November is over, and I did achieve my goal of writing a chapter a day for all 30 days. However, the story is not finished, and a great deal of work still remains to be done. In between working on other projects, I will spend several months doing three things:
- Delving deeper into character arcs.
- Firming up the plot
- Identifying and cutting the chapters that don’t advance the main character’s story and turn them into short stories.
I always start with the characters.
As stories unfold on paper, new characters enter. They bring their dramas and the story goes in a different direction than was planned. When I meet these imaginary people, I assign their personalities a verb and a noun.
As an example of how I work, let’s look at four characters from my novel, Julian Lackland, which was published in 2020. Each side character impacts Julian’s life for good or ill.
This novel had a rough beginning, and an even harder path to final product. I nearly shelved it forever, but I had the good fortune to attend a seminar given by romance author, Damon Suede. THAT high-energy seminar changed how I approached the story.
I took the story back to its foundations and in the final rewrite, I made a point of looking for the two words that best describe how each point-of-view character sees themselves. It changed everything, allowing the story to be shown the way I saw it in my mind.
Julian’s noun is chivalry (Gallantry, Bravery, Daring, Courtliness, Valor, Love). He sees himself as a good knight and puts all his effort into being that person. He is in love with both Mags and Beau.
Beau’s noun is bravery (Courage, Loyalty, Daring, Gallantry, Passion). Golden Beau is also a good knight, but his view of himself is more pragmatic. He is Julian’s protector and is in love with both Mags and Julian.
Lady Mags’s noun is audacity (Daring, Courage). Mags defied her noble father and ran away from an arranged marriage to a duke in order to swing her sword as a mercenary. She will win at any cost and is not above lying or cheating to do so. She is in love with both Beau and Julian.
Bold Lora’s noun is bravado (Boldness, Brashness). Lora is in it for the fame. She doesn’t care about the people she is hired to protect, and makes enemies among every crew she is hired to serve in. As one unimpressed side character puts it, “If Lora rescues a cat from a tree, she wants songs of the amazing deed sung in every tavern.”
The way we see ourselves is the face we present to the world. These self-conceptions color how my characters react at the outset. By the end of the story, how they see themselves has changed because their experiences will both break and remake them.
Next, we assign a verb that describes their gut reactions, which will guide how they react to every situation. They might think one thing about themselves, but this verb is the truth. Again, we also look at sub-verbs and synonyms:
Julian has 2 Verbs. They are: Defend, Fight, (Preserve, Uphold, Protect)
Beau’s 2 Verbs are: Protect, Fight (Defend, Shield, Combat, Dare)
Lady Mags’s 2 Verbs are: Fight, Defy (Compete, Combat, Resist)
Bold Lora’s 2 Verbs are: Desire, Acquire (Want, Gain, Own)
A character’s preconceptions color their experience of events—and they are unreliable witnesses. The way they tell us the story will gloss over their own failings. As always, the real story happens when they are forced to rise above their weaknesses and face what they fear.
As readers we see the story through the protagonist’s eyes, which shades how we perceive the incidents.
When I write my characters, I know how they believe they will react in a given situation. Why? Because I have drawn their portraits using words:
Julian must Fight for and Defend Chivalry. Julian’s commitment to defending innocents against inhumanity is his void, and ultimately it breaks his mind.
Golden Beau must Fight for and Protect Bravery. Beau’s deep love and commitment to protecting and concealing Julian’s madness is his void. Ultimately, it breaks Beau’s health.
Lady Mags must Fight for and Defy Audacity. She’s at war with herself in regard to her desire for a life with Julian and Beau. Despite the two knights’ often-expressed wish to have her with them, a triangular marriage goes against society’s conventions more than even a rebel like Mags is willing to do. That war destroys her chance at happiness and is her void.
Bold Lora must Fight for and Acquire Fame. She believes that to be famous is to be loved. Orphaned at a young age and raised by various indifferent guardians, she just wants to be loved by everyone. Julian’s fame has made him the object of her obsession. If she can own him, she will be famous, adored by all. This desperate striving for fame is Lora’s void.
The verb (action word) that drives them and the noun (object of the action) are the character traits that hold them back. It is their void, the emptiness they must fill.
Have you thought about the two words that describe the primary weaknesses of your characters, the thing that could be their ultimate ruin? In the case of Julian’s story, it was:
Julian Lackland: Obsession and Honor
Golden Beau Baker: Love and Loyalty
Lady Mags De Leon: Stubbornness and Fear (of Entrapment)
Bold Lora: Fear (of Being) Forgotten
So, in the novel, Julian Lackland, a girl who was ignored by everyone, a child who’d lived on the outside looking in and who was fostered by indifferent relatives, decides that the one person who had ever shown her kindness should become her lover. If she could have Julian, fame would follow.
The way she goes about it changes everything and is the core of Julian’s character arc.
Julian Lackland took ten years to get from the 2010 NaNoWriMo novel to the finished product. He spawned the books Huw the Bard and Billy Ninefingers, both of which were written and published before the final version of Julian’s story was completed. Billy and Huw play a huge role in shaping Julian’s life.
Placing a verb phrase (Fight for and Acquire) before a noun (Fame) in a personality description illuminates their core conflict. It lays bare their flaws and opens the way to building new strengths as they progress through the events.
Or it will be their destruction.
By the end of the book, the characters must have changed. Some have been made stronger and others weaker – but all must have an arc to their development.
Sometimes, as in the case of Julian Lackland, the path to publication is fraught with misery. Other times, the book writes itself and flies out the door. Who knows how my current unfinished novel will end? It’s in the final stretch, but nothing is certain.
I am a step ahead in this process, though. I already know my characters’ weaknesses, their verbs and nouns. As I learned from my experience writing Julian’s novel, I just need to know who they think they are, and then I must write the situations they believe they can’t handle.
Life in the Realm of Fantasy 