Scribely How-To: Tools For Character Development

Hello again, fellow digressors. I bet you didn't expect to see me again this soon, did you? Well, here's the thing -- it's a blast sharing with you things I've written and read, and raving about the new writing music I've found. But as an author, when I visit the blogs of fellow authors, I get a little excited when there's some kind of how-to on something that's been giving me trouble. A long while back, I uploaded a post called Scribely How-To: Insecurity Maps, and it seems like several of you were excited by the concept of a new way to explore your characters' insecurities and see them laid out together. Well, I'm not sure I've discovered any other kinds of graphics to make, except maybe for character playlists, but we're not talking about those today. The theme of this post will be finding ways to make character development easier to tackle. 

The thing about crafting complex, compelling characters (alliteration happens) is that, while it is vitally important, sometimes it's hard to actually pull it off. Why? Well, think about it. What would happen if someone tried to sum you up as a character? 

Say you're a sixteen-year-old American girl, and you love dystopian novels and knitting. (Let's ignore, for the moment, the probable statistics on how many sixteen-year-olds actually enjoy knitting.) It would probably be easy for someone who had just exchanged a conversation with you to say this much if anyone else asked who you were. The information would be accurate, but it wouldn't sum you up as a person. If someone asked the person who'd just talked with you what your outlook was on life, and all they knew about you was that you had those hobbies, would it be accurate for them to say that the meaning of life to you was knitting and reading your genre of choice? Probably not, because your age and hobbies are only one small part of who you are. They might occupy much of your time, but they are surface details, symptoms of whatever lies within your mind and heart. 

Additionally, while you might connect on a certain level with others because they also love dystopian novels and knitting, if that was all you ever talked about, the relationship would seem to be a shallow one indeed, because no-one is made up solely of what can be seen on the surface. What is within you, what matters to you, and how you view the world affects what you do on the outside, so if someone wants to truly connect with you and understand why you love certain things and act a certain way, they would have to find out a whole lot more than what hobbies you used to occupy your time. The same thing is true of characters. Character development is hard because characters are people, albeit fictional ones, and people are complex, made up of so many different elements that you could know them for a lifetime and they might still surprise you. 

And sometimes it seems like it's taking a lifetime to get to know your characters, doesn't it? At least it's felt that way for me in many cases. One key difference between getting to know a real person and getting to know a character is that you can spend time with a person. You can sit down and have a face-to-face conversation with them. You can exchange questions and have lengthy conversations about your interests, your likes and dislikes, and your views about yourselves, each other, and the world. You can also observe them in day-to-day situations and see how they respond to various circumstances. A fictional character, on the other hand, is trickier to know, because you're creating them. You can't exactly sit down with them and say, "Okay, character -- tell me about yourself," or invite them to a party and observe them there. I mean, you could, I suppose, but you'd still have to be the one coming up with their answers and writing/typing what happened to them and what they did. (If you're sitting down to figure out a character and their words start appearing on the page or the screen without your intervention, something might be off.) 

So what, then? Well, you could always just sit down and start writing down known facts about your character and see what else comes to mind. But after a while, that can get old, and when you run out of ideas, where do you turn? I have a few ideas, some of which I might have mentioned in the previous How-To, but bear with me here.

1. Find a character development worksheet. 

These things are tremendously helpful for me because they provide a list of things that a reader might want to know about a character, things which might not have occurred to me otherwise, and allow me to simply fill in the blanks with whatever seems most consistent with how I want my character to be. It's easy for me to come up with questions such as how they look, how old they are, and what they like to do for fun, but what about their quirks? What do they do when someone presses them to do something they don't want to do? How do they feel about their family? What is their best characteristic, or their worst? There are so many questions to consider, and they might not all come to mind immediately. There are a plethora of worksheets out there, but here's a good one, complete with relevant advice and tips on things to consider when developing your characters. (Yes, the author of the post has been mentioned here a few times. Now shush.)

While you're at it, go ahead and explore the Go Teen Writers blog that hosts the worksheet I just showed you. It's tremendously helpful and encouraging. In fact, they have a whole list of topics here if you're looking for advice on something specific. Finding more should be easy -- just go to Pinterest or your preferred search engine and type in "character development worksheet" and there should be several options. Make sure to do a quick scan-read before you download, though -- not only does the quality of worksheets vary, but some worksheets will be geared more towards one genre (e.g. science-fiction, contemporary, romance) and might not be the best fit for you and your WIP.

