How to write a story that doesn't suck

Character Introduction

My personal favorite thing about all of my stories are my characters. But introducing them is hard, even when its the beginning of the story and I'm introducing the reader to, well, everything. Introducing characters can be done in many ways. Through drama, humor, terror, crisis, accident, or coincident, two or more characters can meet. But you want to keep it interesting, especially if the character you're introducing is an important one to your story. 

You can't always rely on your main character to already have a formed relationship with the other characters in your story. Unless it's an old friend, family, neighbor, a teacher, etc, having a character already know another character that's important isn't very.... Enticing. In fact, it's flat out boring. Especially if you are writing a romance. I know childhood friends is a popular trope but if the two have known each other their whole lives, when you introduce one it just feels like... "Oh look, thats the guy I grew up with and is utterly not important."

So here's some spicy ways to introduce a new character! (These are just ideas, you can do something else if you want.)

1. Have one character save another.

This could be through saving one from a car accident, from making a mistake, from harassment, from a dangerous animal, or really just from death. A stranger helping a stranger is exciting! 

2. Have characters meet each other at an event. 

This is also very simple and could be boring but that depends on your story. If it's a slice of life, romance, or general fiction/non fiction, this is perfect. Ex: wedding, funeral, sport, family gathering, holiday, school event, etc. This already establishes a common interest between the two, even its by the chance they know the same person or are both interested in whatever they're at a convention for, such as anime or art. 

3. Have one character do something nice for another out of kindness.

This goes along with the first point but less extreme. Character A helps pick up a mess that character B made on accident. Or maybe Character B offers to pay for character A's groceries when they find they can't afford it. It establishes what kind of person they are, so please don't do this if you're introducing a douche bag character. It'll make all their actions following it see out of character. 

4. Have the characters placed in a group together, or forced to work together. 

This works well, especially if you want to start an enemies to lovers trope by having them not get along. Or maybe they work together great and you start a great friendship between them. This can also go for sharing a college dorm, being placed on the same team together, having to share a cabin at camp, etc. 

5. Have character A get sent to character B on a side quest. 

Ex: "Go to the mountains to seek answers from the witch of the sky." Great! Now this witch character just got introduced and you haven't even met them yet.

6. Have them forced together by accident.

Ex: They bump into each other on accident, they get stuck in an elevator together, some tragic accident forced them to meet, etc.

7. The reason they meet is what plays a big role in the plot.

Perhaps this is through a prophecy one was following (which is the case with my book, Land of Armonia), maybe they're thrown into a dystopian environment together like the Hunger Games or Squid Games, perhaps they're trapped in a haunted mansion, even. 

There's really a lot of ideas you could do but the worst way to introduce a character is to have them introduce themselves. That makes no sense, right? No, I mean it. They can't just see each other and go "Hello! I'm Zoey!" because that feels utterly wrong and inhuman. Now, they can introduce themselves in some contexts but thats after they initially meet. What I'm saying is, they can't introduce themselves AS their introduction, you know?

So seriously, make it spicy.

"Oh god I'm so sorry I shot you in the shoulder! I thought you were someone else!"

"CALL AN AMBULANCE ALREADY!"

If you have any questions, ask them in the comments!