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How To Write a Novel Step by Step: Develop FictionalCharacters

Part 1 in a Series of 5

By John T Jones, Ph.D.

I heard that Ellery Queen sat on his porch in Florida and wrote out his novel by hand in anotebook. Off it went to the publisher. I heard that Earl Stanley Gardner simply dictated hisnovel, and that was that. And then there was Hemingway who was after one perfect pageeach day and he didn't care how many times he had to rewrite that page.

You can sit down and grind out a novel without doing any preliminary analysis about yourstory, the characters, the time frame in which the action takes place, the location or placewhere the action appears, and the articles or things that are important in the story (such as asword, a ship, a horse, etc).

You can simply decide on how many chapters, typically 20 chapters for a genre novel(detective, western, romance, etc.) you desire and write a synopsis of each chapter before you

start.

Or, you can just start writing.

In this series of articles I do not want to cut-short your native creativity but I believe that if you decide where, when, who, what, which, etc., and such before you start, your novel writingwill move more smoothly. If you don't, you may end up with much rewriting and editing.

When you first get the bug to write a novel, you will probably think of characters, time andplace. That is good. Until these elements are defined, the events can not take place. But let'sstay out of trouble by doing one thing at a time. We'll focus on character first.

1. Give your character a name. Don't use names of famous people. Think of a

name that suits your character. Don't call a cowboy Francis or a model Mildred.

2. State the role of the character. 

• The character is called the protagonist. He or she is the hero.

• The villain or antihero is called the antagonist.

• The protagonist's friends help the hero accomplish his or her goals.

• The antagonist's henchman does the same for the villain.

• Other characters fill in the blanks in the scene, like the kid that shines

the boot for both hero and villain.

3. Describe the physical appearance of your character. Can you sketch your

character? If not can you root around for a picture of such a character that you canhang on the wall? That is one way to start. What hair, eye, skin color does yourcharacter have? How old is he? How tall is she? Is he overweight? Any tattoos or other

distinguishing marks? Freckles? Pock marks? Mustache? Glasses? Keep going! Howdoes he walk? How does she walk? Clumsy? Ugly? Pretty? Agile? Handicapped?Nimble?

4. Describe your character's likes/dislikes and general character. A boy might

be too young to like girls, but likes frogs and dogs, and likes to chases cows. A girlmight be too young to like boys, likes flowers and clouds, chases butterflies. Doesyour character have any taboos? Is he or she afraid of his or her shadow? Do you getthe idea?

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5. Describe the type of personality of your character. Is she always happy? Is

he outgoing or reclusive? Is she kind of dumb? Is he very aggressive? When you runinto this character, do you want to stay and talk or do you want to run?

6. Write a short or long description or history of your character. A short

description is adequate for a minor role player. The main characters deserve moreattention.

The stunning model is the anti-heroine—the antagonist. She is tall, slender, vivacious,and a gold digger. Her mother ran a house of ill repute and her father was a loanshark. She plasters herself with perfume and wears fake jewelry unless she can get the real stuff. She is a shop lifter even though she earns good money. She often walksoff with clothing that she should leave at the modeling job. Men love her, women hateher, even her grandmother hates her. She carries a gun in her purse. On the street,she is known as the Looker Hooker even though she shuns men in general.

That cowpoke (who’s picture is hanging on the wall) is the hero— the protagonist. Heis new in town. He smells "horsey" and he chews gum a pack at a time. Before hecame into the city, he chewed tobacco, but when he spit some tobacco juice and it landed on the shoe of a policeman, he decided to give it up, at least while he was intown. He hangs out at the pool hall and looks funny standing over the other men. In

his hands, the pool stick looks like an arrow. He always wins and he bets every penny he has. He likes to play poker and he wins at that too. Only once did a city slicker takea swing at him. He’s still in the county hospital. He has decided that city life is muchmore profitable than poking cows. He still wears his cowboy boots but he ismetamorphosing into a city dweller. In fact, some folks, at first site, think he is just aweirdo playing like he is a cowboy until he opens his mouth and says, "Howdy, Mister!Nice day, ain’t it?" Then he is known as the real thing. He works part time for a bail bond outfit. That’s how he met that stunning model. She jumped bail and he caught her. He decided not to turn her in. They are living together and guess who iscorrupting whom? She says, "Just because we are messing around, Chad, doesn’t mean that I love you or even like you." He replies, "Bulls don’t favor one heifer over another, Madge. You are just another cow to me." 

Can you tell from the last two descriptions when these two characters lived? It could

be now or one hundred years ago, right?

The above is preliminary to writing your novel. You should make sketches in writing(better than those above) before you write the novel. The more of this preliminarywork you do, the easier it will be to write your novel.

