characters

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Point Of View: Hitting The Beats (It’s a Marathon, Not a Sprint)

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One of the hardest tricks to learn when writing novels is pacing. It’s a little easier with a short story—at 5-15,000 words, it’s harder for readers to become bored with your characters’ exploits. But with a novella or novel, pacing becomes more important. The classic example of a pacing template comes from the historical Romance market. Once upon a time, there were very specific plot expectations laid out for romance books by the major Romance publishers: • The characters meet • They’re in denial about their connection • They decide to give it a chance • They date • There’s … Read more

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Point of View: Diving Into Your Characters

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Writing fascinating, well-rounded characters comes easily to some people. Character traits, past histories, and quirky, unique personalities seem to just flow out of their fingers and onto the page, and every book is a new adventure filled with a fascinating new cast. I am not one of those people. Are you? If you are, you can stop reading here. 🙂 I grew up devouring science fiction and fantasy, and I was hooked on the Big Concept. Dragons are real and can travel between in the blink of an eye? OMG, give me that book. Living space ships will carry humanity … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Writing Alien

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Alien - Deposit Photos

I just finished reading The Bantam by RJ Theodore (review coming soon). I really enjoyed it – it’s like a crash course in writing a relatable alien. So how did the author do it? When writing truly alien characters, we have to discard everything we know: Why should they be bipedal? Why should they have hands or fingers, and why would these appendages be at the end of arms? Why would they have two genders? Why two eyes? Would they even have something we’d call eyes? Many sci-fi shows, books and films create aliens that are basically humans with different … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Stanislavski-ing My Characters

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man in mirror

Constantin Stanislavski came uo with a theory of acting that I’m loosely going to describe as “become the character” – a method of connecting with the personality of the person you’re playing, and learning how to think and feel like they did. It’s also known as Method Acting, and taken to its extreme, it can mean basically living as the person you are portraying. As folks who regularly read this column know (thanks to both of you!), I’m working on going deep with my characterization. Lately, I’ve found myself thinking about method actors and how they get into the heads … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Building Compelling, Complex and Charismatic Characters

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Every writer has an achilles heel. Mine is characterization. I’m fantastic at world building – I can create compelling settings that will wrap you up and transport you away from whatever mudane place you find yourself in. I’m also great at plot. Not bragging here. It’s something that just comes naturally to me. The one thing I consistently get dinged for is my characterization, or lack thereof. I’ve worked on it for years, and I’m way better than I used to be, bit alas, there’s still room for improvement. Agents and publishers have a word for this – they call … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Keeping a Series Bible

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Series Bible

Fiction authors have a lot of things to keep track of in their books- – character descriptions, locations, plot details, and all the other things that go into constructing a world. It’s a complicated business, building an entire world. But what about when you want to write a series? When you’re working on a single story, the details are still (fairly) fresh in your mind, and it’s easy enough to flip back and forth through the text (or to use the search function) to find what you need. But writing a series multiplies the details you have to keep track … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Writing What I Don’t Know

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I long ago discarded that old tried and true truism of writing – “write what you know.” While I get the sentiment behind it – you can best convey ideas, characters, and places with which you are already conversant – I also find it also intensely limiting, especially as a writer of sci fi and fantasy fiction. One of the ways I set out to break this idea down is by writing characters who are not at all like me. In “The Shoreless Sea,” my trilogy ender coming out in October, that has put me far out on three different … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Finding the Flaws

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I’m coming up on my five year publication anniversary in May. Interestingly, it’s not the first story I sold – “The Bear at the Bar.” That honor actually goes to “Avalon,” originally published by Mischief Corner Books in their wonderful and now defunct MCB Quarterly journal. When I was first starting out, I got two main complaints from readers in my reviews. The first one was that my stories just weren’t long enough. This kind of pissed me off at first – I mean, you knew you were buying a novella, right? – until a friend pointed out that it … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: Writing Different

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I love you ASL

Hey all, As I continue to write, I like to find new ways to challenge myself as a writer. Yeah, I’m a glutton for punishment. 😛 Often this means working on my writing skills themselves. I love to watch really good films and TV shows and dissect how they put their stories together, and then apply that to my own work. It’s a great source of writing lessons and helps me keep advancing my skills. Sometimes it manifests in my characters themselves. In the last couple years, I have written a number of characters very different from myself that I’d … Read more

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Point of View: Writing Interesting Characters

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characters

Every writer has a weakness. Or two. One of mine is characterization. I came to this whole writing thing via reading lots and lots of sci fi and fantasy – really really long, epic fantasy – and so my great love has always been worldbuilding. I adore strange new worlds – Pern with its dragons and thread, Dune with sandworms and funny sand walking, and Asimov’s overarching Foundation and Psychohistory. So when I write my stories, I start out thinking high level themes, weird and wonderful planets, and devices of great power. Then I have to fill those stories with … Read more