How do I show that my character's special?

If she has amazing insight, you should show her having amazing insights throughout the story.

well maybe make her cry at the end of the day or something like that. Without reading your story it is in fact very difficult to imagine your character. Maybe post in the share your work section so I can read that (an others) and tell you of your character.

Lady Ice said:

The whole plot revolves around her having an amazing insight into life and people. If I can't convince a reader to believe that, they won't believe the rest of the story.

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I think my acid test here as a reader would be whether I believed the character was genuinely insightful, and was therefore earning her knowledge through her intuition, or whether the author was just trying to make her look good.

Intuition, for example, is often a vehicle for authorial interference. Protagonist meets antagonist, instantly knows antagonist is evil thanks to their super intuition. There is no real reason. The protagonist has done nothing, the antagonist has done nothing. The author has decided that the protagonist has intuition, and that her intuition will tell her that the antagonist is evil, and that's it. (I'm looking at you, Tamora Pierce.)

Whereas if the protagonist meets the antagonist, and through a clever line of questioning causes the antagonist to betray themselves, then the protagonist has earned the knowledge that the antagonist is evil. She worked for it. She did something tangible. The knowledge didn't just spontaneously pop, fully-formed, into her mind for no other reason than that the plot demanded it.

Does that make sense?

Make her sparkle?

(sorry)

Ellefire said:

Make her sparkle?

(sorry)

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Give her violet eyes and a katana.

MGraybosch said:

Give her violet eyes and a katana.

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And again the thread returns to Tamora Pierce ...

(Not that I have a big beef with Pierce. She just way overdid the specialness and the magical authorial intuition in the Alanna quartet.)

It sounds like her intuition and her tendency to be taken advantage of might conflict a bit. How do you portray someone being insightful when they're consistently unaware?

I don't see how she can be insightful and blinded by anything....

Your character is either insightful or not. You can't "make her." Your readers can see through that.

And is seems to me that if she is being deceived and manipulated she may be sensitive and many other wonderful things, but she is not insightful. Why would the readers need to think otherwise?

Lady Ice said:

The whole plot revolves around her having an amazing insight into life and people. If I can't convince a reader to believe that, they won't believe the rest of the story.
I don't think she's a Mary Sue as of yet- she may be insightful and have a nice looking boyfriend but she's primitive. If she wants something, she makes it clear, and she ends up being manipulated.

That's the other thing. How do I show how she is mistreated without making her look pathetic?

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Read dune. This is done very well with the lady Jessica and he explains what clues she (and other witches) use to read people.

If your character is special, she will demonstrate that all by herself. Instead of worrying about how you tell the reader how special she is, you need to show it. You can't throw in narrative that says, "Jane Doe is special. She has insights, but hse doesn't use them with her boyfriend." You have to demonstrate it. Maybe she's standing in line for a movie and her intuition tells her to move out of the way. She does, avoiding getting accidentally on the wrong end of a fight, but her boyfriend steals her money out of her pocket and she doesn't notice. Maybe she's driving her car and slams on the brakes for no reason, thereby avoiding a car that runs the red light at the intersection but she gets rear-ended in a minor accident she didn't predict. There's millions of ways to do it. Maybe she's Cassandra-like, in that she always prophecies accurately but no one (including herself) believes it. Maybe her insight has a blind spot that grows as she gets to know someone. Maybe it only works on strangers. Whatever it is, you have to make it intrinsic to who and what that character is, otherwise you're just wasting time.

Although, on first reading, I'd say that the conflict between an insightful character who is constantly manipulated by others is fairly insurmountable.

When I was a lot younger, I could always see through people and their motives, except for if I was in love with them, then I was blind. Now I'm middle-aged and not looking for Mr Right, no one gets past me.

veinglory said:

I don't see how she can be insightful and blinded by anything....

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I agree with those who said you have a conflict here, so you'll have to give up something to make the character believable. Throw out her vulnerability, or throw in something else, another twist on who she is. Being incredibly insightful while still vulnerable to manipulation doesn't make sense.
And everything else mscelina said.

Lady Ice said:

Insightful as in very philosophical. That sort of insight, I think. To add to further problems, she's a Psychology student so should certainly pick up on body language.

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Well, then you might mean more like 'sensitive', 'thoughtful' or 'contemplative'.

I would note that psychology students are taught very little about reading body language and if they are taught it they still don't tend to be very good at it--that sounds more like counselling or even psychoanalysis. It is a common stereotype I faced at parties that psych students can read people's minds from their posture, but IMHO most of the wisdom accumalted by psychologists comes from practice, rather than education (which just lays the foundation).