1. Reveal your characters through action and dialogue. Never use descriptions

like those above in your novel. Your readers will mosey off to the television set.Instead, feed them this information slowly, often through dialogue:

Madge pushed a strand of blond hair out of her eye and said, "Chad, pass the milk." 

"You can reach it. I’m not your slave." He went back to polishing his boots. 

2. Watch for stereotypical characters. Here is a definition you should remember.

Stereotype: a person or thing that conforms to a fixed idea or type or to attributeover-generalized and preconceived characteristics to someone or something.

Don’t use movie heroes or heroines as models for you characters. Use real peopledeveloped in your mind. A screen writer may get away with certain things that you willnot be able to get away as a fiction writer. Have you ever met a real cowboy that talkslike John Wayne or Clint Eastwood did in their movie roles? What? You have!

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I haven’t and I only know about a zillion cowboys.

What’s next? 

Well, I’ll be a moseying on out of hear. I’ll meet you at the arranged time and place in PartII.

How To Write a Novel Step by Step: Develop Time andPlace

Part 2 in a Series of 5

By John T Jones, Ph.D.

In Part 1 of this series on how to write a novel step by step, we discussed character

development. In this article we talk of time and place.

1. Place. There are only so many story lines as they say. The same story can be told

over and over again in different settings. I often say, "Against different backdrops."

For example: Our story is about a man who turned jewelry thief to support his family.He gets caught, goes to jail, and later helps the police find other jewelry thieves whilestill burglarizing homes for jewelry. In the end he accidentally helps the police capturehimself.

Now, where can this story take place?

 Jake Brimley dismounted Pinky and patted her on the nose. "Now you keep quiet,Pinky. Don’t be a-whinnying after Buck Henson’s stallion like you do. I got work todo." 

Now where and when did that last action take place? Did you guess Cheyenne in1890? How about last week in Young, Arizona? It could have taken place in London or

New York in 1740.

 Jake lowered the brim of his hat. "Darn, that northerner is cold. If we don’t get toCheyenne soon, Pinky, both of us will freeze to death." 

So you know where this last action took place. But when?

2. Time.

 Jake rode Pinky along the railroad tracks. He pulled the brim of his hat down to cut the sun’s glare. The tracks converged in the distance and the poles for the telegraphline shortened to a dot. Cheyenne is still a long way off  , Jake thought. I’ll be gladwhen those trains start rolling.

Now when did this action take place?

With a little research, we can learn that the telegraph line was put up at the sametime the tracks were laid in Wyoming. We also can determine when the first trains forpublic use (not construction) were running through Wyoming.

For example, Stephen E. Ambrose wrote a book entitled, Nothing Like It in the World. The subtitle is, The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad 1863-1869.

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That is what I call easy research. You just read the cover of the book.

3. Time and Place. As your character, Jake, rides his horse, Pinky, he might say

something about the railroad line he is following. He may have worked on the line asthe construction crews passed through Wyoming.

What Jake says and thinks tells us when and where the action is taking place.

Jake will seldom tell us exactly when and where the action took place, but he might. "I remember that day, the day they hung Old Tom in front of Myrtle’s Place on MainStreet in Cody. They never should have done it. He never hurt nobody and never rustled one critter like they said he did. It was just because he was Blackfoot and them town folks hate Indians. Yes, I remember that day. It was the last day of October in 1886—exactly three years ago today." 

Note that Jake was referring to a past action but Jake told us that it was three yearsago to the day. So the action is taking place when? Let’s see, 1886 plus 3 is…

The place and time will tell you how folks talk, walk, earn their living, what they eat,how they entertain themselves, how they dress, and many other things. If the reader

knows the time and place, many things can be left unsaid.

1. A story may have more than one location or time, for that matter. One

moment Dorothy is in Kansas, and suddenly she is in Oz.

In my science fiction articles, Xrytspet , my alien friend or nemesis often carts me off to some far off world to see what trouble she can get me into.

Columbus started off in Spain and landed in the new world.

Maybe your readers will be carted off to a "lost world" where they can be gobbled up

by a tyrannosaurus named Rex.

As you prepare to write your novel, name the place, describe the place. Be able to tellyour reader what he or she is seeing, smelling, hearing, feeling: "Ouch! Who left thisneedle on the chair? Are you watching that pot? It's about to boil over and we got kidson the floor." 

Boston was a hellishly cold place in January. People walked the streets so bundled up

they could hardly recognize each other. They moved fast, nodding to acquaintances asthey passed, not stopping because their noses where already frozen and they needed a warm place and a bowl of hot soup. The church bells sounded across the Commons,louder because of the chilling temperature. Jake pulled his collar up and thought how cold it must be on the St. Charles. He sniffed and mumbled, "What ever is coming out of Harry’s place I’ll be eating in another minute. Smells like Indian Pudding." 

