ADDING CHARACTER EMOTION AND DEPTH
Once you’ve conducted a number of fantasy interviews and have come up with a working prototype, now’s the time to give your protagonist a sense of character. When I refer to character in this instance, I’m talking about moral substance, strength of will, integrity or lack thereof. Your main character should be someone the reader can trust to behave in a consistent fashion. That doesn’t mean this person is always virtuous; that would make for dull reading. I mean that the character’s behaviors remain consistent with who we know him to be over time. Of course a character’s moral development can be weighted by circumstances that are laid bare to the reader.
Because we are writing about humans (or at least animals or aliens with human emotions and dreams), a character can’t be brought to life without interaction with others. As social animals, we are largely defined by our relationships. That’s especially the case for young adults, for whom peer relationships often take precedence over familial ties. This holds true for those who feel alienated as well as for those who are slavishly attached to the crowd. Adolescents define themselves through interaction with their peers.
For illustrative purposes, let’s return to the main character I’m developing. By now readers might be wondering about Taylor: Is this guy a spoiled brat, or what? Where did his family get all that dough? And what the heck is he so angry about anyway?
The general rule is to allow your character’s actions to speak louder than your explanations. If you gain your reader’s trust, he or she will wait for all to be revealed in due time.
Upon entering the house, Taylor hears his mom calling, but he rushes from the sound of her voice, not pausing until he’s in his room. Leaning against the closed bedroom door, he wishes he could stop his mom from walking in and telling him what he doesn’t want to hear. But she’s already in the hallway, and then knocking hesitantly, to which he grumbles something akin to “Come in.”
Taylor turns on his computer and taps a few keys, any excuse to avoid making eye contact. He doesn’t have to look up to see her. He already knows that she’s young for a mother, too young to have lost a husband and to have raised a son alone. The two of them learned to depend on each other, and they were close, at least they had been close until she married Frank…that clown.
“So…” she says, casting her gaze around the room. He can see her by sneaking shy looks from under his heavy lashes. As long as he can remember, she has been determined to befriend instead of parent him. She’s biting her lip now, as if holding back complaints about the clothes-strewn floor and junked-up room.
And his mom is stalling, he notices, which means the news she’s about to deliver has got to be the absolute worst, and it is.
“Frank did accept the job, Taylor. We’re moving to Brazil.”
Now do you feel more sympathy for Taylor than before? This is key in creating a good character. You want your reader to feel sympathy, understand, and care for your protagonist as he becomes more finely nuanced. And the best way to get these attributes across is through your main character’s interactions with other characters. Taylor, for instance, grown weary of his mother’s obliviousness and his stepfather’s lack of integrity, may throw all caution to the wind and commit an act that he later regrets, but this would be fully understandable given his circumstances.
As you do reveal the heart of your protagonist, make sure his behavior seems in keeping with his character. For instance, Taylor may make it a point to never look his mother in the eyes. I don’t think that’s because he’s a shady, unpredictable louse or even because he sees himself in her reflection—he’s not that introspective. I think it’s because he’s frightened by her weakness. She’s making decisions that will change the course of their lives, and he needs to feel assured that there’s a grown-up in the house. No wonder he’s so angry.
Keep in mind that what separates the YA protagonist from any other is that his or her emotional reaction almost always involves peers, and that will offer clues about his character. Ask yourself how your main character will react inwardly and outwardly to the dilemmas you pose. For instance, Taylor may love his mother and feel fiercely protective of her, but his response to moving to another country will certainly involve a longing to commune with other young people. He’s terrified of flying without a safety net. Will that girl he likes at school forget him? Will there be new kids he can identify with in Brazil? And most important, will they accept him? These are questions of paramount importance in a YA novel.
Now that his mother has decided to move to Brazil, Taylor is forced to choose between the familiar and the exotic. Should he put up a fight and refuse to go? Will he accuse her of destroying his life? And is he a fighter?
I hate to be the first to inform you, but you won’t get to decide one way or another. You’re developing a flesh-and-blood teenager with a heart that beats. He’s not going to let anyone tell him anything. He gets to decide what he wants to do. And it will be easier for you to listen for how your main character wants to respond if you start compiling his history, which is often called a backstory.
The backstory includes details that you may or may not weave into the plot. You write a backstory because this is your opportunity to get to know your protagonist. It’s as if you have a weekend away together and you get a chance to really talk; only you’re remaining quiet and allowing him to do all the sharing.
To start creating your protagonist’s backstory, list everything that comes to mind about him that you want to flesh out. Your list should grow eventually into several pages and should start out looking something along these lines, as mine would with Taylor:
1. He pretends he doesn’t care squat about his appearance but hates seeing himself in a photo or mirror. He brushes his teeth and combs his hair in the bathroom with the lights turned out.
2. He has tucked beneath his box springs a crumpled photo of himself at the age of three sitting on his dad’s shoulders. When he’s distressed, he talks to the photo.
