Character Development - How much is too much?
I've read loads of books where the reaction and development of characters seems to extreme for the events that effect them in the story.
However not having any development makes the character boring, or at least harder to relate to.
So i was wondering how much development do you think makes the character look fake or over acted?
Thanks, Randomman159
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This is my opinion and how I write: Your character has (at least) a physical appearance, skills, morals, sexual persona, and beliefs (about how the world works, what people in general want and how they go about getting it, etc).
Describe none of that! Not without reason. I don't care if Sheila is 5 foot 1 blond cheerleader, unless that impacts the story in some way. I don't care if she is a champion dart thrower, if it makes no difference to the story. I don't care if she lost her virginity at 14, unless it somehow matters. I don't care if she is a Liberal Socialist, or thinks the world is governed by psychopaths with criminal levels of greed.
Nothing matters to me about Sheila unless it has some plausible influence on her behavior in the story. If she's short, I probably don't say so, she asks Tim to get something off the shelf for her. I'm not going to mention she was a closeted gay cheerleader in high school unless a sexual relationship from back then is shaping part of the story now (as it could, say if Sheila is a politician).
I think your character development is too much when you include elements of character that are pointless and have no real influence on how the character behaves. I don't think it is developing a fuller picture for the reader, or turning the character into a real person, I think it is wasting their time.
What matters is how they act, how they speak, and what causes them to make mistakes or prevail over hardship. And many of those things should not be told anyway; if Alice is brave, show us some ramifications of being brave, put her into a situation where she choose bravery, and you never have to write the world "Brave". Let readers conclude in their own mind, "Wow, Alice is brave."
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Looking fake isn't a factor of too much character development, it's a factor of bad character development. Use as much as you need to show every facet of the character that you deem important. The way you make sure they don't seem fake is to just keep it consistent.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/366. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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