2. Find a list of potential traits and go through it to find ones which might fit your character. 

While a worksheet may help you come up with new questions to ask and prompt you to come up with answers, a list of traits can help you answer those questions more easily and effectively, and also perhaps to consider the implications of a particular aspect. Writers Helping Writers is one of my favorite resources for this method. The creators have released four wonderful thesauri in digital and paperback format: 

The Positive Traits Thesaurus (Useful for exploring character attributes and strengths. Available in physical and digital form.) 

The Negative Traits Thesaurus (Useful for exploring character flaws and weaknesses. Available in physical and digital form.) 

The Emotion Thesaurus (Useful for writing believable emotional reactions to events. Available in physical and digital form.)  

Emotion Amplifiers (Useful for realistic application of secondary elements such as sickness and fatigue which might influence a character's reactions. Free download! No paperback version, as far as I know.) 

I have found these to be invaluable because not only do they provide a list of traits, but they also offer such information as potential reasons for a particular trait, behaviors associated with it, and what traits in other characters might highlight or aggravate your character based on the traits the first possesses. They also have a set of more limited but still useful thesauri (such as ones for physical features, talents and skills, and emotional wounds) online here. The character wounds one is especially useful in exploring various elements of a character's backstory and how various events would likely shape them as a person, so I recommend you check that one out.

3. Take them for a test drive. 

This traces back to my note about being able to observe a person in situations and better know them by their reactions to what happens. There is, in fact, a difference between having a head knowledge of a person or character's traits and knowing how those traits translate into their behavior. For example, you might know that a person dislikes spiders, and from that knowledge you might extrapolate that they will react negatively should they encounter an actual spider. You could always learn from a secondary source how extreme their reaction is, but until you actually see it happen, you have only a head knowledge of their probable reaction, not drawn from experience of any kind with watching them actually react.

With characters, I've found that of all the various kinds of prep work I could do during their development, one of the most helpful things to do is to follow writing prompts using them, or throw them into character chats wherein they react in real-time to other authors' characters (and yes, I'm aware the authors are still doing the work, but trust me when I say that the method makes a difference). For instance, if I asked you how your character would react to a random dog growling at them, you could tell me that the character is afraid of dogs and would react accordingly, or you could write a scene wherein the given scenario happened and show me that way. This is probably more effective in testing whether the character development you've done has been effective rather than necessarily coming up with anything new, but it can still help. Sometimes things look just fine when you're scribbling them onto a list, but when they're actually brought to life, you might find there's some related detail you haven't considered (or you may choose to experiment with different details and see how it fits). CCing, however, has helped me at every stage of development. There's just something about throwing a character into a room (or forest, or whatever) with a character neither you nor they know fully, with another author whose mind works differently from yours guiding the other side of the conversation.


4. Ask "Why?" until you've completely run out of things to discover (as far as you know). 
This is, honestly, one of the main things I do with any kind of development in my writing -- whether I'm exploring a character, their culture, or the way their natural world works (if it's not the real one). If you think about it hard enough, there's usually a reason for most things in the world. Like, let's assume again that your character is afraid of dogs. Why? Is it just because they're loud, or did he/she have a bad experience with one earlier in life? Look into that, and also consider what other implications the reason behind that fear might generate.

My second book, 'The Merchant's Son', takes place in a bordertown wherein there's a lot of racial tension between the people from within the borders and those from without. That's all well and good to know, but why is there tension? Well, I figured, maybe the people from without felt like their territory had been infringed, and so they didn't take to their neighbors too well. This might lead to them performing acts of varying levels of resistance towards those from within the borders, who would retaliate by providing their own methods of resistance. Over generations of this tension building and running ever deeper between the nations, there would grow a common belief on either side that the people from the other side of the border were universally terrible (or nearly so), which would only foster the feelings of hostility and drive tension levels higher.

So here I've taken a surface detail that I'd already established about the cultural setting of my story and gone deeper to investigate the reasons behind it, which gives further insight into both cultures and also hints at what attitudes my characters might have inherited by being born on one side of the border or the other. Likewise, exploring the reasons behind surface traits and attitudes in your characters (whether a fear of dogs, a distrust of their parents, or simply a dislike for the number 7) may help you to understand the way they think and, as a matter of course, explore what other consequences their attitudes -- whether conscious or no -- might have on their behavior.


