Falling In Love With Your Characters

by Janis Patterson

Don’t worry – this isn’t a post about romantic love, though show me a woman who writes romance (as I do sometimes) who doesn’t get all hot and bothered over writing the perfect hero. Just imagine… you can create the perfect man with muscles, a twinkle in his eye, a rugged but handsome face, sensitivity, strength… the perfect Build-A-Hunk kit.
That said, however, we all know there are many kinds of love, so for this post, at least, let’s forget the idea of hearts-and-flowers romantic love.

Do you believe writers should love their characters? I do. Now I will admit that any competent professional writer can create a believable character on technique alone, without anything empathetic or sympathetic or even liking between writer and character. I’m not talking about whether this character is a villain or a hero – we’ve all either written or read a story where the villain is the most likable character. I’m talking about a deeper connection – an instinctual, inner knowing how the character feels/reacts opposed to declaring through technique how the character will feel/react.

Personally, I am all for the empathetic (it’s more than that, but we need to give it a codeword for this essay) approach than the purely technique-driven format. You and the character – perhaps all the major characters, and yes, it’s possible to jump from head to head – almost meld into one. You know what he is going to say. You know what he is going to do. It is almost as if you were doing it yourself.

By contrast, the technique way is very one sided. You have created a character, maybe even using the old trick of the character interview – a questionnaire which you answer as your character. This is supposed to give you an insight into the character’s mind and being. There are the standard questions of name and age and eye color, but some are so detailed they go in to truly deep (and in my opinion useless unless there is a direct tie-in to the plot) question such as the maiden name of the character’s grandmother and his favorite flavor of Jell-O. My personal reaction is this creates a Frankenstein-like character – everything is there, everything works, but it isn’t really alive.

Most of my writer friends look at me askance when we talk about character development. Many of them use some version of the character interview model, whether or not they use a written sheet of questions or just keep the information in their head. Some brainstorm with other writers. I’ve never heard of anyone using my method, which really isn’t a ‘method’ at all.

I get a wisp of an idea – a situation, a relationship, sometimes a thing – and start to build from there. Then the characters come. They just walk in, tell me their names and a little something about them (but not everything, as they like to keep surprises for me for later in the book, mischievous little creatures that they are) and the story starts to grow.

And they are not always little darlings, either. One hero in particular had a name that I just hated, so in a moment of hubris I decided that I was the writer, I was in control, and I could change his name to something I liked. Except I couldn’t. He shut up and for at least a week refused to talk to me. The story died. Oh, I wrote every day, and then spent the next morning tearing up what I had written the day before.

Finally I caved and gave him back the name he liked – the name I hated – and from that moment on the book was one of the easiest I’ve ever written. I liked the book, but I didn’t like that character, which was a shame, as he was a great protagonist – strong, smart, courageous, with just enough flaws to make him totally human. My readers loved him and I’ve gotten requests to put him in another book.

Perhaps the reader won’t realize the difference between an empathetic and a created character, and with a skilled writer they shouldn’t be able to, so some people will ask if it makes a difference. To the writer it makes a lot of difference, the difference between being a collaborator and a puppet master. Each technique has its adherents, and a writer can use either or both according to his need. Thank goodness there are no hard and fast rules in how to write – other than the obvious dictate to produce the best book you can.

Now you know I can’t go without a commercial, and this is a good one – Christmas is coming, and I’ve got news of a great sale for you! I have blogged for years with a wonderful group of women mystery writers called Ladies of Mystery and this year to celebrate the season we’ve put together a bunch of 29 books about Christmas. Some are mysteries, some are romance, some are on special sale, some are not, but they’re all good stories by proven and popular writers. The sale begins 15 November, so you’ll have a good long time to read and enjoy a bunch of Christmas stories! Go take a look – here’s the link: