86 Things I've Said On Twitter, the 9th and final part

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Writing Theory - The Circle

Today, we focus on some writing theory. You may have seen this elsewhere, or seen it in pieces, but I rather like this method (it is not my own), and thought some of you could benefit from it.

For this, you'll need:

• 1 legal pad (or blank piece of paper)
• 1 pen
• 1 name for a character 

Now, draw a circle on the paper.

Now draw a plus sign in the circle, to create four quarters. (Divide the circle in half vertically then in half again horizontally)

Now number the ends of the plus with 1, 3, 5, and 7

In the middle of the quarters, number 2, 4, 6, and 8

It should, basically, look like this:

This is a cycle, and we're going to go through the numbers clockwise. By the time we're done, you're going to have a  good idea about the development of your story.

Note: This applies to all kinds of fiction - from screenplays to novels to big epics to cave paintings - anything where you have a character and a mission to do something.  

Let's get started.

1.CHARACTER

 You're going to start this off with a character. I like to use protagonists for this, but it's also possible you use an antagonist for this, depending on your tone or your objective. You want to stay away from using secondary characters here, because they don't really need so much attention. 

The character starts at the top of this chart as we find them at the beginning of the story. Understand that the state we have the character at Position 1 is NOT going to be the state we find them in after Position 8. 

Also understand that if you go through this wheel several times (say it's one character over a series of books), that each Position 1 is relative to the start of the respective book, and it's not always going to be the stripped down Book-1 version. 

2.NEED (AS EXPRESSED IN PLOT)

This is the conflict or problem the story has put forth to challenge the character. This isn't so much their internal desire, this is more like the plot of the book. For those people writing series, try and keep this to one book at a time -- being too broad here really waters down the efficacy of the subsequent numbers. 

If your story has twists or big reveals in it, then Position 2 is where you document the most complete and most knowledgeable plot of the book -- after all the twists, after all the misdirects, whatever the challenge is, goes here.

So, for something like The Usual Suspects, the plot isn't so much "To let Kevin Spacey get away with it", it's to "have the detective/audience understand what happened" 

For something more linear, like Donkey Kong, it's "To have Mario rescue his girlfriend (Who wasn't Peach) from a gorilla."

3.GO (TO THE UNFAMILIAR) 

It doesn't have to be literal, this isn't quite Campbell's overdone Hero's Journey, but the idea here is that you take the character and put them in an environment/situation that they're not used to. An environment/situation different than what they're used to from Position 1, and as we learned about in Character 101, this should be  filled with challenges big and small for the character. 

The comedic route is to make this an issue of extremes - the milquetoast suburbanite in the ghetto, the rugged outdoorsman in the big city, the disconnected pair of lovers in the wilderness, that sort of fish-out-of-water element plays well comically provided you stretch it far. 

In more serious work, this represents a larger context for the character - the character leaving their familiar confines for new and larger surroundings. It provides a sense of expansion and intimidation, while also offering hope that along with the challenges come rewards. 

4.SEARCH 

Here, the character is going to struggle. Not to their lowest point of their progression, hope isn't entirely vacant here, but they will be tested. They will have to adapt to the new environment, and initially that process won't be comfortable. Over time though, they'll become more comfortable and more accustomed to the new environment so that they can expand their comfort level and possibly develop satisfaction in themselves for obtaining new skills.  

Position 4 is about the act of the quest, the progression from starting-point to further-along-point and the improvement of the character along the way. This is NOT about the specific item or knowledge that will make them better, because...

5.FIND/DISCOVER 

Position 5 is all about the item or knowledge they need to improve. For the stranded castaway, it's the making of fire. For the nervous lawyer in court, it's the discovery of the witness or a legal precedent that will change the tide in their favor. 

Critical here though is the idea this: In Position 4, they didn't know the "thing" existed, in Position 5 they find out it exists and....

6.TAKE 

In position 6, the hero goes and gets it. He makes fire, she finds the legal precedent, the boy pulls the sword out of the rock. Ideally, Position 6 is made possible because of the confidence gained in Position 4 and the character benefits from the knowledge or awareness in Position 5. This is a pretty "hooray" moment for the character, and can very easily be the climax of the whole story if you wanted it to be, but often this can just be a moment of hooray on the path of the story. 