5. Read books about characters you love and study what makes you love them. 
It always comes back to reading, doesn't it? Well, I imagine that makes sense. After all, you'd be hard-pressed to create any sort of great art without first studying what's done before and how it was accomplished. Otherwise you're basically running blind and going off of your instincts, uninformed by any accomplished sources, which isn't likely to help much. Of course, you shouldn't try to copy other people's characters, as this might get you anything from a complaint about them being unoriginal to someone calling you out on plagiarism (which is a serious charge). Besides which fact, you are an artist, a creator of worlds, ones which can come from no mind but your own. Why would you want to rip off the product of someone else's creative process?

Regardless, there are some elements which most well-developed, beloved characters have in common, even if they're nothing alike in background or personality, and the more you read of the characters whom either you or those you trust love, the better equipped you will be to answer questions such as, "What makes a character likable? What combination of traits could potentially turn a reader off to my character, and if those traits are central to them, how can I make the combination work anyways? Is there a gap somewhere in the list of things I've considered about who this character is and why they are the way they are?" Basically, when trying to find ways to become a better writer, read, read, and then read some more. Repeat ad infinitum.


In summary, character development is a complicated process, but there are many ways to make it easier on yourself, or at least to make the tireless work you do to get it right as effective as possible. I won't tell you to stick to one method, nor to use all of them, because no two minds work exactly the same way, and therefore what works for one person may not work for another. What I do hope is that you'll come away from this list today with a little less fear of the process. But be patient with yourself. Creating new worlds and people from the ideas swirling around in your head is a tremendous feat, and it won't always come easy, but that's okay. As Theodore Roosevelt once said,

"Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty... I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well."

So what do you think? What methods do you generally use for character development? Do you have any that I haven't listed here, or maybe some elaboration on one of the points? What's your favorite character worksheet that you've found? I'd love to hear about it! And possibly check it out for myself... Even after years of working with the same characters continuously, I keep finding out little details that I'd never considered. My family says I talk about my characters and fictional worlds as if they're real and I'm just finding out more about them as I go along, and sometimes it does honestly feel that way. I wonder if that's a good sign or a sign that I need help with my problem of blurring the lines between fantasy and reality...

But, of course, I digress. 

'The Runaway' - Part One

Hello yet again, fellow digressors. How was your weekend? Mine was a little busy, but not too bad. I got a copy of Microsoft Office on my laptop at long last, which should make my life as both a copy-editor and a novelist a lot easier. This makes me happy. However, because the program took time to install, and because I needed time to play with and get used to my new toy, I'm delivering this next short story opening a day or two later than I intended. (The opening for the first story, 'Street Rats', is here, in case you missed it.) 

Anyways, some of you may remember Jorthen Lavahr from 'The Follower'. Despite any mistakes he might have made, he still seems to be well-loved by readers, and it's been quite interesting trying to develop his backstory, especially as he tends to come across as 'Mr. Perfect'. As you are probably aware, no-one is truly perfect, and we all have secrets, some bigger than others. So, without further ado, here is the next short story... 

--------------------------------------------------------------------

The Runaway

–––––––

Reshan Territory, North-East of Jaern – Outerlands

Eleven years before the events of ‘The Follower'

There was a time when Jorthen Lavahr would have done anything for his father. If Atrin gave him an order, Jorthen would keep his mouth shut and obey, no matter the consequences. If someone from the outside asked him, he would say that hadn't changed.

But here, with the campfire crackling before him and Atrin plotting a course with their map a few feet away, Jorthen couldn't keep his mouth shut any longer.

“...I don't want to go.”

Atrin looked up briefly from the map, then went back to it without so much as looking Jorthen in the eye. “You'll go. The Council is expecting your arrival.”

“They're all older than me. I'm not supposed to join until I'm sixteen.”

“Ordinary people join at sixteen.” Atrin reached for his canteen of water and took a brief swig before speaking again. “We are not ordinary people.”

Jorthen swallowed. “What's so bad about being ordinary? What about...” He hesitated, but the question escaped him despite his efforts to be quiet. “...What about Amra?”

Atrin threw his prodding stick into the fire. Sparks leapt up from the coals upon impact, and Jorthen cringed to avoid them. He raised a hand to shield his eyes, but a hot look from Atrin made him slowly lower it and straighten his posture. 

Atrin ground his teeth and raised his eyebrows slightly. “I believe I remember telling you not to mention her again.” 

The evenness of Atrin’s tone made Jorthen gulp. His tongue felt thick, but he concentrated enough to make it work. “Sh-she…” No. No stammering. Stammering was a sign of weakness. He cleared his throat. “…She’s my friend. I barely got to say goodbye.” 