As you describe your place, tell your reader about transportation, landmarks, whatthey can see in the distance, commerce, churches, schools, whatever makes the

location live.

Now don’t write long narrations about the place. You can get away with a paragraphlike the one about Boston above, but generally you should not be in too big a hurry todescribe a place, just let it seep in as you write.

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Going further, who lives here? Are they German, French, Lilliputians, Zombies, etc?How did they get here and when? What do they do? What goes on in your place atnight? What activities are important? Do they have a parade? When? Why?

Pick up all the odds and ends you need to make your story real even if it is not.

2. Can pictures help you in your writing? 

A picture of a western town in 1905 will help you better describe the town in 1889before there were any pictures of the town. A photograph of Boston in winter mighthelp in the above example.

Are you an artist? Even if you are not, make some sketches of your place. If it is atown, label the streets, mark the court house and the church and the haberdashery,etc. When your characters move around the town, know exactly were they are andwhere they are going. If they are out in the desert, what are the landmarks and wheredo the trails lead?

Can’t you smell the sage brush, the cows, the perfume, the flowers, the smoke fromthe factory?

Hey, is the sun in your eyes? Is the wind blowing? Did you just pull your sweater off because of the heat? Did the chiggers bite you? Are they driving you crazy? Did youslosh your last bottle of booze on your feet to kill the little beggars?

What, you have a boil that is about to burst but you have to stay in that saddle?

Well, I think we are ready for the next step -- developing objects in your novel. "Well,that’s a nice brace of pistols you got there!" 

How To Create a HeroBy B. Danesco

Forget what Tina Turner says -- we all do need another hero. And whether you're writing anovel, short story, or script, you can create the kind of unforgettable hero audiences love tofollow. Here are some steps for creating heroes in your work.

1. Set the mission. If Batman didn't have to save Gotham, if Luke Skywalker didn't

have to save Princess Leia, if Jack Bauer didn't have to save the world -- then why onearth would we care about them? The answer is, "we probably wouldn't." To create agreat hero, find a mission that becomes his reason for being. Your audience needs tocheer him on as he tries to "do the right thing" even when it's hard.

2. Give him backstory. Any great character, hero or villain, will have certain things

in his past that make him who he is today. These things may not always come out in

your story. Or they may play a minor role in how everything turns out. They may evenbe central to your plot. In any case, don't create a hero who simply exists in the "hereand now." Spend time figuring out how your hero go to the "here and now," how hebecame a hero.

3. Give him weaknesses . Yes, life for Superman would be sweet without

kryptonite. Yes, if Luke Skywalker had more patience in the first Star Wars movie,he might have taken down Darth Vader right off. And yes, Jack Bauer's drugproblem a few seasons ago did make for some uncomfortable moments. Butreally, don't we all want a hero who isn't perfect, a hero who has someweaknesses? If the guy (or girl) can do everything, all the time, then what's the

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point of watching his story unfold? He can walk in the front door, kill the villainand save the day -- end of story. That's pretty boring, isn't it? Vulnerability addsconflict and, in a story, conflict is always a good thing. Plus, a character with hisown weaknesses can be more relatable to audiences and more likable, too.

4. Give him a villain worth fighting. Along with having to battle his own

shortcomings, a hero should have to battle an antagonist who is up to thechallenge. If Jack Bauer had to take on Girl Scouts every season, even if he stillfound a way to employ torture, it wouldn't be satisfying to watch. The better thevillain, the more the hero has to fight for his victory; and remember -- conflict isgood!

5. Give him a life beyond 'saving the day.' Yes, your hero should spend most of 

your story squarely fixed on making the world safe for democracy/ending the alieninvasion/rescuing the farm from the landlord or whatever it is he plans to do. Buttake time to give your character other traits that will make him fuller and shadehow he goes about his job. Jack Bauer has a daughter -- an annoying daughter,but still a daughter. This could affect how he looks at the task of torturing those

aforementioned Girl Scouts. Indiana Jones loves artifacts and history and, in fact,teaches about them; his background affects the zeal with which he tries to rescueancient pieces from thieves and Nazis. In "In the Line of Fire" ClintEastwood's Secret Service agent played lonesome jazz piano. And almost every

hero has a love interest who complicates things. Your hero shouldn't live in a"mission vacuum," in other words. Don't digress too far from your story (unlessyou're writing a novel, in which case, digress as much as you like...), but alsoremember to add those memorable quirks and traits and circumstances that makea character unforgettable.

Your hero will be at the heart of your story, driving it forward. He will also be the "rootinginterest" your reader or viewer hooks onto and follows. Providing your story with a good herois one of the most important steps in creating a story that succeeds in gripping your audience.