What to know about your character

In part 1 we covered the why of your characters’ personalities, now it’s time to cover the what. When determining and defining what your character’s personality will be, it may be helpful to already know some things about them to build off of, such as: - Their origins, environment, and predispositions/temperament - Their role in the story, and what traits and personality would best fit that role - The character arc or emotional growth journey you want your character to have

Are you ready to take your writing to the next level? Whether you're tackling a short story, an essay, or a novel, you'll find techniques and lessons to improve your practice, conversations about industry hot topics to grow your writing life, analysis of the master writers to learn what works, and workshops that will get you writing. Real·Good·Writing starts here!

If you're a writer, you know that creating well-rounded characters is essential for any successful story. But where do you start? Check out my article on how to create a detailed character outline spreadsheet to learn how. This article is full of tips on how to organize your character details into categories like identifying details, basic personal info, physical traits, personality traits, and even relationships and inventory. Let me know what character details you think I missed!

TweetPin2EmailShare Introducing a new character to your story can be difficult. There’s a lot that goes into it, and to make matters worse, you only have one chance to give... Read more »

Artful clothing description does make a character, a setting, and even a moment more engaging. It’s all in the craft. It’s good that you’re here to learn how to describe clothing in writing, because it’s a powerful tool. What your character wears reveals where they come from, how they rank in society, how they want to be perceived, and even how they feel about themselves.

These are what I would consider to be the most basic, bare-bones questions of character creation. What would completely break your character? What was the best thing in your character's life? What was...