In RPGs, this is the item gained in a dungeon crawl, or the loot from a boss fight. 

7.RETURN 

The character is confident (Position 4), aware (Position 5) and armed (Position 6), and now they can go back to the environment (Position 3) and complete the plot (Position 2).

Like Orpheus, this is the character's emergence from the trials thus far back to the environment he calls home. In some stories, this means they'll go all the way to the village he was kicked out of or they'll just go back to their "newer" home because they've matured/grown/developed independence from their old ways, and possibly can't go back (either metaphorically or literally).

This can be a whole part of the story, like a return to areas previously thought dangerous now made easier because of equipment and experience gained, or it can be as simple as transitioning the story back to the bigger world. 

8.CHANGE. 

Lastly, the character is able to take on the plot, and (depending on how you want it to play out) possibly succeed. To reach this point, you had to go through all the preparation of previous positions (alliteration!). Without the equipment/knowledge acquired in Position 6, without the struggles and adaptation to a tougher environment of Position 4, they wouldn't be as ready to take on the plot as they first heard about it back in Position 2.

How would Harry defeat Voldemort without any of the knowledge from the middle of the series? (Sure you can argue that all he needed was 'Expelliarmus' and Horcrux knowledge, but he had to gain those at some point.)

How would Indiana Jones be able to find the Grail without going through the harsh lessons of his youth? 

How would James Bond be able to defeat...whoever he defeated if he didn't have the invisible car? (Seriously, dude had an invisible car...and fought someone on a glacier or something. I kinda blanked on some of the Brosnan films)

The point here is that the character has come full circle in some senses, but is on a whole new circle as well. Yes, there's the plot to contend with still, but there's also a visible set of benefits and consequences gained from previous actions. The character has matured, our understanding and appreciation of them has deepened and the story can move forward, through the plot and into resolution. Or even into subsequent stories, if you want to repeat the cycle with a whole new plot, and build forward. 

If ANY of this is unclear, let me know. Leave a comment, write me an email, catch me on Twitter.

Happy writing.

By request - Query and Summary Letters

Dee Solberg asked about query letters and summary letters, in terms of their construction and how to navigate the apparently bizarre demands from one publisher to the next.

A word first about those demands - they've never struck me as bizarre. Just like going from one store in the mall to another has never bothered me about where they put the registers or whether or not they wear name tags. Every place is different, and entitled to make up their own methods for accomplishing the same end goal - which in this case is getting your work published.

Now, a tangent: Do you know why those needs are so different? Mostly for two reasons - First, to see if you follow directions (you'd be shocked by the number of people who don't) and second to see if following directions discourages you from going forward. Publishing on the whole, is a test of endurance, (writing is the test of skill) and there are many stages of hurry-up-and-wait as well as stages of I-cannot-believe-I-have-to-rewrite-this that turn publishing into a very intense pursuit. I would also like to point out that you (the author to-be-published) should avoid taking this time to start developing the philosophy that you're competing with other writers. This is not about scarcity or about some game of book-musical-chairs. There are PLENTY of chairs and the music NEVER stops playing.

So what's step one? Where do I begin?

Step one is something that doesn't go down easily, but if you commit to it, life gets exponentially better. Step one is 'make sure the project is complete'. I know, some people reading this are going to grab this magazine or that website over there and point to examples that say flat-out you can query a partially completed 'thing'. Yes, you can. You possess the ability to package pages together and get it sent to a destination. That is an option.

But doing that, moving ahead to acquire all the bells and whistles of publishing (the elements often thought to bring legitimacy: an agent, a publisher, a partridge in a fruit bush) without finishing your work puts you on someone else's schedule. And that new schedule likely is unaware that your children may have sick days, school plays and sports practices. Or that your spouse might decide to rewire the house and leave you powerless on a Saturday afternoon. Or that you have two jobs and a mortgage and the phone bill and the credit card and you want a vacation and what about the grocery shopping.....etc etc.

By finishing your work ON your schedule, you make their schedule INFINITELY easier, no matter who the "their" is.  Take the extra time (which shouldn't be a problem if you've disciplined yourself to a good writing schedule, right?) to make the project the best it can be before it leaves you, and everything thereafter is much simpler.

