Posts tagged characters
I am writing a story that involves time travel, and I have a chapter where a character from the future interacts with his present-day self. This chapter is written from the present-day self's POV. ...
The crawling chaos, Nyalathothep, has formed a cult on the mortal plane devoted to his cause which worships him as a god. This cult has been operating in secret for thousands of years, sowing destr...
People mostly say that the characters of a story have to be developed first, but I don't really understand why characters play such an active role. Can't the characters simply be classified as obje...
I have a character who is a Syrian refugee to Canada. His first language is Arabic, but he's lived in Canada long enough that he's learned English and uses this as his primary spoken language. On o...
I decided to give a try to the snowflake method. The idea is that you gradually expand the story from a blurb into a full draft. This question stems from the character-characterization step, but it...
There is a character in every story. Special One. It becomes the center of the story. i.e. the Main character. The author takes special care of them. Provides them wise thinking. Good luck. A cha...
I have a character that likes to make humor, puns and jokes. Humor should work here as a character trait; something really peculiar to this particular char. He says a lot of puns because he find ...
Following the previous question: Characterizing a sentient robot: sensory data I'm writing a robot character with a particular PoV. In the previous question I wanted to talk about sensory data;...
(For reference, I am not white. I've asked another question about race here). So I'm pretty far into writing my dystopian novel and I was reading over what I had. Something that helps me when I ...
Joe is the worst. Nobody likes him, not even the so-called friends he teams up with at school, filling other students with terror. He's sarcastic, nasty, and a bit of a racist, and especially ant...
OK; I'm obsessed with Toonami and their event Trapped in Hyperspace features the computer virus antagonist Swayzak, who I base almost all my computer virus characters on. Swayzak behaves like a on...
My main character gets shot and survives. One thing that bothers me is a character who is injured and keeps going like the energizer bunny. I try to set up for a rapid recovery, mentioning traini...
I've been writing a story, and recently someone came to me and said the characters are very similar to a couple of the ones in Leigh Bardugo's Six of Crows, I myself read the series which inspired ...
On the modern day many people complain about how models, actors are damaging to society because people can't identify with them. Males actors or models which are ''too'' muscular are considered ''u...
So, in my novel, I have a mother-type character that's a little young to be a mom (am planning on having her have a child she's planning on saving). So, I wanted to know your opinions on how far I ...
As the title says, I'm looking for advice on how to handle changes of scene from one character to another, each in different places, but experiencing the same event. This story is about a bushfire...
I'm just getting into writing and while reading about it I've found a lot of topics which claim that reactive protagonists are generally frowned upon. Reactive: Acting in response to a situatio...
So I'm writing a story where the main character is sent to kill the main villain. I have the basic world set out before me, and now I focus on story. I was planning out the main storyline and I hit...
Edit: I looked at What are some ways to get to know your characters? and while I noticed similarities, I think that question asks in broader terms about what tools can be used for developing charac...
In my story, I have found myself in somewhat of a pickle: Although the hero is more than powerful enough to defeat a villain (which is your typical 'Dark Lord’) I don't think my protagonist is read...
My trilogy features an otherworldly monstrosity called Fenrisúlfr as it's primary antagonist, whose characterisation takes cues from Nyarlathotep, Sauron, Showa!King Ghidorah, Sutekh, Makuta Terida...
On the topic of keeping a reader engaged: Dialog is a great way to balance out a scene of description and action. Dialog allows conflict, information, reveal of character, and so on and so on. My...
I have a little contradiction in my story that may well be fatal. In my high sci-fi setting, one of my main characters is an android. Let's call him Bob. Bob is efficient, cold and straight-to-th...
I'm writing fantasy stories in different worlds which do not share any history with our own. I was thinking I wanted to move away from the classic 'all white cast' scenario in most games, by picki...
I'm writing a story where the main character makes and detonates bombs. The character could be considered a terrorist. I want to portray the character as an expert, but I don't know a way to obtain...
One of my secondary characters is going to play an important part, more important than at present, in the story. Is it OK to introduce him, make the reader love him, and then leave him behind til ...
I want to write a story featuring two main characters--Al and Bob. In the beginning, Al, the paragon, will be a kind, friendly, competent and well-liked, whereas Bob, the protagonist, is unliked,...
My question is, is this even realistic? She's a woman in her early twenties who specializes in torture, only working on her victims when they're tightly strapped down and confined so she can go a...
In a school setting, what is a way to allude that a school is full of students, without making new characters or overusing pre-existing ones? A school is the main setting of a book. The main and s...
The tall figure was overwhelmingly tall. It stood in the corner of the room. The skinny figure right beside him sat on a chair. It wasn't moving at all. The tall figure moved to the opposite...
So I wrote a short text recently in which the character has a very strong political opinion (anti-LGBTQ), which in addition is totally different to my own opinion. Now, I wanted to make the charact...
I have a tendency to forget to describe character's appearance. But I always describe them, though often a little while after their introduction. So, how long after someone's introduction is "accep...
I was wondering if there is a rule or advice in which order to name my characters. For example, if I want to tell that Bob, John and Rob entered the room should I just name them in random order o...
I've never seen or read Game of Thrones but I hear that the author is in the habit of killing characters off quite frequently. I have no idea what these particular characters in the series are like...
This is not quite the same question as Writing Diversity because it's not my intention to focus too much on diversity for my story, nor am I struggling with new ways to represent more cultures/mino...
I am currently writing a character that represents Lust and is a demonic entity... but to tone it down for a YA audience. I thought of trying to make them "Love-based" instead, but I always envis...
I'm writing a storyline for a game where the forces of evil have humanity cornered. Truly everything seems lost, that is, until our main character decides to step in. Let's call him Bob. The Chosen...
I am currently writing a novel where the main character will be far more powerful than most of the people in the world and I am worried that I will end up losing sight of what I am writing and star...
A lot of people die in my story, some of them are parents. One of the main characters for example lost his father (and one brother) in a car crash when he was young, which he was a part of. He beca...
I'm trying to find an appropriate name for my main character. I want his name to reflect his personality and symbolize certain aspects of his past. For example, for a character who has supernatura...
I want to tell a character's backstory, but I don't want that character to tell it directly to the protagonist, or to use another character to do it for them. Is there a way to do this?
Should I repeat character descriptions if a minor character reappears the second time too far into the story? For example, I have a minor character who is introduced and has a bit of involvement a...
I introduced a young person (called Raven) who the main character was friends with in my story; Raven is an excellent student who the main character is also teaching music to. The story is the resu...
This is something I've pondered before. I asked about one gesture on yahoo answers long ago. All I got was a guy saying that even he didn't know the term for it (it was the gesture where someone ho...
I'm adding a qualifying question to the end of this question. So I have (let's say) two types of feedback in my beta critiques and real-life writing clubs. One is that I have floating heads syndr...
I have characters who have to use false names. Should the narrator use their real name or false name? For example, if person A was being called Adam when their real name was Archie, person B would ...
As mentioned elsewhere, it has been a stumbling block for my readers to understand what drives my characters. I had thought I had communicated character desires through showing, and action, but it ...
I’m writing a paper and I have these sentences that are a bit problematic. I feel they generalize a bit and could be rewritten in less words. I’m kindly seeking suggestions on how to improve the be...
Let's look at two characters who are generally considered to be iredeemable: The Diamond Authority (from Steven Universe): The extremely childish leaders of the race of spacefaring lesbian magical...
The Spy is a Netflix series about Israeli spy and hero Eli Cohen. In a recent interview, Eli's widow Nadia expresses great dissatisfaction with the series: a lot of changes were made, ostensibly to...