3. He’s about to go into his senior year, and he knows if he puts up a big enough fight, his mom would let him stay in the States with his aunt.
4. Taylor won’t ask to say behind, because he’s afraid his mom would agree, and he just can’t let her go that far away with Frank on her own.
5. There’s something waiflike, naïve, undeveloped about his mother.
6. Taylor goes through Frank’s paperwork. His mother’s new husband is a complete mystery to him, and he can’t understand why his mom was crazy enough to marry that clown. Frank claimed he was selling his house and business when he moved to join them in San Diego, but the guy never gets any mail or anything that would suggest he has closed down a business or a home.
7. Taylor is growing a beard, but when his mother notices over breakfast and rubs his chin, he blows up.
8. While in Brazil, Taylor falls in love. The young lovers can’t speak the same language, but they communicate nevertheless.
9. His mom is hiding a secret from Taylor: she’s pregnant with Frank’s child.
10. In Brazil, Taylor practices some native traditions that annoy Frank.
In the coming days, continue adding to your backstory as you get ideas from studying other people, reading, and watching TV and other forms of entertainment. Soon enough some items on your list will seem contradictory or out of tune, in which case you should drop them or make adjustments. Remember, this is not a list of ideas that advance the plot. As a fly on the wall you get to see this character up close, and through your observations come to know more about him than he even knows himself.
- ANATOMY LESSONS -
James Patterson is the bestselling author of adult thrillers who also writes the YA bestselling Maximum Ride series. The main character of that series, Max, is the leader of five other flying kids who were engineered in a laboratory. Max can make fast work of ruthless predators and fly at two hundred miles per hour, but Patterson grounds this exotic character in reality. Max longs for
what most teenage girls take for granted, like dating a cute guy and overeating at Thanksgiving. Since Max has had to learn to be wary of people, when she does let her guard down and gets hurt, readers feel her loss deeply. In Maximum Ride: School’s Out Forever, Max must leave behind one of her fellow flock members after reuniting him with his parents. Looking around the room, she observes that everyone else is on the verge of tears. Although brokenhearted herself, Max maintains her sarcastic tough-girl veneer, thinking, “I hate stuff like this, where everyone’s overwhelmed and weeping with joy and emotions are splashing all over the place. Ugh.” Because readers are tied into Max, we cry for her, even though she can’t afford to. Patterson’s success in the YA field is a reminder that readers don’t keep returning to a series just because of the plots, but also because they’re eager to reunite with literary friends.
SECONDARY CHARACTERS
You can create a second protagonist, should your story call for one, by following your main character’s lead. You don’t have to go back to the interviewing technique, unless you want to, because if a second protagonist is required, you will find that this person is so integral to the developing story that executing the plot would seem impossible without him.
As your protagonist is brought to life, you will also be introduced to the secondary characters who will populate his universe. You will want to keep the number of characters to a memorable eight or even fewer. There’s nothing more annoying to readers than having to turn back to recall who’s who. But don’t worry about character counts as you start your novel.
After finishing a first draft, ask members of your writing group (if you have one) or someone else you respect to offer comments. If you’re told that the characters are difficult to distinguish from one another, you may have some cutting to do. If that is the case, try playing around with merging two or more characters. For instance, Taylor has grown to depend upon his family’s housekeeper and her husband, the chauffeur. But because the cast is becoming unwieldy, I might find it necessary to kill off one of my darlings and get rid of the chauffeur, giving the housekeeper more to do.
MOTIVATION
Finally, let me offer one last word about your main character’s behavior. Take time to understand and communicate his motivation. Here’s how I view motivation: if your protagonist is the embodiment of your story, his motivation is your literary lifeblood, the often unstated explanation for why this character is willing to go to such great lengths and endure difficult circumstances.
Make sure you imply in the plot why your character is motivated to follow a certain course of action. The motivation of the protagonist in my plot, for instance, hinges on Taylor’s sense that his mother is too weak to survive Frank’s evil nature. Still, Taylor is considering staying put until he overhears that his mother is expecting a child. Taylor is determined to keep the baby safe. Your motivation should be in keeping with the protagonist’s character. The motivation that explains why Taylor is willing to move would not be credible were he not a very mature kid, with legitimate reasons for worrying about his stepfather’s morality.
Taylor suspects that Frank is moving his mom away from familiar climes so that he can take her for everything she’s worth. The cross-purposes of the two—Taylor, the protagonist, who’s determined to save his mom and her unborn child, and the antagonist, Frank, who may in fact be planning to get his hands on his wife’s wealth—intensifies the plot and makes it all the more intriguing.
Finally, when a protagonist resists an opposing force, you can write power-packed scenes. Consider, for instance, Taylor’s last view of his childhood home.
The limo has pulled up, Taylor is insisting on carrying an oversized suitcase on his own, and as the three leave the house for what feels like the last time, Taylor stops to check the front door, which his mother usually leaves unlocked. But Frank steps forward, a muscular arm barring Taylor’s way. “I already took care of it, kid,” he sneers at Taylor. “You gotta let me be the man in the family.”
