August 14, 2024
Creating a strong character is essential for any writer. Readers want a main character who’s compelling and memorable. They want someone they can root for, and they want the protagonist to be surrounded by a cast of equally engaging friends, love interests, sidekicks, and villains. How can you make your readers care? Follow these tips on strong character development, and you’ll be on your way to creating unforgettable characters in your next novel.
Character development includes the way a character changes as part of the plot. This is sometimes called a story arc or character arc. If you want readers to care about what happens to your protagonist, you must have a strong character arc for them to follow.
That means charting a path that shows growth, maturity, and the development of personal characteristics that make your main character a hero. In a satisfying arc, the hero learns things that help them develop more deeply as a person. They learn new skills or new ways of seeing the world. They bring out inner qualities, like bravery or compassion, they weren’t even sure they had. This is known as a rising arc or heroic arc, and it’s the most common one in fiction.
Some characters follow a negative arc. By the end of the story, the character—who may have started out likeable—become corrupt, weak, or evil. This is known as a “heel turn” in the world of professional wrestling. A negative or “falling” arc is compelling, and it can be the basis for creating a villain who’s believable.
Some strong characters don’t go through dramatic changes. You can still make them interesting by making them well-developed characters with strong personalities. These include detective series, the Harry Potter stories, the Earthsea novels, and Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse books. These strong characters are loved by readers who can’t wait to read the next story.
A well-developed strong character is one that has gone through a series of events that transforms them. Through a series of tests, they become wiser, stronger, and more aware of the world around them. This arc drives the stories behind famous classics and top best-sellers today.
In Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff goes through a falling arc as a young boy with a loving heart who ends up bitter and violent after years of loneliness and being treated like an outsider. He is so bent on revenge that he has no feelings left for anyone except his lost love. By contrast, his daughter Cathy starts off as an angry, snotty girl—partly because she, too, has been mistreated and lonely most of her life—who is cruel to the rough, uneducated Hareton. By the story’s end, she has learned patience and compassion, and she forms a friendship with Hareton that blossoms into love.
In Ruth Rendell’s The Girl Next Door, Alan leaves his wife for his former high school sweetheart, Daphne. At first, we sympathize with Alan, who is trapped in a passionless marriage to placid, boring Rosemary. We sympathize even more when Rosemary, in a fit of temporary insanity, tries to stab Daphne. As the novel progresses, however, Rosemary forces herself to cope with the loss of her marriage, and she becomes increasingly independent. She fills her days with new activities and acquaintances. When Daphne kicks Alan out, he goes back to Rosemary, but he doesn’t get quite the welcome he expects. It’s a satisfying strong character arc that makes us root for Rosemary.
In The Lord of the Rings, Saruman the wizard starts as a wise guide and mentor. He becomes corrupted by power and the promises of Sauron, and he eventually turns on his closest friends and allies. It is a frightening falling arc that transforms him into a terrifying menace. At the same time, his chief rival Gandalf goes through several horrible experiences, but they make him stronger and braver. In the end, he transforms from Gandalf the Gray to Gandalf the White, which is a sign of his growing power.
Readers want a clear picture of what your strong character looks like. You don’t need to paint a detailed picture, but you do need to give them basic information, including height, build, hair color, age, and ethnicity. These make your strong character seem real, which is an important part of strong character development.
Physical details reveal quite a bit about a strong character without your having to spell it out. For instance, does your character have tattoos? What are they of? Do they have scars, or missing teeth, or any physical disabilities? Describe your character’s voice and mention their age. Make sure you include these details that help create a full picture of their appearance.
Everyone has habits and mannerisms that set them apart. In a group of characters, your reader may have trouble sorting everyone out at the beginning. To make this easier, add some of these personality quirks, and use them each time your character appears to make them easy to remember.
These quirks could involve habits, physical attributes, or personality traits. Maybe your character is always asking other people for candy, uses a wheelchair, or pulls over to rescue animals. Maybe your character is freakishly organized, always takes notes, or always gets angry when someone asks about their childhood. To make these traits work, be consistent. If you can, use the character quirk as a strength later in the story.
Quirks are part of character development. Use them well, and you’ll create compelling, memorable personalities for everyone in your novel.
To fully develop your character, you must know everything about them. You know what happened in their history to make them the person they are today. Just like an actor who prepares for a role by knowing the character’s history, you will know how they react to every situation. You may never include this information in the novel, but you need to know:
Many writers resist writing outlines because they don’t want to be committed to a single plotline. You may be a writer who doesn’t have the exact ending worked out until you start writing and see where the novel goes. Yes, it’s important to be flexible.
An outline serves many important purposes, however, and it’s critical for character development. If you know the direction you want to take your characters, you will avoid writer’s block and have a clear plan of action. An outline gives you a clear line for your character to follow. Every plot point should build toward that final goal.
Your development arc should be evenly paced and believable. It’s not convincing for a person to go through a sudden transformation out of nowhere. It’s also not believable for them to suddenly develop new skills and talents out of nowhere. Use your outline to note places in the plot where you will show those personality traits or skills through the novel.
Be sure to give your character something that wins the reader’s heart right away. Screenwriter Blake Snyder coined a storytelling structure called “Save the Cat,” which means the hero does something early in the story that makes them likeable to the reader.
In his example, this means saving a cat from a tree, but it could be anything that shows your character in a good light. It doesn’t have to have a hugely dramatic plot point, but it should show a heroic side to the person. Have your character help an elderly neighbor with her groceries, go to a volunteer job at a hospital, or take care of their plants.
When your character steps up to become a hero, you’ll make it believable by first laying the groundwork. Show how your character had these strengths and heroic qualities all along. They just needed the right opportunity to use them.
Characters are the heart of every story. When you’re ready to print your story, contact Publishing Xpress. With decades of experience and a personal approach to customer service, we’ll be your publishing hero. Contact us today, or request a free estimate.
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