How to write: strong characters

Your characters need to slam up against each other and send the sparks scattering.

A re-creation of civil war at Chepstow Castle, Wales. Characters in conflict!

A good way to create memorable, dramatic characters who keep your readers turning the pages is to be sure to know, as a writer, what each character wants more than anything else. It might be a big want, such as being the first person on Mars, or a ‘little’ one, like not wanting to be lonely (though that is a serious desire and I’m not belittling it here at all). Characters can come into conflict via their competing wants. If you know what your characters desire, you’ll know how they drive, how they dress, how they speak, whether they wear scent or aftershave, what their relationships are like and so on.

For example, think of a character who wants more than anything else to find a cure for a kind of cancer. He’ll do anything it takes to find the cure, even risking his life to do so. It doesn’t take much imagination to bring this kind of character into being, and to give him a backstory (why does he need to cure cancer? His wife/mother/twin brother might have died of it? He might have it? His child might inherit a propensity for it? He wants to be famous? He wants to beat a rival to the cure?). Once you’ve worked all this out, it doesn’t take much more of a leap to know lots more about him.

The character, let’s call him Dr Dave, has a wife. More than anything else, she wants to spend more time with him but he’s always at work. You can see the potential for conflict here.

I love creating characters with strong desires. Check some out via Kindle’s great deals.