Not likely, Taylor thinks, balling his hands into fists. His mother steps lightly toward the limo, her gait signaling her excitement about their new life.
Taylor checks his anger. This is not the time to fight, he tells himself, but soon, soon enough.
Whatever your story is, strong characters with their own motivation will make or break your novel. If it isn’t clear why your characters react the way they do to their circumstances, your reader will lose interest and stop caring about them.
Vivid, engaging characters can act as a reader’s best friend, alter ego, mentor, frenemy, or the family member they never had. When you bring a character to life, readers will follow him anywhere.
- ADVICE FROM PUBLISHERS ROW -
Evette Porter, publisher at EP Publishing:
“The novice writer will try to tell too many stories in a single novel. They try to throw everything in with the kitchen sink. At the core of any novel you need to have a clear and concise plot. A subplot is designed to enhance the main story line, and if it doesn’t it’s a distraction. In much the same way you would pitch a movie or television script, you should be able to articulate the core story line of your novel. If you can’t tell what your story is about in a synopsis or outline, you won’t be able to write a readable novel. However, subplots can be used to develop sequels and this technique is popular for those publishers like Harlequin. We look for series opportunities.”
Daniel Ehrenhaft, editorial director at Soho Teen:
“My house almost never signs series. We typically sign a book with an option for a next book. We’re the kind of publisher that does stand-alone mysteries maybe with one sequel. I’m always very excited to see what authors come up with next, as a fan of their work, and if for some reason one of our titles should make the bestseller list, then I’m open to exploring if we can turn it into a series.”
CHAPTER 4
UNDERSTANDING PLOT
So what’s your manuscript’s story? And what’s the plot? What’s the difference anyway?
Many people don’t know the difference between a novel’s story and its plot. This chapter is designed to help you articulate your novel’s story and to teach you how to construct a well-crafted plot. By learning the difference, you’ll learn how to propel your manuscript forward and gain an understanding of the overall concept of your novel—its story.
PLOT VS. STORY
The most important point in this chapter is that plot is not story. The story of the novel is the full sequence of events in a work of fiction as the reader imagines them to have taken place, in the order in which they would have occurred in life.
Stories can be plot-driven or character-driven.
• Plot-driven: A plot-driven story is one in which a preconceived story line is the main thrust and the character’s behavior is constantly being molded by the inevitable sequence of events that leads to the climax.
• Character-driven: A character-driven story is one in which the character is the main focus. Character-driven stories tend to be literary, and the story is a study of human behavior, emotions, internal conflict, and personal weaknesses. The pivotal point of a character-driven story is when the protagonist understands his weakness and takes the first steps to overcome it.
Generally, novels for young adult readers are plot-driven and not character-driven, although the separation between the two types of story consists of a vast gray area where characteristics of both types may be found. Due to their lack of maturity, introspective ability, and experience, most young adult readers generally cannot understand and appreciate a character-driven story consisting of narration of human internal conflicts.
A plot is a chain of events where each event has a cause. Each event then becomes the cause of other events along the chain that leads to the climax of the story. Plot extends well beyond the boundaries of the story both into the past and the future. However, the author does not always explain every connection of the events to the lives of the characters. Often this insi
ght is reserved for the reader, drawing him more deeply into the world of the story.
There are three kinds of plots:
• Integrated: An integrated plot is one where the story and the plot are tightly bound together and the cause-and-effect events of the plot drive the characters toward resolving the conflict at the climax. The vast majority of young adult plots are integrated.
• Episodic: An episodic plot is composed of loosely connected incidents, each one more or less self-contained. They are often connected by a central theme, location, conflict, or character. At times the distinction between an episodic novel and a collection of short stories with the same theme is not clear. Ray Bradbury’s Martian Chronicles is an example of an episodic novel.
• None: Plotless stories are extremely rare in young adult literature. An example of a plotless story would be Ernest Hemingway’s Big Two-Hearted River, in which the meaning of the story is entirely symbolic. Stories like this are an illumination of life—the point seems to be “this is what life is about.”
TYPES OF PLOTS
In the canon of literature all of the broad categories of conflicts have been in use since before the ancient Greeks. There are no new plots, only new ways to use them.
How many plots are there? That depends on how they are categorized. Pick a number from five to fifty, and a list of plots can be found for that number. Seven plots, which only slightly overlap one another, are generally mentioned by many writers.
• Man versus nature
• Man versus man
• Man versus the environment
• Man versus machine or technology
• Man versus the supernatural
• Man versus himself
• Man versus God or religion
Since there are no unique plots, the quality of a work of fiction rests on the author’s ability to guide the trajectory of the plot and use it to build an original, interesting story. Most novels follow a familiar plot structure that forms the foundation for telling the story.
Writing Great Books for Young Adults Page 4
