Every story you care about is built on strong characters. Long before drafting, before plotting, before even world building, your characters must be carefully developed. They must be capable of doing courageous acts, of providing humor and insight (even if they aren't particularly funny or wise themselves), and, in their most basic thoughts, impulses and actions, be interesting. Because if they can't make us wonder, catch our intrigue, we won't want to see more.
One of the best book of exercises I've ever used for my characters was John Vorhaus's The Comic Toolbox. Though this is a book on writing humor, I argue that every character, even your antagonist, must have a side that allows for comedy. Even if you never write it. Because people are that way--we're complex. The most dour existence when seen though the right filter, is hilarious--one prime example, A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. Only by adding traits that allow for humor can we get close to making characters that seem like real people.
So, you want to start your basic character sketch. You give your protagonist a strength. Let's say he's super strong, for simplicity's sake. Then you give him a weakness that is the extreme of his strength: he's so strong, he breaks things he doesn't intend to. Therein, you have a recipe for comedy. As he follows his hero's journey, he must learn to overcome his weakness--breaking things he doesn't intend to--by using his strength. Which, in this case, is strength. Clear as mud, right?
As Wilkie Collins once said, "Make 'em laugh, make 'em cry, make 'em wait." Good stories do all of those things, and if you don't build your characters from the first page with the potential for comedy, your stories won't have the pull that you need to keep your readers interested.
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Writing Well
Non-FictionTips on the craft of writing, becoming an author, getting readers, and getting published.
