In today’s blogpost and video, I’ll be sharing Part 4: How to Brainstorm and write down details about your main character(your Hero or Heroine). What is their backstory and personality? Pick details you relate to and understand.

Just a little aside here: The ideas I share in this video seres are brainstorming techniques that have helped me to write my own novels. But it’s important to remember that all writers are unique in their own way and what works for you … might not be what has worked for me. I want to encourage you to experiment with different methods for brainstorming your own story ideas — and come up with a way that works best for you.

But that being said, lets first dive into why it’s important to write down details about your main character or Hero.

Essentially, it’s your Hero or Heroine that makes up the heart and soul of your story.

As you choose the main characters for your book, it’s important to make them real. Imagine your Hero or Heroine as a real person with real flaws, wounds, goals and desires.

Your reader will interpret the story through the eyes of the main character. Your reader lives the story world you create, in tandem with the Hero.

Your reader will feel similar emotions as your main character as they read your novel. For example: That tugging on your readers heart strings when the Hero’s mom dies of cancer is what gives the novel you write — real meaning to the reader.

A writers goal when writing a novel, is to keep a reader’s interest to the end.

James Scott Bell in his helpful book for writers titled, Writing Unforgettable Characters defines a novel as:

A novel is the record of how a character, through strength of will, fights against death.

This is the fight that your main character makes in the novel your writing.

Your character is fighting for something. There is something they want so badly that they are willing to sacrifice themselves in some way for it.

This is how writers of fiction get readers to truly care about their Main Character.

When your readers are intensely and emotionally invested in your Main character, they will feel everything that character feels and will stick like glue to your main character.

 

 

This is the super glue of how to get your readers to bond with your character.

This is done by applying two main elements:

• An urgent challenge that the Main Character must face
• Giving something in the character’s life that readers really care about or feel empathy towards.

For example:

In The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen, must face the challenge of survival in that desolate dystopian world.
Readers come to care deeply about Katniss because at the beginning of the story we see her caring for her mother and her sister Prim…. And she even takes care of the cat she doesn’t really like.

This act of caring and compassion, makes readers empathsize and really care for and bond with the main character, Katniss.

It’s important to note: that when a character takes care of someone or even an animal whether from affection or duty — it increases a readers admiration for that character.

Here’s a tip: If you can introduce a scene that shows your main character’s compassion or caring for someone or an animal in the first one or two chapters, it really helps your readers to bond quickly.

So what are other ways that we can dig deeper and really get to know our Hero or Heroine?

By digging deeper into his or her backstory and understanding their emotional wound — a traumatic event, a lost love, the death of a loved one, a loved one with addiction, a loss of faith — those things that continue to haunt your main character as the story begins.

The reliving of some sort of past trauma is a staple of drama. And even Freud said “We as humans unconsciously seek out people, events and situations that duplicate our core traumas in the hope of eventually triumphing over the situation that so wounded us.”

In some stories the wound seems to be similar to a family curse. e.g. Michael Corleone(from the Godfather) is not able to escape the long shadow of his family business and his powerful father.

In some comedy and romances the character’s wounds come off as more subtle. For example in the romance movie “While You Were Sleeping” the main character Lucy( played by Sandra Bullock) — her father has recently died after a long illness and Lucy falls hard for a man who looks very much like her father.

So do a deep dive into your main character’s wounds. I highly recommend The Emotional Wound Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi as a resource to help you.

Some examples of wounds your main character may have in his or her backstory…

1.Crime or Victimization

• a home invasion
• a physical assault
• being held captive
• identity theft

2.Disability

• learning disability like dyslexia
• physical disability(perhaps your character was in a fire and has burns on his or her body).
• Speech impediment — like stuttering or muteness
• Brain injury
• losing a limb or one of the five senses

3.Failures & Mistakes

• being imprisoned and recently coming out of prison at the start of the story.
• caving in to peer pressure
• declaring bankruptcy
• failing at school
• failing to save someone’s life

