Character or plot? That is the question.
62
CONTRARY TO POPULAR BELIEF
The principal ingredient, the one component that is absolutely critical in mainstream novels is the central character(s). The plot is important of course, but unless you can create a rapport between your readers and characters, the plot means nothing.
So what about fantasy, what about sci-fi and thrillers do they place more emphasis on plot? Not so. Characters matter most - think, JK Rowling's Harry Potter, think Stephenie Meyer's Twilight. Would the stories be so popular if there were no Harry Potter to care about? Would Twilight matter without Bella?
|
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Widescreen Edition)
Price: $8.06
List Price: $19.98 |
|
20Q Harry Potter
Price: $2.05
List Price: $24.99 |
|
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7) (Paperback)
Price: $8.17
List Price: $14.99 |
|
Deluxe Harry Potter Tie - Gryffindor
Price: $17.99
|
A lot of new writers spend hours searching
Searching for a unique storyline to make their own is a waste of time. New writers run around like headless chickens trying to uncover an original plot thinking this is the way to fame. Believe me, after all this time it's almost impossible to find somthing new . Forget unique, instead, think fresh approach. Tell the same old storyline in a different way, make your VOICE unique, rather than the plot, and you'll stand a far better chance of succeeding.
A good central character is what keeps readers turning pages. If characters are well sketched, if a reader ‘connects' to them, they'll want to know how the protagonists get over difficulties. They'll become anxious, as they would for a friend, and want the whole thing to turn out right.
If your characters are cardboard cutouts, if they don't come to life, readers won't be caught up. If they don't get caught up, they'll become bored; they'll toss the book to one side and it will die. Readers MUST believe in the characters.
Characters should behave like real people
Characters should resonate like real people; have passions and opinions like real people. Not ‘run of the mill' people of course. Successful novels aren't concerned with ‘run of the mill'. Average people lead average lives, characters must be larger than life, yet still be ‘real'.
Characters are most successful when you, as author, equate with them. You should identify with them and take pleasure in their company. You HAVE to be absorbed with the story, if not, forget it.
Psychologists allege that all characters are a representation of some component of a writer's persona. Maybe it's true, maybe not, but it matters nothing, because you as writer, must fully empathize with them or your story will fail. YOU should be the first person to believe in your characters or what chance do they have?
- Profile of an author
Anthony's offical website - BEDLAM
A critical look at life - Tell Me a Story
Hints, tips, and interviews. Anthony's writer's blog - WITHOUT REPROACH
Anthony's Virtual Book Tour
|
Twilight (Two-Disc Special Edition)
Price: $15.13
List Price: $32.99 |
|
Twilight Board Game
Price: $10.99
List Price: $19.99 |
|
Twilight Soundtrack
Price: $8.98
List Price: $18.98 |
|
Official Twilight Movie - Forever Stretch Bracelet
Price: $36.95
|
Anthony has been published since 1994.
His stories have appeared in magazines, international competitions, been recorded for 'Talking Newspapers', been broadcast on radio and recorded for audio books.
Without Reproach is set in the Costa Blanca area of Spain, where Anthony now lives.
PrintShare it! — Rate it: up down [flag this hub]
Comments
True, but I don't believe that all characters have to be larger than life. Many successful characters are ordinary people, who get caught up in extraordinary circumstances, such as Agatha Christie's Miss Marple. She has a very ordinary life, but has a very extraordinary talent. The same with Laura Ingalls Wilder. Surely the "Little House" books were not about larger than life people, but they endure and will always endure, as some of the best literary works in the world.
I personally like novels about ordinary people caught up in something that takes them out of their life, and makes them find strengths and talents they never had. Characters with a past that colors their present, such as Lillian Jackson Braun's Qwilleran in "The Cat Who..." novels draw me in and keep me there.
Men tend to love the larger than life characters, but women tend to like reading about ordinary people who have wonderful and extraordinary things touch their lives. I guess it depends on who you are writing for.
But doesn't the fact that Miss Marple was able to solve crimes make her larger than life - extraordinary.
When ordinary people are caught up in something that helps them find strengths and talents they never thought they had, it makes them larger than life. They rise to the occassion - become extraordinary. They aren't living 'ordinary' lives, the character is moved beyond the sphere of ordinary, into another realm.
By larger than life, I'm not suggesting the character is superhuman, I'm suggesting they aren't humdrum.
Hi, Anthony, (am now recovered from pollen season and human again) -
I'm with you on the character is most important. Characters can differ thousands of ways with all kinds of quirks that make them endearing or irritating. (Loved Miss Marple and especially Poirot)
Besides, aren't there only like 5 basic plots in the world anyway? The Greeks cornered the market on those thousands of years ago... Make an old story sing with interesting characters and a new time and place!
Steven King certainly specialized in that and it brought him commercial success (and pandering to easiest human emotion to evoke: fear). My older brother went to college with him in Maine and even then folks thought he was weird - but he was stellar to his single mother who scrubbed floors to put him through college. There are no one-dimensional characters - not even as authors! :)
Blogging this on over to The Social Poets blog for this week so aspiring writers can benefit from your advice, thanks!
Thanks for your comments, Denny. You're very kind. Sorry to hear you've been ill. Hope it didn't take you down too low.
Do you think that the short story format rather than the novel is better suited to characters who are average people?
I understand what you're saying, Liminal. However, there must always be an element of 'something different' about the character, or the way they handle a situation, otherwise why bother writing about them....
The person can always be an 'Average Joe', in fact they should rarely be 'superheroes', but they should have something about them, or some reaction from them, that makes them interesting.
Let's face it, most of us lead pretty boring lives, if we wrote about that, we'd bore our readers.
ajbarnett says:
11 months ago
Thanks for the comment, Bob. It's amazing how many people don't realize. Plots are very important of course, and I'll be hubbing on that soon - but first prioity should be characters.