Writing for character

Character development is a subject that gives many writers problems. Development of your stories characters is also the one area that you cannot afford to skimp on in your planning stage. Many times, as you are writing, you will need to go back and refer to your characters history.

So how do we develop our characters? Well I believe in a good outline at the very least and possibly some actual stories based on your characters history. If it sounds like a lot of work, that is because it is a lot of work.

Most of my characters have stories and histories that go for many pages in my development folders. A lot of this information is never revealed in the story but is present because someday I may want to revisit the story, or use the character in other related stories. This will give me a reminder of the characters history and will allow me to decide if each character is appropriate for the story at hand.

Generally I start with a simple character sheet. This is the easiest to create and it lays out some basic facts for your characters. I take a single sheet of paper for each character in my story and I write down all the physical characteristics for them. I include hair color, height, where they live, date of birth, what time they live in, education, talents, music interests, favorite color, where they work, etc. The more detailed you get with this sheet the better.

You can also create your character's bio on a computer using a notepad type program and some computer folders to store them in.

If you like you can use a more fancy program such as Microsoft's free online One Note program to do this. Also available are a number of online and offline "Mind Mapping" programs that will work as well. Just keep in mind that a simple typing program will work just as well for your writings.

Also keep in mind that you will be referring to these character sheets as you develop your story so make sure you have easy access to the program or file system that you use when you are writing.

Now take another sheet of paper, or make another computer document and work out a basic timeline for the story, be sure to include how long of a time period the story will span. For example if the story is to take place over the course of a 2 year period, then put down a start point and and end point and write the dates covered. Just add more points to this line, in the middle space,that shows major plot points in your story. Outline format will work very well for this also.

Now create smaller and more detailed timelines for each character. Include every major plat point and be sure and note exactly where each character is and what they are doing. Think of this step as the detective work for your story. You will need to be your very own CSI "Your town here". This outlining step will help you to avoid many common errors such as having the same character in multiple places at the same time. Or having a character appearing a great distance away in too short of a time period to be believable.

Then, based on your plot timelines, take each character and write down the things that they will be doing in the story during each time point. Also remember to list the skills that they have that they can use for each plot point in the story.

If your character does not have a needed skill then you have time now to decide how they will handle each event as it unfolds. If you feel that they cannot handle an event you can edit the character's history or skills on your sheet so that they can handle it better. Or you can add a new character to your story that will enable your character to handle the event utilizing the new characters talents. Basically how you handle each plot point is entirely up to you.

The main point behind all of this is that you will need to be really flexible with your characters until you get the story mostly worked out in outline form. Once you have your characters developed to the point that you are comfortable with the entire story based on your timeline, then the real work of writing begins. Using this outlining technique will save you hours of writing that will end up on "the cutting room floor".

So hopefully this will assist you in getting started with your character development. Please feel free to comment if you find this to be useful, or if you have a better way then be sure and list it below as well.

Have a great day and remember to keep on writing!