I do love stories where characters rise above overwhelming odds, but let’s ensure we give our literary heroes opportunity to develop sufficient core strength to make the distance.