Samantha's_Song said:

When I was a lot younger, I could always see through people and their motives, except for if I was in love with them, then I was blind. Now I'm middle-aged and not looking for Mr Right, no one gets past me.

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In which case the plot needs to show such a character having these amazing insights in other areas. But insight (from the point of view of psychology and characterisation) is something you do, not something you have.

I think she can be insightful with a blind spot. You need to show her rejecting her intuition because of the prestige/lack thereof of the person she encounters.

I agree with mscelina. If your character is special, she will consistently demonstrate this. If, on the other hand, you keep telling the readers how special she is, the readers aren't going to be very forgiving.

But isn't what the OP is asking: how to SHOW a character is insight, etc.?

You have to ask, who do insightful people do? What do they say? How do they react when faced with adversity? What would they do during conflict?

So think in terms of what your character would do during difficult situations, and think on how insightful people would do.

But again, if your character is not "insightful" you can force them. But everything else is shown through action and conflicts.

Lady Ice said:

The whole plot revolves around her having an amazing insight into life and people. If I can't convince a reader to believe that, they won't believe the rest of the story.

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For my own part, I find that writing while thinking whether my character is convincing causes me to write an unconvincing character.

I don't think she's a Mary Sue as of yet- she may be insightful and have a nice looking boyfriend but she's primitive. If she wants something, she makes it clear, and she ends up being manipulated.

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I listen to the voices of my characters. In other words, I let them speak to me rather than pondering overmuch how they come across. When I am having a problem with a character's direction, I get up and walk away from the keyboard. I let myself relax. When I return, I close my eyes and say outloud, "I am [insert character here]. I have her thoughts and feelings, her experiences and emotions. How do I handle this situation?" I put my own ideas of life out the window and let the character lead instead. This usually works, but if it doesn't immediately, then I shelve the story for the evening and work on something unrelated. Coming back to it fresh the next day also can cut through the static.

That's the other thing. How do I show how she is mistreated without making her look pathetic?

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By making her real. Sometimes when I've written characters that end up being mistreated, I find myself judging them in the writing which in turns causes the reader to see them the same way.

Such as this:
Sharon walked into the coffee shop and paused just over the threshold. Her eyes widened as she took in the sight of her boyfriend and her best friend engaged in a kiss. Humiliated, she turned and ran, blinded by her own anguish.

This is how I'd view this situation as an outsider. Sharon is certainly humiliated, but that's not true to her character. It's my thinking for her, telling myself that she'd naturally be humiliated. But this is not allowing Sharon to tell how she feels herself. If you are really going to write this scene, you need to put yourself in her shoes and feel it just as she does, which may be uncomfortable.

So if I closed my eyes for a minute and let the character speak, I'd imagine Sharon as 5'7", blue-eyed with a fair complexion and amber-colored hair. She's wearing a green peacoat with a light orange scarf, jeans and tan loafers. Her face is pixie-like and whimsical and smiling slightly as she thinks about getting that first hit of coffee. She is wearing a blue topaz ring on her right index finger that matches the spiral silver hoops in her ears. And listening further, she has a tattoo of David the Gnome on her left foot, which was a show she enjoyed watching with her father. So I am now this person and I am about the experience the heartbreak of my life:

Sharon opened the door to the coffee shop, but paused just over the threshold. The scene before her unfolded in slow motion, rolling over her ever thought until the very breath stilled in her chest. She saw her lover's hand reach out to caress the face of her best friend at a corner table. This his lips, the same lips she loved so well, met Julie's in a soft kiss. Their eyes drifted closed as the contact deepened, swelling to a crescendo so horrifying that Sharon backed out of the shop in denial. Her hands fluttered by her sides erratically as her heart stammered, then broke in two. Blindly, she walked down the street seeing nothing except the kiss, feeling nothing except the pain...

Real characters speak for themselves and show it. Even with the best of intentions you will have some reader out there who will think Sharon should have gone in and tackled Julie, body-slammed her on top of the table, then broken the lover's nose. So don't think about them; think about your character and how she feels. Make her real to you.

I hope this helps. If not, then I ask the Muses to send you as much inspiration as you need to further your story. Enjoy the rest of your evening, love.

Respectfully,
Olivia

Rhys Cordelle said:

It sounds like her intuition and her tendency to be taken advantage of might conflict a bit. How do you portray someone being insightful when they're consistently unaware?

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"Insightful" does not have to be in regards to everything. A person can be insightful when giving advice on how to fix your car yet clueless on how to fix your lovelife. It sounds like the character in the OP is insightful in regards to other people. Her blind spot is insightfulness into how others regard her.