Okay, I did that, but what's up with queries?

I do a lot of workshops about queries. Here are the basics.

• Start where the action of the story is. I don't mean action like where the first emotion is felt or where the first verb is, I mean start telling me the story at the good parts. The parts that are going to make me want to hear more about it. Practice this - summarize your favorite movie. Now out loud, talk about it. Those scenes and facts you're saying? Those are the things that show where the action/meat of the story is. 
• Find out how many words the whole thing has. Put that number and the title (which you'll put in ALL CAPS) in one of the last two or three sentences at the bottom of the page. 
• You have between 200 and 300 words (I aim for around 225-240 max) to seduce the person into reading the manuscript. That's the job of a query - to entice the reader to go to the manuscript. Not give away the story. Not bore people to tears. Just excite the person into wanting more information.
• Do not give away the ending. If you tell the whole arc of the story, there's no reason to read the manuscript. Remember, you're supposed to be seductive. Telling the reader how this is going to end is not seductive. 
• This query is about your story NOT you. I'm now beating a dead horse, but the query letter is not the place to list all your great publishing or personal successes. (The document for that is called a resume) The query letter is about this story, and its merits, not the struggle you went through to put it together. I'm sure it's a very harrowing tale, but it's completely irrelevant to the quality of the story or a reader's interest in making the jump from query to manuscript. 

That's the basic template. You get those pieces set in your query, whatever other demands come down the road at you are cake. 

And what about story summaries? 

That's a different animal. Here you want to treat the page like a candy bar or a cake - and that having one piece (the summary) makes you want to have other pieces later. Like ten seconds later. Or at midnight. Or for breakfast the next morning. 

You still start where the action is, you still need to know how long the whole manuscript is, but now you have about DOUBLE THE WORD COUNT (400 to 600, I like a cap of 550) to demonstrate in tiny version what happens in the big version. 

Think about movie trailers. That's a small piece of a larger cake. You now get to do that by writing. Look at your outlines, your notecards, your bullet points. Identify the big action beats, the funny beats, whatever beats make you proud of your creation, and find a way to string them together. The magic here lies in how you make use of the words and ideas available to you. 

And in non-fiction?

For the love all that you hold dear, DO NOT drown the document in headings. Not everything needs to be broken out and explained. Do you know how that comes across? Like the sniffly desperate kid in your class who used to eat paste and who just had to keep yapping and explaining. (In my elementary school, his name was Chas or Charlie or Chuck or something)

Likewise don't go the other way and have two or three headings and then big blocks of text underneath them. That looks more like you just don't know what you're doing and you're desperate. 

Instead, try this. 5 headings.

1. About the book (the length, the genre, etc)
2. The Characters
3. The Plot
4. The Author (that's you!)
5. How You Plan To Market This

If you're writing a book that lacks characters or plot (hi cookbook authors!), then change into "Reasons For This Book" and "Recipes". The point is that you don't need a TON of headings. You just need organization. Critical here are items 1, 4, and 5. Especially 5. 

Why is 5 important? Because the more you know about how you're going to get that book into other people's hands, the easier that will happen and the better it will be for everyone involved. If that means you need to educate yourself on how to market or publicize, do it (Here's a starting point, come ask me questions! Email or Twitter). Also, the heady days of disposable income are for the moment gone. So take the initiative and make something happen with your work. 

Any other advice? 

Yes. Two things.

I. There's no one road to this goal of yours. Even if you and I do the same research about the same topic and go to the same people to ask the same questions and query the same book, we're going to get different results. There is no one way to get published. There is no "right" way, there is no "wrong" way. One way is NOT better than another. What matters here is the answer to the binary question - Published? Yes/No. Having said that though, remember that publishing is NOT legitimacy. Getting published does not make you a better person or a superior one or smarter or kinder or more loved or anything like that. It's just something you did, like yesterday when I did laundry. There are lots of ways to accomplish it. 