“You’re lucky you even got a moment with her. I should have made all the preparations myself instead of giving you time to bid goodbye to the local rabble.” 

Jorthen tensed. “Amra isn’t rabble.” 

“Look, I’m going to say this once more, and if you bring it up again, there will be consequences. Are you listening?” 

Jorthen’s muscles quivered, but he managed to nod. 

Atrin’s blue eyes burned into him. “That girl is beneath us. Always has been, always will be. Forget her.” 

All Jorthen could do was stare, unable to even avert his gaze. His mind seemed frozen, and with it every other part of him. Maybe that was why he shivered. 

Silence stretched, and Atrin picked up another stick and fiddled with it in what seemed like a casual manner. He snapped off a deviant twig that had sprouted from it and eyed Jorthen again. “You hear me, boy? No son of mine will run off with an herbalist’s daughter.” 

Jorthen wanted to retort, to ask what was so wrong with caring for an herbalist’s daughter, especially since that herbalist had kept him alive these fourteen years. But he withered under Atrin’s gaze, and he lowered his eyes to stare at the grass and mumbled, “Yes, sir.” 

“And hold your head up.” 

This command Jorthen rejected. Instead, he worked his jaw and glared at the coals of the fire before him. Half of him hoped Atrin would not notice, but the other half knew he would, and relished the rush of adrenaline that came from that knowledge. 

“…Go to the tent and wait for me.” 

The adrenaline faded as blood drained from Jorthen’s face. His mouth went dry, and he swallowed hard as his thoughts scattered. Atrin was taller than him. Even if Jorthen turned out to be the faster runner, his heart would likely betray him and take him to the ground long before Atrin gave up. 

A Lavahr never gave up. Never quit. Never showed weakness. 

“Did you hear me, boy?” 

Numbness overtook Jorthen as he rose to his feet and stumbled towards the tent. If he was lucky, by the time he got there, he would be completely devoid of feeling. He would no longer care. By the time Atrin arrived, he would no longer feel pain, either physical or in that corner of his mind where Amra Sheram’s freckles and glittering brown eyes taunted him. 

But he had never been lucky. So numbness would have to be enough for tonight. 

–––––––

Reshan Guard Military Base, Jaern – Reshan Territory

Eight years later

Lieutenant Cpt. Jorthen Lavahr strode down the hall and ignored the looks his frenzied stride drew from others. Well, perhaps it would not have seemed frenzied had someone else used it, but the uneven rhythm and the way he leaned forward to gain momentum were so unlike him that only a few around him neglected to move out of the way. A young recruit with silky raven hair smiled and stepped forward as if to intercept him, but he ignored her. He barely felt the impact when his shoulder connected with that of a passerby, and it only occurred to him as he entered the echoing stone foyer a few feet ahead to mumble an apology. He spotted a door ahead as it swung open and some officer he couldn’t identify entered. He should have been able to identify him. Perhaps he was from another province? 

What did it matter? Jorthen caught the door before it could swing closed and stepped through it. 

“Lieutenant!” 

Jorthen’s feet halted even as his mind raced forward and tried to plot a course to the nearest solitary place. He took a deep breath and ignored the ache growing in his chest as he turned and smiled at the recruit behind him. “Yes, Haren?” 

“Sorry to disturb you, sir.” Ardran Haren’s copper hair fell into his eyes, and he brushed it out of the way as he straightened his scrawny shoulders. “Permission to make a request, sir?” 

Ardran’s sudden change in posture reminded Jorthen to square his own broad shoulders, though he didn’t bother with the dark chestnut hair that likely fell over his own forehead. He put his hands behind his back and managed a slight chuckle. “Ardran, if you want to make a request, then make it. An overture isn’t necessary.” 

Ardran’s cheeks flushed red, and he ducked his head briefly. “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. Um…” He wiped his hands on his tunic, then quickly folded them behind his back as if to copy Jorthen. “…I… would like to file a complaint, sir. A-about my roommate.” 

One of these days, the recruits would learn the difference between a request and a complaint. Jorthen nodded. “Find Inspector Brehn. He should be in the northern training room.” 

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” Ardran turned and sprinted a few steps before halting. “…Uh, what should I tell him, Lieutenant Lavahr, sir?” 

You can tell him to keep you busy for a few minutes so I can get out of here. 

