I Treat My Characters Like They're Real People

It sounds crazy, doesn't it? Fortunately, though, I haven't been locked up in a padded, white cell--this is a running joke between me and my friend. Well, probably not a joke. More like something that could actually happen to us. But do you know what the best part is? We're writers. Do you know what that means? We have an excuse as to why we go around talking back to voices inside our head. Which, by the way, hardly ever shut up.

Anyways, the point of this post is to tell you that--if you're a writer--you need to treat your characters like they're real people. Real people have background, a tortured and beautiful past, fears, complicated relationships, best friends, emotions, and, most importantly, dreams and goals. If real people have all of this going on, then why shouldn't your characters? In fact, treating them like real people will induce the feeling of them being more realistic to your readers. Which is what all writers want, right?

Another fun way to spice up your characters is to figure out some of their quirks they might have. For example, one of my characters revealed to me that she had a strange obsession with pina coladas and cheese puffs. Not necessarily together. Oh, I hope I didn't just give her an idea...

No, Cam, you cannot make a pina colada/ cheese puff smoothie!

Sorry, where was I? Ah, yes. Character quirks. By giving them little abnormal favorites or habits, you develop them. While you want their quirks to be interesting (and hopefully relevant to the story), you also want to try not to make them too extreme

To pull characters out of stereotypes, try adding contrasting details to them. For example, maybe your serial killer absolutely adores the color pink. So much, in fact, that he painted his entire house that color. Pink is usually considered a color associated with love, so by adding that contrasting detail, you raise him out of his stereotype. Besides, doesn't a pink-loving serial killer just sound like that much more interesting of a character?

I actually have a video on characters, if you'd like to check it out:

Alright, my characters are yelling at me to write their story. I better do that and stop Cam from creating World War 3. Have fun discovering your characters and happy writing!