4.Misplaced Trust and Betrayals

• being disowned or shunned
• being let down by a trusted organization or system
• being abandoned by unexpected pregnancy
• getting dumped
• telling the truth but not being believed

5.Specific Childhood Wounds

• parent’s abandonment or rejection
• being raised by an addict
• experiencing the death of a parent as a child or youth
• growing up in Foster Care
• growing up with a sibling’s disability or chronic illness

6.Traumatic Events

• a house fire
• a life-threatening accident
• miscarriage or stillbirth
• natural disaster
• terminal illness diagnosis
• losing a loved one to a random act of violence

Figure out what your character’s biggest wounds are and what they fear most and you will have even the climax of your story figured out.

The climax is where your Hero or Heroine will need to face their greatest fear.

In my latest cowboy sweet romance(written under a pen name), the Heroine was physically and verbally abused by her stepfather as a young child — after her mother died of cancer. So up until the age of 10 years, she lived everyday with her alcoholic and abusive stepfather.

I questioned for a week or so what was to be the climax of this book. Then it hit me — since both the Heroine and the Hero were trying to discover the kidnapper and the missing girl, the Heroine would need to come face to face with someone who was — you guessed it — both physically and verbally abusive and controlling — someone like the little girl’s kidnapper.

That way she was able to face what she feared the most and it would give her an opportunity to overcome those fears and begin to heal from her past.

In the example of The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen has been helping her family survive in a very desolate dystopian world.
In the climax Katniss comes face to face with physical death — and the fact that she could very likely did in the hunger games.
We get the feeling though through the movie, that Katniss worries more about how her mom and sister will be taken care of — then about her own survival…

And let’s not forget President Snow — the villain who is a big problem for Katniss whom she has to fight against at every turn.
A conflict which makes for a great story.

Which brings us to Motivation or Desire.

Your main character (and every scene in your novel for that matter) must have a overarching motivation or desire. 
Ask these questions: What does my Hero or Heroine want? Who wants what in the scene and how do those desires conflict?

For your main character: What is their overall DESIRE and NEED in this story?

A strong character will want something immediately — get the promotion; date the girl — but there is something underneath the surface that is really driving the character — it’s the inner and outer desires which are in conflict.

Here’s a little tip to remember: Your main character will know that he or she wants that outer desire — but will not really understand that what he or she really NEEDS is the inner desire.

So as the writer, you must know your main character’s inner and outer desires and how they conflict.

Great example is from the movie: A wonderful life. George Bailey wants to see the world and do big things — design big buildings —big external goals.

But his deeper need (aka inner need) is to become a good man and community leader like his father.

An every choice George makes defers his external big goal of wanting to escape that small town — and ties him close to the community and starts him on the path to taking over his late father’s role of being the community and moral leader of the town.

It’s quite normal for your main character’s external goal to be a selfish desire — and for the inner need will be unselfish — something your main character wants for other people.

This is the transformational arc in your main character — the transition from external desire to internal need shows growth in your character by the end of your story.

So those are some tips to help you dig deeper into who your main character truly is.

This week, ask some questions of your main character. What are their deepest wounds and fears? What happened in their background to cause these fears? 
What will they need do to face off and confront these fears at the climax of your novel?

What is your main character’s overall need and desire and how do their external goals and inner needs conflict?

You can do this. Begin to brainstorm today… you can do this.

I often find it helpful to brainstorm either with a pen in my notebook, or on a whiteboard — somewhere where I’m forced to physically write out my ideas. For some reason, I find I’m more creative when I can use my a pen or marker on a physical surface. Try it and see if it helps you too!

After you’ve done that, you will be ready for the next blogpost and video in this series. Part 5  is coming up next.

In the next video, Brainstorm and write down details about your secondary character. Your secondary character(aka: best friend, mentor, or even frenemy, etc.) helps your Hero achieve their goal. Write down your secondary character’s backstory, their personality and their goals.

I’ll share what that looks like in the next video!

Thanks for joining me today and I’m excited for you as begin your journey to write amazing stories!

Happy writing!:)