Question about fleshing out a character?

It's actually a rather complicated answer. It means the character has to come to life for the reader and be someone the reader cares about and wants to succeed. It's a character with goals, dreams, and fears; it's a character with personal stakes that drive him through the conclusion of the story. It's a character who is faced by all these different challenges around him and struggles through it anyway because of who he is. Or makes mistakes because of who he is. Having a character with a strong voice doesn't mean obnoxious; it means he has a strong sense of self that comes through in the story.

I think (as a novice writer myself) that what makes a "strong" character is that they trigger the "what would I do if I were in their shoes?" reflex. "Strong" meaning not necessarily that the character is strong, but that they grip the reader's interest, whether the character's actual personality is powerful or contemptible.

To trigger the "what would I do in their shoes?" reflex, I think you need the proper amount of tension between the character's strengths and weaknesses, and the situation they're facing. I just finished Dan Simmons' Fires of Eden, (not a genre I would normally read, but I was looking for something different one day) and one of the principle characters is a billionaire, Donald Trump-ish type, s.o.b-type, in short, the kind of person I would hate in real life. But he turned out to be a very strong character for me because despite his forceful personality and vast wealth, he was in a tight spot and was in danger of losing his shirt. What would I do if I were a billionaire, and had all kinds of dough and all kinds of guts and was fighting for my financial life? Ah, fantasy!

So if you feel like you're going cross-eyed staring your character in the face, take a step back and look at your character in his/her setting, and see how the setting makes him/her a more interesting and sympathetic person than they would be if you just sat next to them on the bus.

You character is coming across to the reader as 2 dimensional. It may be that you know who they are and why they do things but you are not communiacting this in writing. Do you give details of their life, make their motivations clear, show things from their perspective?

The person isn't saying what kind of character to make (strong versus weak personalty etc) but to make it communicate this character more. To see how valid this crit is and get way to correct the issue you need full crits on the work itself--perhaps try 'share your work'.

Hi Baywitch,

that's two complex question's, my answer isn't neccersarily right or definitive (I'm a newb writer myself) but what the hey, I'll have a go.

I think the ultimate purpose of fleshing out a character (something I struggle with too) is to try and get to the point where your readers stop thinking of them as characters and start thinking of them as people. Which is difficult.

There are lot's of techiniques, and just like everything else in writing, there's no one right answer or one way to do it (unhelpful I know).

I guess the first step is to make sure you're not using stereotypes (the tart with the heart, the strong but silent warrior, etc.) or stock characters (the fat jolly inkeeper for example) as these will always seem stale.

One trick James N. Frey talks about, in "How to Write a Damn Good Novel" is to flip the stereotype on it's head, and go in the opposite direction, by looking at what has gone before in your genre and creating a character that goes against type.

The example he uses is hard boiled detective fiction, where the protags are usually ex-cops/soldiers, terse, tough on the outside (with a soft heart when it comes to women) and good with their fists. He then turns this on its head and creates a detective who is the opposite; an academic type, fast thinking, not pyhiscally strong, but equally determined to solve the case and equally unafraid.

Another technique is this; for each important character do a write up, a page or two, on each of these things; Physiological: all the usual, height weight eyes hair stuff, and more detailed descriptive stuff too. Sociological: social background will make a massive impact on a character, their upbringing, skill set, resources, circle of friends, job, etc. all stem from their social background and finally Psychological: what drives them, fears, passions, defining moments, etc.

Then write a short (again one or two pages) Bio, detailing their life up untill the point your story starts. Write this bio in your charcter's voice in first person (even if you won't be using that POV in your story).

This proccess is one way to flesh out a charcter or a start at least, there are lots of techniques available, whole chapters dedicated to it in how to books and whole books about creating characters.

As to "strong voice", your characters only need be obnoxious , if you want an obnoxious character.

A strong voice is an individual one, a unique one. A voice you can read and know isntantly, this is a particular character or this is a person, an interesting person, one I want to read about.

In first person, a voice has to be really strong as it carries the the story. No matter what the plot, or how interesting/exotic the character might be, if it's delivered in a flat or dull voice, the story won't work.

In third person, the protag's voice won't be so prominent (but you'll need a strong narrator's voice or style) but is still equally important. As an exampe in dialogue you should be able to tell line by line, without any speech tag's which dilaogue is that of your protag's, and which is the other character's.

A strong voice has it's own rythms, nuances, and phrases. Places a character, say a lot about their social standing (a teacher and a janitor will have very different voices) their jobs, their outlook on life.

Err, I'm rambling on now. Voice is really complex, I don't fully understand how to do it, let alone how to explain it.

Here are a couple of links to articles that might help.

Voice...

http://www.poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=68795

http://www.rachelsimon.com/wg_voice.htm

Character...

http://www.rachelsimon.com/wg_character.htm

http://www.poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=66542

http://www.writerswrite.com/journal/feb00/keegan22.htm


Anyway hope that helps however little.

the trick is to make sure that "soft" doesn't mean "bland."


show us why she's timid. show us what she's afraid of. show us who she is. the better we know and understand her, the mroe rewarding when she comes out of her shell and lives.