Wednesday - Writing ABC - Characters - Wants #MFRWauthor

Now our characters have names and traits there's another thing characters need to make them come alive. What do they want?

Want can equate with goals but goals aren't simple. The character may want love, to kill someone, to find who the killer is, to fly to a new planet, to learn magic. These kind of wants are rather basic. There have to be levels to layer their goals to make each story stronger.

So let's look at what the character wants. There are reasons they may want a specific thing, but we're not looking at reasons today. We're looking to discover a goal, a want, a need. To reach the goal there are steps to take. A writer can't just say Jane wants love and she spots a man and they fall instantly in love, Jane has to take steps. The same is true with each of the general goals a character may want. The steps add to the complexity of the character and suddenly there are many more layers to the character.

How does one do this? What a person must do is look at the end goal and plan via scenes how the character can progress to this achieve their want. A writer must also remember there are other characters in the story. Well, usually there are more than one character in a story. The goals of one or more of these other characters may not be the same or be in opposition to the character's want. These must be taken into consideration and that winds into the story and brings the characters to life.

And these wants must mesh with the character's traits. So when you sit down to plan your story you'll become a juggler keeping lots of balls in the air.