Character Relationships

R. L. LaFevers gave some interesting advice in her June 23, 2009 post of Things Left Unspoken:

...It is the things left unspoken that define the relationship...

...it is the things we are too afraid or too angry to say that often define the shape and quality of our personal relationships. That betrayal you felt from your sister that you never dared to tell her about will shape all your future dealings with her. The fury you felt at your father, or the heartbreak your husband unknowingly dealt you; all of those emotions will bend and distort your interactions for years to come.

And it occurred to me what a powerful tool that would be to use in our writing, what an effective layer of subtext. So consider asking yourself, what is left unspoken between your characters? And how does it distort and drive their relationship to each other?

Settings are Important

From this article about SF/F:

O'Neill: Probably the best piece of advice I can give an aspiring writer is to pay as much attention to your setting as to your plot, characters, and prose.

When I'm reading an unsolicited manuscript, I'm reading to reject....So you've got a few precious minutes to grab my attention, and you better use them.

It's hard do with plot. If your plot is simple enough to communicate in the first two pages, I've probably seen it a hundred times. It's hard to do with character, for similar reasons.

It's easy to do with setting. Two pages is more than enough space to paint a picture of your world that grabs my attention, if it's fresh and intriguing. You can't compete with [other things demanding my attention] when all you have to offer is yet another version of the tale of King Arthur, or a generic medieval setting, or a tavern filled with rangers, dwarves, and a half-orc with a dungeon map.

Non-Typical Settings

Jessica Faust wrote:

To make an international setting work in genre fiction I think the locale itself almost needs to become a character. The reader needs to be transported into another world and not feel like the book could have just as easily taken place in Houston, Omaha, Reno or Scranton.

Backstory

Carolyn Jewel wrote:

...we are not writing a story about the backstory of our novel. We’re writing about what happens BECAUSE of the backstory.

And that's how you know what backstory information to include and when. Work in the information about why the character is acting the way she is when she acts in a way that doesn't make sense or seems odd or off-putting to the reader if he doesn't have that information.

On Beginnings...

Kathleen Dalton Woodbury gave this advice on where, exactly, one should start their story:

...the story should start when something starts to happen, and that's usually when the main character gets involved.

So, if you wanted to start with a fight scene, for example, you wouldn't start with the first punch. You'd start with the main character minding his own business, when some idiot comes up and tries to pick a fight with him. Of course, the main character, being smarter than to want to get into a fight with some stranger, tries to defuse the situation (and provides the author with a chance to do some characterization and get the reader to care about the main character), but when the idiot goes ahead and throws the first punch, the fight can start and the reader is more likely to be hooked.

Probably one of the main reasons for flashbacks is to try to show the reader why the main character is in the opening situation in the first place. If that "why" is at all interesting, the author should consider starting the story with it instead of starting it later.

One of the biggest problems with flashbacks is that they tend to stop the current story action (which, if the author has hooked the readers into caring, the readers are not going to want to have stopped) while the story goes back in time.

You don't EVER want to stop your readers as they are reading, because they may decide not to start up again.

Think of the Reader

In The Writer magazine, August 1989 issue, Piers Anthony wrote:

The writer must know his readers...their hearts and dreams.

Debbie's thoughts:
By tapping into those desires and dreams, the writer can capture the reader's interest: his desire to see justice done, his longing to feel he can control of life in some small way even when it seems out of control, etc. The more the characters struggle with problems that everyone struggles with, the more the reader can relate to the problems and will read on to see how the hero deals with them.

Likewise, the most effective horror stories tap into the things we all fear: the unknown, loss of control, etc.

Avoiding "as you know" Explanations

In The Writer magazine, December 1989 issue, Jeffrey Sweet wrote an article on "An Object Lesson for Playwrights." In it, he writes:

You can often dramatize what is going on between your characters through the way they negotiate over an object.

He gives an example of a man stopping a boy as he goes out the door. The man demands to know what the boy has in his hand, finds out it's a key, wants to know where the boy is going, and then demands the boy give him the key or he'll ground him for another week. From the example, it's obvious the man is the boy's strict father, the key is to the family car, and the boy is currently grounded and is resentful about it. All of this was conveyed by how the two characters interacted around the key instead of by the author explaining the situation to the reader.

Keeping the Reader

In The Writer magazine, December 1989 issue, Phyllis A. Whitney wrote an article on "Let's Do It Over." In it, she writes:

If your characters feel nothing strongly, neither will your reader....The more your characters stand to lose or gain, and the more they care, the more powerful the effect on the reader.

She suggests starting the story with the heroine in a conflict that she cares deeply about and that she must take some action in or do something about. And make the conflict something the reader can care about.

Next, check your suspense level. She asks, "Is everything too out-in-the-open, too obvious or predictable?" If so, then the reader is less likely to continue reading. Add some mystery to the story.

Ending the Story

In The Writer magazine, October 1990 issue, Karleen Bradford wrote an article on "Do You Want to Write for Children?" In it, she writes about wrapping up the story.

The main character's problem is solved (and always by the character himself--no intervening hand of fate, no helpful adult stepping in, no discovery that it was all a dream).

[I would add that the main character doesn't always have to be the main person to solve the problem but he does have to add the critical element to the solution. For example, a child doesn't have to personally drive the sword through the evil warlord's heart as long as he somehow plays the critical part in making that action possible.]

She goes on to say that perhaps the main character only learns how to cope with the problem.

In any case...your reader must feel, "Yes, of course, that's the only way it could possibly have ended" and even if it came as a total surprise, your reader must be satisfied [and feel positive about the ending even if it isn't a happy one].

Writing Historicals

I picked up a batch of old magazines at a library sale. In The Writer magazine, March 1990, Rosalyn Alsobrook wrote an article on "When You Write a Historical Romance." Her advice is excellent for writing any sort of historical. To quote a small part:

Not only must the setting and the time period...be portrayed accurately, it has to be made an actual part of the story. The conflicts in your story should develop from true events or known customs of the time and place...

and

[Your characters] must be a product of their time....Their personalities and mannerisms must mesh with...the historical era...

She also points out that the historical elements should be accurate and interesting, but only included as backdrop or as a catalyst in the conflict.

For example, I read a historical novel where the author paused to explain the meaning of a tavern's name when that information wasn't needed to understand the story. Worse, that information was given in the middle of a "life-in-danger" scene and it totally drained away the tension.

Finally, she points out that heavy dialect can be very difficult for a reader to work through and will slow your story's pace.

Insert a word here and a phrase there to give the reader...the characteristic speech patterns...

And that's enough to get the idea across.

Creating Interesting Characters

On DeepGenre, David Louis Edelman wrote an article on Building Character(s). In the comments section, Sherwood Smith said something I found very useful about creating interesting characters:

...A couple more possible additions to your list:

1) Character emotional range. If the character is always gloomy, always sarcastic, always with the wise-ass quip, or always nasty, even if he or she has all the motivation in the universe, that character is going to read one-dimensional because we all know we’re a bundle of (usually contradictory) emotional reactions. The hard-assed villain at a light or even tender moment, the hero being off-balance, the side-kick having the cool head, you get the idea, giving characters range helps because:

2) The perception of lack of dimension (I think) comes through readers’ expectations being fulfilled. If the reader can guess ahead of time how a character will react, even if there is every logical reason for the character to do or say that thing, then there’s no growth or guesswork. When the character takes the reader by surprise, I think it ups the ante, the possible interest.