Jorthen blinked and reined his thoughts in again to form an answer. “Tell him what you just told me – that you want to file a complaint against your roommate. And give him whatever details he asks. Understood?” 

“Yes, sir.” Ardran nodded again and halfway turned to go, then hesitated again. “You don’t look well, sir. Should I call for a physician?” 

Abomination. Was it that obvious? Jorthen forced another smile that he hoped looked real. “I’m fine, Haren. Now you’d better hurry if you want to catch Brehn. I think he’s scheduled to meet a lady friend in about twenty minutes.” 

Ardran’s blue eyes widened. “Yes, sir.” It took only half a moment for him to forget entirely about Jorthen’s appearance and to sprint off towards the northeast section of the base. 

And people thought women were the only ones with ears for gossip. 

Jorthen glanced around to be sure no-one else was approaching, then turned and walked out of the building, pulling the door closed behind him. 

Outside, the town seemed to be made of all brown materials, and even the grass that sprouted up between cracks in the walkway seemed to have aspirations of turning to match that palette. The military base’s grey stone set it apart, as did the splash of color from the Reshan standard that waved from the battlements. Jorthen set his sights on the green of the grass at the edge of the town square and headed that way. Out here, people still recognized him, but as none had any immediate business with him, he met with no delays. 

He did not know how long we walked before spots crept into the corner of his vision and crouched to lower his head between his knees. From there, he rocked back into a sitting position, closed his eyes, and focused on breathing evenly. His pulse still raced, but with some effort, he made it slow and even out into a less painful rhythm. The adrenaline that had charged his flight drained slowly from his muscles, leaving him fatigued and aching for bed. But it was only midday, and he had two batches of recruits left to wrangle before his scheduled activities ended and the paperwork began. Not to mention any meetings he hadn’t known were coming, or any more impromptu questions from the recruits who already knew him. 

He had a good mind just to sit here for the rest of the day and pretend he’d been in some secret meeting the whole time. 

If only Atrin Lavahr had not been sitting in one of the southern meeting rooms at that very moment, likely prepared to launch a full investigation should Jorthen not return in time to perform every one of his duties. 

Jorthen raised a hand to his right temple and rubbed it, trying to rid himself of the headache growing there. How had his life come to this? When he’d joined up eight years ago, he’d managed to convince himself that the Guard would serve as an escape. True, he’d left some things behind, but at least he would be away from Atrin, except for the inevitable visits here and there. He could be independent. He could make something of himself. 

And he was something now, all right. He was twenty-two years old, easily over six feet tall, and strong. He could put on a brave face in any situation, and there was hardly a woman in Jaern who would not revel in his attentions. Even those who did not particularly like him could not hate him, such was his charm and his skill as a diplomat. 

And in this moment, he hated it. He hated all of it. Because it had all come from Atrin. He orchestrated everything, pulled strings to get Jorthen in before he was technically of age, conditioned him by various methods to push through anything, and constantly reminded him of any shortcomings he still needed to eradicate. There was not an aspect of Jorthen’s life that did not smell of his father’s influence. 

But then, had he ever really expected that to change? 

A rhythmic pounding fell on his ears, and he opened his eyes. His vision was still blurred, but if he squinted, he could see something on the northern horizon, a dark shadow in the distance, growing nearer as the pounding grew louder. A horse and rider? 

He stood and fingered the shakahn at his belt, just in case, but kept his mouth shut and his eyes on the figure in the distance. It could be a scout returning with news from one of the Reshan-Shamindo bordertowns, perhaps, but if so, why did he ride so hard? And as the horse approached, Jorthen could see that it was far from a war steed. It looked to be more of a packhorse, really, its shaggy grey coat littered with dirt and flecked with sweat, stride faltering as if it could not take much more running. 

And the skinny rider’s black hair, pale skin, and ragged clothing sent the word Shamindo ringing in Jorthen’s head. 

His pulse spiked again, and he pulled his blade free of its sheath. “Guards!” His voice came out hoarse, so he cleared his throat and called out again. Voices from the town behind him proved that someone heard him. If it came to a fight, he would have backup. 

At the disturbance, the grey horse tossed its head, released a shrill whinny, and stumbled to one side, then toppled, throwing its rider into the grass some yards away as if he weighed nothing. Jorthen dropped into a fighting position, but when the rider did not rise, he strode forward and tried to get a better look. The fallen horse paid him no mind as its lungs heaved in an attempt to catch its breath, but he leaned down to pat its neck as he peered at the rider nearby. He had landed facedown, but from here Jorthen could tell that he was small, barely a man if he was one at all, and that he carried no weapon. Jorthen slowly lowered his own weapon and froze as he spotted burns on the arm that was not pinned beneath the rider, and charred holes where fire must have caught his clothing. 

