We’re back on the normal train with the blog. Today, we’re going to talk about bothersome characters. I’ll get into the details below, but it’s all about being true to the heart of a character. This is what makes them believable to a reader. In your head, you can rationalize anything. Not so from a reader’s perspective. I hope your New Year is going well and you’re achieving your goals. Let’s get into it.
Drawing from the Well
I got another chapter done this week and dove deep into the next. I’m zeroing in on the end of this step of the process. The chapter I’m working on right now is interesting because when I sat down to write it, I knew I needed the chapter for character development, but I had no idea what the character would realize in order to grow. That’s where the importance of reading comes in. In The Crown’s Fate that I’m almost finished with, there are several introspective scenes and chapters that allow characters to decide what to do next. More importantly, it allows them to react to what has already happened. That realization told me what my character needed to realize and we were off to the races. By next week, I aim to finish this chapter and at least one other. I want to get through this!
Page 325
168,723/176,480 Words
Filling the Well
I finished The Crown’s Game last week, but this was a short week so I didn’t have as much time to listen and read. I’m renewing some habits this week that should help me chew through more books. Here’s hoping. Anyway, The Crown’s Game was excellent which propelled me right into the sequel in the duology, which is also great. I’m almost finished with it and can’t wait to see how it ends.
2/100 for #ProjectBookworm2024
It has been almost a month since this was announced, but the next patch is about to hit WoW so it felt appropriate to bring it up. It’s going to be another full year for my favorite MMO with Seeds of Renewal launching later today. I can’t wait to see what all of these patches bring. It’s going to be a lot of fun.
Well Chat
Further into the structure that crystallized into how you read the blog today, we come to my blog about Ceding Control on February 3, 2019. In this, I talked about the phenomenon of bothersome characters and how to handle them. In 2019, the big realization for me was that my characters don’t stand up and refuse to perform. It is now more like they tap me on the shoulder and remind me that something isn’t right.
Now, things are a little different. Obviously, my process has evolved. Now, I make most of the decisions on the front end, so I’m deep in a character’s mind and motivations from the jump. That doesn’t mean I don’t still run into problems, though. Perish the thought. That would be too easy. Now, instead of the feeling being that something is wrong, it is still a feeling, but more that something is missing. That has been the largest feeling throughout the drafting and editing of Book III. This book was so large and so opaque for me to approach, that I focused hard on getting the foundations and scaffolding right. The problem was that there has been so little character in my characters at times. It is why I have had to go back and write a dozen chapters to fill in the gaps.
Are there ways to avoid this on the front end? Absolutely. My approach to this book came largely from a place of fear. I am doing things in this book that I have never done before. I have more points of view and storylines than ever before. It’s a lot. If I was able to face and overcome that fear sooner, I would likely see the problems earlier. If I recognized that my approach was cutting out connective tissue, even from a story structure perspective, I could have avoided these additions and rewrites. It’s fine. Book I required a frame off restoration. This is not my first time making big changes. Avoiding them saves so much more time than fixing them, though.
Characters and plot are inextricably connected. Fixing one requires changing the other and vice versa. It’s what I’m going through now and I’m sure it is what I will go through again. How do you grapple with your characters or the difficulties in your creative process? Let me know on social media.
May the tide carry you to safer shores.
BSG