Help with Characters Archives

Writing Secondary Characters Who Stand Out from the Crowd

November 3, 2016
Student Contributor
Guest posts, Help with Characters, Push Your Imagination, Self-editing Tips, Writing Tips and Tools
9 Comments

By Emily Steadman, Guest Contributor How do we create sympathy for the main character without villainizing whoever comes against her? How do we create tension and conflict while treating characters on all sides as three-dimensional people who can be good as well as bad?

What I Learn from Theater about Writing Characters

May 5, 2016
Student Contributor
Guest posts, Help with Characters, Push Your Imagination
2 Comments

By Irie Odessa Browning, Guest Contributor I love to act, but I’m a writer, too. One of the reasons I love acting is how it helps me develop my writing, mostly in the area of character development.

Telling a Religious Story Without Being Preachy, Part 2

March 24, 2016
Staff Writer
Help with Characters, Self-editing Tips, Writing Tips and Tools
0 Comments

By Rachel Garner, Staff Writer Last week, we looked at the problem of “preachiness” in Christian stories, and two major elements to eliminate to avoid coming off as preachy in your own work: Mouthpiece Syndrome and the Willing Recipient. This week, I focus on some other practical ways to address the problem of preachiness, especially when editing important thematic scenes.

Telling a Religious Story Without Being Preachy

March 17, 2016
Staff Writer
Help with Characters, Self-editing Tips, Writing Tips and Tools
4 Comments

By Rachel Garner, Staff Writer If everything else we write mimics life, then our characters’ faith should too. We have to give characters the dignity of their own opinion. Sometimes they will agree with us, sometimes they won’t. The important thing is that they express it in their terms.

Writing Characters When You Don’t Hear Voices in Your Head

December 16, 2015
Student Contributor
Guest posts, Help with Characters, Writing Tips and Tools
2 Comments

Miguel Flores, Guest Contributor People have told me their characters “talk” to them. These fictional characters use our brains as home base but are otherwise free to explore both their world and ours. When these vagabond ghost squatters re-enter our brains, they kick up their feet, scatter our neatly organized plot bunnies, and babble about their lives or rudely commentate on ours.