Jorthen kept still for a moment, then sheathed his weapon and knelt next to the boy. He touched his shoulder as lightly as he could and turned him over onto his back, then recoiled slightly at the sight of more burns on his face and neck. If treated, they should heal without leaving scars, but how had they gotten there? How much more of his body was burnt? Jorthen heard footsteps behind him and called over his shoulder, “He’s injured. Find a physician.” 

One of the newcomers repeated the order, and someone else sprinted back towards the base. Yet another person knelt beside the fallen horse to assess its condition. Jorthen stretched out a hand to feel for the Shamindo boy’s pulse. 

The boy gasped and jerked away from Jorthen’s hand as his eyes flew open. Jorthen started, then held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Easy, easy – I’m not going to hurt you.” 

From behind him, someone called out, “Shamindo! He’s a Shamindo spy!” 

“Quiet,” Jorthen snapped. He looked at the boy again and offered a hand. “Come on. We’ll get you some help.” 

The boy shook his head and tried to scramble away from Jorthen, but fell to the ground again, his green eyes wide, emaciated body trembling. The burns covered his hands and arms, and his tunic was singed halfway into oblivion. He could not have been much older than sixteen. 

Jorthen swallowed hard. “…Easy,” he repeated, and extended a hand again. “I’m Jorthen Lavahr. Let me help you.” 

The boy blinked at him, uncomprehending in his panic. All at once his muscles went loose, his eyes glazed over, and Jorthen barely moved forward in time to keep him from hitting his head on a rock as he fell unconscious again. 

Jorthen cursed under his breath and glanced at a Guard recruit as the boy stepped up beside him. “Help me get him to the base.” 

The boy nodded, and with little difficulty they lifted the Shamindo and headed for the military base. Until this point, Jorthen had managed to focus his distractible mind on the matter at hand, but as they walked, he could not help thinking, Won’t Atrin be thrilled when he finds out about this? 

Scribely How-To: Insecurity Maps

Hello, fellow digressors. Welcome to 2015! How have your first few days with the new resolutions been? Have you written the wrong date on very many checks yet? Myself, I've made a longer list of goals than I did for any previous year, and I expect to keep maybe half of them. Maybe. You know me -- I get distracted. There are too many shiny things in this world to have complete focus 100% of the time. 

Anyways, this post was requested a month or two back by some writer friends on Facebook, and I'm finally getting around to writing it. As any writer knows, or figures out eventually, good character development is key to writing a good story. You can have a fascinating premise, a plot so twisted it looks like a big soft-serve pretzel that the dog mangled, and the writing skills of the most popular author in the world, but if your characters are flat, you're probably doomed. I'm sure there are exceptions, but in general, this holds true. 

Why is this? Well, let me see what reasons I can think of off the top of my head: 

1. If your reader doesn't care about your main character, why should they care about anything that happens to them? If the character is hit by a car, or their mother is kidnapped, or their dog dies, why does it matter? (Well, okay, everyone will always be sad if a dog dies. Bad example.) If they're not rooting for (or against) someone, they have no reason to care about anything that happens. 

2. If your reader cannot connect with your characters, they will not connect to your story. My most effective marketing strategy has been a strange one -- in Go Teen Writers and other online circles, I will let my characters interrupt me in comment threads, I will talk about them, I will post quotes from them and discuss their quirks and deepest insecurities with other group members. People get to meet my characters, they grow to love them for their sense of humor, their intriguing backstory, or their habit of tripping over everything that crosses their path, and they say, "Hey, I love this character -- I want to read their story now." I don't even have to talk much about my ingenious (or dry) plots, my wordcraft, or anything else. People connect with the characters, and because of that, they connect (or want to connect) with my stories. It makes sense, really. While you read a book, most of the fun involved comes from hanging out with these characters, with living vicariously through them and rooting for them no matter what the plot throws their way. People may forgive a simple plot, a slightly cliched premise, or a less than dazzling writing style, provided they love the characters. To me, at least, the characters are what make or break a book. Everything else is secondary. If your characters are unrelatable or boring, you'll lose me pretty early on in the book. Make them interesting, and I'll be willing to trudge through a few more chapters of less than thrilling prose just to spend some more time with them. 

