Getting To Know You, Getting To Know All About You

That song is rolling through my head this morning as I stare at the puzzle that is this character in DOTH.  It’s always strange to me which characters are easy to write and which ones aren’t.  In Red, Elodie came easily as breathing.  Sawyer was like pulling teeth.  For DOTH, it’s been hero Jake who’s been a Chatty Cathy and Bree who’s taken time to get to know.  But she’s been nothing compared to the enigma that is Lachlan.

I was not originally going to make him a POV character until the next book, but it’s become evident as I’ve moved forward with book 1 that I’m going to have to bring him in sooner.  This morning I’ve been making scene sketches for a couple of scenes to insert earlier in the story to seed both his POV and presence so that when he gets introduced to Bree, it’s not totally out of left field (as it is right now).

I’ve got character interviews that I sometimes do to get to know characters.  And I’ve picked a face for him (pretty no?).  But I don’t know him at all.  He’s not human, and I need to figure out how he reacts and interacts with our world.  I know how his relationship with Bree develops–which is all later.  It’s this early Lachlan, how he appears from the beginning, both from Bree and Jake’s perspectives, but also from my own, that really confuses me.  I need to sort out what I want to show, what I need to show.

What are your favorite ways to get to know difficult characters?

4 thoughts on “Getting To Know You, Getting To Know All About You

  1. I really enjoy character interviews, especially lately. Usually it’s just something I do in my head, but for the fiction series I started on my blog, I added interviews that I share to the series. It’s funny, but somehow sharing those interviews has made a difference for me.

    Sometimes the interviews directly relate to the story, but sometimes they end up giving me a little picture of the character’s life separate from the story, which can really help with understanding them.

    I tend to be a rather unstructured person when it comes to my writing, so this has sort of been my free-flowing version of a character worksheet. 🙂

  2. It’s funny you’re blogging about this today. I’m in the middle of a character interview with Libby Fox that I’m going to post, but it’s so OTHER people can get to know her. LOL

    The biggest problem I’ve had with a character is when I tried to write a book only from the female MC’s POV. The male MC kept needing to be heard and wouldn’t hush until I let him have his say. 🙂 I guess the way I get to know my characters is to sort of put myself in the story and really think about the characters. I don’t really know how to explain it, so it may not make sense to anyone else.

  3. Well, by the looks of Lachlan, it should be fun spending time with him to get to know him better. 😉 Thanks for including the series on character interviews. Perfect timing as I’m at the stage of creating a scene list and getting to know characters and their backstory, etc. I love having another tool for my writers toolkit.

  4. First of all, HAWT male lead there. Second, I don’t interview my characters, although, thanks for that tip!

    When I’m having issues with a character, I lay awake at night (or more realistically, sit up at night nursing New Baby) and think about their life. Recently introduced a new character to my series and I just basically imagined a whole life for him outside of the book. I really suck at writing all that stuff down though, so I forget a lot of interesting stuff. I seriously need to be more organized.

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