We inch ever-closer to creating an honest-to-goodness for-really-real outline.

But we’re not quite there yet.

Let’s get to know not only your protagonist and antagonist, but also your supporting cast.

The Exercise

Grab your favorite brainstorming equipment (pen and paper for me) and let’s get started.

Begin with your protagonist. If you’ve been following along with the exercises, it’s been a while since we’ve spent time with them, so take some time to remember what you know.

1. NAME Write down their name. If they don’t have a name yet, pick something for now. You may decide you hate it later, but it’s easier to do a find+replace on “Shayla” than it is for “[Insert Protagonist Name Here]” and “Shayla” is easier to type, besideswhich. I took this opportunity to create random names for all of my characters. Those names may change, but I was surprised how much happier I was after having assigned them. Do a google search and a baby name search for your names to make sure you aren’t going to accidentally pick up any word associations you don’t want.
2. STATUS Write down a word or phrase about their status. Rich, poor, loving family, abused, educated, agrarian, city – make it short and make it count.
3. PAST Write down a phrase or blurb on any story-vital events in their pre-book past. Any tragedies, victories, births, deaths, etc? Did anything happen that irrevocably changed them in ways that matter to the story? If they developed a love of horses because an aunt gave them a toy for their fifth birthday, that only matters (for the purposes of this exercise) if that love of horses affects your story in a big way.
4. PERSONALITY Write down words or phrases to help you pin down their personality. Are they kind, good, jealous, shallow, wise, rude, angry, emotional, cool, competent, scatter-brained, happy, miserable, shy? Keep this to a minimum.
5. STRENGTH Does your character have a special ability or gift? Whether magical or learned, this should be key to the story and what they are capable of. If you have a character who is a master spy, one imagines that skill will be used somewhere in the book. If not…why are they a master spy?
6. WEAKNESS Write down your character’s weak points. What are they bad at? What are they afraid of? I don’t mean just “kryptonite spiders” – I mean things like public speaking or expressing their feelings or admitting when they’re wrong. What is the worst possible thing that could happen to your character – the thing that would make their blood run cold and their breath shorten just to think of?
7. GOAL Write down the character’s motivation or goal through the book. Why does your character care about what is happening? What are they seeking? Why are they involved? Keep it short and sweet.
8. EMPTY LINES Leave space for more notes as you move forward.

Now, repeat all of the above for your antagonist. After that, repeat for any other MAJOR character in your story. Do you have a romantic subplot? Then you probably need to add your protagonist’s sweetheart in there. Does your antagonist have a primary henchman? Does your protagonist have a sister, brother, friend, or family member that spends a lot of time interacting with the rest of your characters?

Stained

For Stained, I ended up with four primary character sketches. In my notes, these “sketches” are an underline name and a hand-written bulleted list (with many scribblings and “read more” arrows).

• Shayla (protagonist)
• Arroya (antagonist – she’s been assigned a female gender for the purposes of the plot and the conflict her gender will add)
• Hazan (romantic interest)
• Kronen (king of the lowland country)

I will absolutely have more of these before November. Right now, with as bare-bones a plot as I have, these four are the only ones I know that I NEED.

Hazan

I knew I needed a romantic lead for Shayla, but I didn’t know anything about him. Since he stubbornly refused to show me who he is, I used this exercise to build him to suit my needs (or, more appropriately, the needs of my story).

I had a few options for what his status could be. One of those options was to be a prince of the lowlander country. One one hand, that’s a bit cliche. On the other hand, that gives him a reason for contacting the mountain country, constant contact with the king and the antagonist, motivation to resolve the problem, paints a great big target on his chest for the antagonist to aim at, and gives a very good reason why he and Shayla cannot be together. In short, making him a prince gives me conflict opportunities that I would not have if he were a minstrel, soldier, or stable master (or any number of other options).

Written in Silly Putty, not Stone

Even so, I am prepared to completely change that if it becomes more useful for him to NOT be a prince later. Same as with his name. It is a common-enough surname in real life. In my mind, it’s a strong name with an exotic flavor to it. If a better name finds me, then I’ll change it.

The temptation to carve all of this storybuilding in stone is something I’m constantly on guard against. Making a tentative decision now is NOT a blood oath, nor is it something that will take a great deal of work to change in the future.

Back to Hazan

Regardless, I did not want Hazan to be next in line for the throne. I’d rather him be…the third child, or something along those lines. Unless he was very, very wicked, he’d have no real chance at the crown.

Brothers and sisters are useful for more things than just kingship. They can also lead armies or become diplomats.

So what does our good friend Hazan DO? How is he helping his family and his country (which I already know I want him to be loyal to)?

He could be an accountant. A numbers man, someone who makes sure the books are clean and the treasury balanced. He could be a warrior, a leader of armies and a skilled tactician. He could be a minstrel, a painter, a lecherous oaf.

I rolled around the options in my head, tasting them as I would a new hard candy. Each option was weighed, tested, and returned to the drawing board.

My favorite option was fighter. This put him in direct conflict with the villain, who wants to use the lowlander’s army for her own purposes. Now, in addition to him being a prince, she’s got even more reason to clash with him on a regular basis.

He takes his job very seriously. He follows the old school of warfare, inspiring his men from the battlefield at their side rather than barking orders from a distant beribboned tent.

He is in a position to see the changes happening to both his country and his father. He’s intelligent and can tell that something is going wrong (tactician) but he’s also hot-headed and passionate (warrior). He’s not willing to wait around for answers. If nobody else is going to act, he’ll go out and find the answers himself!

Shayla

What does this mean for Shayla’s character? Why would such an intense and passionate man be interested in such a shy, insecure girl?

The Stained are a military society. Shayla has been raised in the company of warriors, as a warrior, from the time her eye color shifted. Among the Stained, women and men are equals. Both learn to fight and to control their abilities.

In the lowlander country, women are not fighters. Shayla’s fighting skill intrigues Hazan, who has never pitted his blade against a woman before, let alone been beaten by one.

If Shayla’s so good with the blade, how could she possibly be insecure? The answer is simple: most of the Stained are able to implement their ability to augment or hone their fighting skills. Shayla’s ability does not impact her fighting. By her own experience, she is one of the weakest of the Stained fighters. The fact that she is quite good for a non-Stained fighter never even occurred to her.

Part of the story is Shayla learning to trust herself and develop her own sense of self-worth. Through sparring matches and fighting, Hazan might be able to help her do that.

Ripples

Especially for these primary characters, decisions about one person SHOULD affect decisions for another. These characters interact with each other often enough that making a decision or change to one character should prompt you to evaluate how that change affects the other characters.

Goal

The goal of this exercise is two-fold.

• At-a-glance character summary
• Develop weak primary characters

You can know every detail of your character’s past. You can know their favorite color, their favorite foods, their mother’s maiden name, and the various animals and plants that make them sneeze. Any or all of this information may actually be used in the telling of your story. It may add color or flavor, or humanize your characters.

But the reason that character MATTERS in this book needs to be something you don’t hunt through pages of information to find.

You need to know what your character wants and what they bring to the table in order to construct a plot that utilizes their strengths AND exploits their weakness.

Experience has taught me that having a blurry, weak mental image of a primary character doesn’t result in spontaneous creativity as I write – it results in weak, wishy-washy primary characters.