3. Characters drive the plot. Now, the extent to which they do this will vary between stories. But ultimately, the book is driven by your main character's wants, fears, and deepest desires. A plot is only interesting if what happens in it matters to your main character/s. If they don't care, then your reader won't care, either, or else they'll find your character unrealistic or incongruous and not want to keep reading. Since, as stated above, half the fun of reading a book is that you get to live vicariously through the characters, what they feel is important. What they believe and how things affect them is important. If things don't affect them, they will seem inessential or detached, and that can be detrimental to your story. 

Okay, I can only think of those three points right now, but suffice it to say, character development is extremely important. I might even go so far as to say that it's the most important part of the writing process. Think about your favorite book -- what was the plot? What verb tense did the author use? What was the message of the book? You'll probably remember most, if not all, of these. But what was it that made you love the book in the early days, when you first started reading it? Chances are that you connected with the characters, related to them in some way, or at least were intrigued by them. For many people, 'The Hunger Games' was interesting because of Katniss, because of her humanity and the struggles she overcomes throughout the series. People love 'The Hobbit' because of Bilbo Baggins and how, even as an ordinary hobbit who claims not to want any part in adventures, he goes so far out of his comfort zone and grows as a person throughout the experience. People love the characters, and so they love following their adventures. Add in a great premise, a plot that keeps you guessing, and some killer writing (literally or otherwise), and you've got the potential for a bestseller. 

SO. Now that I've proven how much of a digressor I really am, I'll get to the original topic of this post: Insecurity Maps. 

This was an idea I had recently, while thinking about one of my main characters' insecurities. It occurred to me that, while people knew about his occupation, his personality, and what other people thought of him, what he thought of himself was equally important. How a person views himself affects everything he thinks or does. A man who thinks himself very important will be more likely to assume that what he says is valid and as important as he is, and will be less likely to take the advice of others whom he deems less important than himself. On the other hand, a man who thinks of himself as worthless or beneath the notice of others might be likely to either draw less attention to himself, or to overcompensate by trying to make himself seem more important than he really is or to make himself feel more important. But at the core of it all will be his insecurities, his longing to be worthy of notice, and his belief that he never will achieve that level of worth. Because of these insecurities, he might either reject flattery because he thinks so little of himself, or accept it because it makes him feel important, depending on his personality. He may become either depressed or disproportionately angry when someone insults him, but he is unlikely to be completely unaffected, where someone with a high sense of self-importance will likely disregard the criticism because he does not think it is true. Personality influences the reaction, but insecurities affect the expression of personality. 

Say someone is extroverted, but has a deep-seated feeling of being a joke to the opposite sex. They may appear confident to others, and converse with people of their own gender very easily, but when confronted by someone of the opposite sex, they will become uncomfortable. There may be many possible reactions to this, but they will all be based upon your character's discomfort and their desire to mask or get rid of that discomfort. 

Insecurities run deep, and affect everything we do. Think about it. What's a deep-seated insecurity you've held for a long time? How much has it influenced your thinking and the way you've interacted with the world? I'd be willing to wager that it's had at least a moderate influence over you at some point in your life. I personally spent my high school years feeling as though I was beneath the notice of others, so I withdrew from them and found lots of little distractions to occupy me without interacting with people. Had I not been so insecure, I might have had more of a social life, and might not have gotten into writing or sketching or music as much as I have. The bottom line is, we all have insecurities, and most insecurities can be a significant influence on our choices in life and how our personalities develop. 

So along with your character's personality, their positive or negative traits, or their upbringings, their insecurities are vital to understanding them and making them real to the reader. I personally cannot connect to characters who are never insecure about anything. They feel too "perfect," almost inhuman, because to be human is to be insecure about something. 

Anyways, an Insecurity Map is basically just a graphic I create that records negative things my characters think about themselves, as well as things others have said to or about them that have seeped into their minds and now influence the way they live their lives. 

(Disclaimer: I do not own the photos used in the maps. I retrieved most of them from Pinterest, and I claim no rights to them. I simply use them for private, non-commercial purposes in representing my characters.) 

