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March 2003 Meeting

Characterization

How to build memorable characters into your story

Kevin Radthorne, author of Road to Kotishi, spoke tonight about the importance of characterization in your stories. He says, "Characters are the story." By that he means characters are what the story is all about. However, you need to keep in mind the other two major elements of story telling.

Characterization is one of the three legs a story stands on: Plot and Setting are the other two.
The characters are who does what, the plot is what they do, and the setting is where they do it.

Other things to consider: Does the character have a specific need? Fatal flaw? What does he/she look like? Is the character sympathetic or antagonistic? Skeletons in the closet? Ghosts of the past who haunt?
Make the characters emotionally react to situations as you would. Take your time building characters.

Starting with two characters, Kevin builds conflict between them. Then he brings in other characters as he needs them and fleshes them out. He starts the story with a problem tracks the struggles of his characters to overcome the obstacles to the solution.

Self-publishing in Kevin's mind, is not a dirty word. He started by self-publishing and was picked up by a publisher later. One advantage is that there is a finished product to hand to a publisher. There are a lot of online publication sources online.