Let’s get back into the Character Under A Microscope series where I dig deep into character development. Today, I want to talk about walking. Walk is one of those bland verbs that can be replaced with something more descriptive. Everyone crosses space at some point, but how does each person Read more
Let’s examine character development in another Character Under A Microscope post. Today, I want to talk about grieving. If you’re writing your story right, the protagonist should go through many trials and eventually end up in an All is Lost moment and a Dark Night of the Soul moment. At Read more
The last character detail I’m going to cover this round for Character Under A Microscope is manipulation. That’s right, I just went there. Every person, regardless of how good he is, manipulates other people to get what he wants. It’s part of being alive. Even animals do it. Why does Read more
This week, let’s take a deeper look at character motivations. What makes the characters act like they do? Writers are often told to give characters goals, but along with those goals come motivations. Why do they want those goals? The reasons characters act the way they do will not only Read more
As writers, we use foils all the time in our writing without realizing it. A foil is when you put opposites close together in order to make one stand out more. I’ve heard that the term comes from jewelers who placed a piece of foil under a gem to make Read more
Some writers start a book without knowing any of the details, and others have a meticulous outline of the story before they sit down to write. I fall somewhere in the middle. For my characters, I like to have some details preplanned. My reasoning for this is twofold. One, I Read more