Jorthen Lavahr ('The Sehret Chronicles', High Fantasy)

Shaetha Sohran ('The Sehret Chronicles')

Sohrem Terahl ('The Sehret Chronicles')

Val(erie) Richards ('Distorted Dimensions', Contemporary Sci-Fi)

Is this the most effective method for thinking up and visualizing characters' insecurities? I have no idea. But it does help me. I look at this big, empty page with my character's face in the center, and I think, "I have to fill this page with as many of their insecurities as possible." This forces me to really examine the darkest crevices of my characters' souls, to remember situations in their lives that might have influenced how they viewed themselves, and to lay it all out in a succinct way. It's also a plus if I can summarize each insecurity in one word or phrase. For some, I could only pull a quote from another character that evoked a basic sense of the insecurity the character in question possessed. For example, a character's map might include the quote, "Why can't you just leave well enough alone?" I have a basic sense of how this might affect my character's view of himself/herself, but it is difficult for me to sum it up in one word. So in those moments where I feel I cannot summarize without obscuring my meaning, I just throw in a quote that gives the general idea. The point is to figure out what your character thinks of himself/herself and make it into a visual. You could also do this for positive things they think about themselves, I suppose, but since insecurities run so deep and affect so many facets of a person's being, I chose to make maps for them first. 

So, how can you make one of these for yourself? Here are some basic instructions: 

For a digitally-generated map like those pictured above: 

1. Grab a background. This could be a normal photo, but that might be distracting. Your best bet is to grab some random photo (preferably high-resolution), take it over to a program like PicMonkey, and use the 'Canvas Color' effect to cover up the original photo with whatever color you think best represents your character. Or, you know, just black or white. Whatever works for you. 

2. Choose whether or not to include a photo of your character, and use the 'Overlay' effect to add them to the map. 

3. Start thinking. You might start with something as basic and shallow as 'Clumsy', 'Ugly', or 'Busybody', and work your way on to the deeper ones, such as 'Failure', 'Not good enough', or 'Toxic'. If you want, throw in quotes from other characters that have influenced your character, like, "You'll never amount to anything," "Why can't you be more like [insert name here]?", etc. Anything goes. This is your character -- take this time to get to know them. Open the gates to the storehouses of their deepest insecurities, and exploit their secrets. (Did I say that out loud?) 

4. Add whatever visual effects you desire to make the map look cooler. Or just leave it as it is. I personally like to make these things as visually appealing an personal to the character as possible. For example, I use their favorite colors as the background colors, and a character who loathes himself will have a darker-colored map than one who tries to think positively and copes more effectively with her insecurities. If you want the effects to change the look of the character's face or of the text, you'll need to merge the various layers so that they're all stuck in place and edited together. 

5. Save the map and store it somewhere for future reference. 

(P. S. DO NOT try to apply the 'Canvas Color' or an equivalent feature if you decide to change the color after you've already added text or pictures. It will cover everything you've done with whatever color you select. It's basically like taking a physical canvas and covering it in new paint. It's a blank slate, which you do not want to create after you've gone to the trouble of creating and tweaking this map. Instead, use 'Tint', and use the eraser on areas where you do not want to add the new color.) 

For a more basic, physical map: 

1. Take a piece of paper and write your character's name on it. 

2. Do the same as above -- start writing the first insecurities that come to mind for your character. Like I said, sometimes it's easiest to start with surface insecurities that are more obvious to others and work your way down to the ones only your character realizes, or maybe even that they've denied long enough to forget they have them. Another method may be to start with the deep ones that you already know and branch out into other deep ones, or swim up to the surface ones that bubble up from the deeper ones. It all depends upon how well you already know your character, and what starting point you prefer to use. 

3. Again, store this somewhere for future use. You might need to reference it later while looking for ways to torture -- er, develop your character's story arc. 

All seriousness aside, have fun with this, you guys. This is nowhere near a scientific method -- it's just a little exercise in getting to know your character, getting a feel for how they view themselves, and figuring out how their self-image might affect their thoughts, behaviors, and ultimately your plot. 

Hm. I wonder what would happen if someone made an Insecurity Map for the Doctor. What might be on it? What do you think? Pick your favorite fictional character and make an Insecurity Map for them. Use deduction if necessary. Look at what they do, what they say, and try to figure out what part of their self-image might have influenced those decisions. 

Huh. For once, I actually wrote a blog post that stayed pretty much on-topic. Mostly. But not entirely. I can never seem to do that. Even if I stick with the basic topic, I always digress from the original plan. Once I tried to write a guest post about the experience of writing a second book in a series, and ended up writing a post about the fear of failure. Yeah, that's just how my brain works. It's very random, and pretty much always has been. That's probably why I can never completely stick to a plot... 

But, as always... I digress.