Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Characters, Eileen Charbonneau

Once again it's Wednesday and I'm looking at Elements of the Novel by Eileen Charbonneau. This time she's talking about characters. Without people in the story, there can be no story. Of course we've read stories using animals as the major characters but they become more than just animals. I once wrote a very unsuccessful story from the POV of a park bench. I'll say nothing more except I was writing in my artsy period. Eileen has written stories with wonderful characters, so let's see what she has to say.

Her first advice is about creating these characters and knowing more about them than their name, height and weight. Looking into other aspects of the life of the characters you're developing always adda dimension to who they are.The more you know about a character and how they developed into the person they have become with the goals they strive for and the problems caused by their social, physical, emotional and mental development, the better you can bring the people you develop to life.

Once you have your character firmly in mind, Eileen talks about how to reveal your character. This is done in many ways such as speech, action, and interacting with other characters. The character is also defined by where they live and the twists and turns of the plot.

So when writing start looking at ways to enhance your characters and some day you may have a character who lives for the ages like Scrooge or Scarlet.