II. There comes a point where you have to stop asking for help and start doing it. Lots of people and books and websites offer great advice. And you can spend many many days/weeks/months/years searching through them all - but NONE of them have the one magic bullet answer for you. It's the sum total of what they say, what you choose to take with you and choose to leave behind that shapes you. 

Yes it's great to ask for help. But there is such a thing as asking for help about a thing IN PLACE of doing that actual thing. This industry, this craft, this art, is PACKED with people who bloat the lanes and passages with poor habits, wrong intentions, poor writing and unhelpful attitudes and advice. This industry is thick with people who aren't going to ever get past the "talk about writing" phase. 

What separates the successful from the unsuccessful is yes, in part talent. But also the fact that the successful actually wrote. And got edited. And re-wrote. And published. And repeated this whole process. 

If you're doing this to be successful, that's the path.

If you're doing this to prove other people wrong, you're going to be disappointed.

If you're doing this to prove your own self-worth, you're going to be SUPER disappointed.

If you're doing this to be rich, you're going to be doing this a long time.

If you're doing this to be more famous than other people, you're going to be disappointed AND doing this for a long time. 

Dee, I hope this answers your question somewhat.

Happy writing

Writing/Gaming - Character 101 - Part 3: Abilities

We continue our look at Characters today. If you need to catch up - Part 1 and Part 2.

So far we've built a world with challenges for our characters, and we've given our characters some descriptive elements and attributes. Today we're going to start diving into the meat of characters. Today's component usually comes later in the series, but I've moved it ahead because it's a nice springboard into the more detail material.

Component 3 of Character 101 is Abilities, and can be expressed like this:

Ability or abilities that differ from audience experience, such that an audience will desire to be like (or against) the hero.

Put more simply, this means distinguishing themselves from "the crowd" by doing different things than "the crowd".

For superheroes, the answer is obvious - they can fly around and lift buildings. For detectives, they solve crimes. Every character, has some trait marking them as unique...even if that uniqueness is unto themselves. Generally, if you're going to name a character, they've got something worth knowing about. Maybe not on that first page we see them, maybe not even in this plot, but somewhere, you had a thought that a particular character had something to offer.

Gamers, this is where mechanics can tie in - those things characters do, those things that make them unique - there should be mechanics to support them. Even if the mechanics are story telling opportunities or narrative concepts, there should be SOME kind of mechanics making it possible for the players to do it too (because, if you've not figured this out, the players want THEIR characters to be in the spotlight the way a novel's characters are)

When we write these abilities, since we're writing characters that are going to do something, and likely that's something other people won't have a chance to do (otherwise you wouldn't be singling out this character for this story, would you?) the audience has to have a little envy - it adds to appeal.

We read about wizards because we are not wizards. We read about the genius billionaire crime fighter because we don't have a cave and a secret identity. While these characters are like us, they aren't exactly us - their deviance from our norm is what makes them memorable and attractive.

The same can said for villains. The reason we dislike the evil criminal is because he acts in a way we don't and more specifically a way that evokes a reaction from us.

You want to create abilities that evoke reaction from the audience. Ideally, you've also expressed HOW those abilities operate and given good context to express any "rules" for them. (Does flying require sprouting wings? Does the detective use technology to solve his crime? Does the wizard have to shout in a foreign language when obliterating his opponents?).

Sometimes the plot and character will do something and elicit from the audience a strong response. Sometimes it's celebratory (Yay, he blew up the Death Star) sometimes though it's shock (What do you mean he killed himself to save his friends?). When you're able to create a character that evokes that type of response, you know the character is strong in the minds of the reader/audience.

We don't always want to root for the hero. We want the hero to win, we want to be along for the ride, but we need not agree with them every step of the way - and I would go so far as to say we shouldn't always agree.

Just like in television and movies when you yell at the screen, "Of course he's not the father, Maury!" or "Don't go out into the barn to have sex you anonymous attractive teenagers, the killer is out there!" the act of disagreeing with the actions of the hero (on more than a this-is-just-crappy-writing level) shows that the audience is invested.

Gamers, you create investment by offering options. This is not to say you need to offer then a bazillion options, or even the same options as your more successful competitor, but you do need to make the player aware that they can do....stuff. And it's not always the amount of stuff that's important, but more the impact of those options. Anyone can roll a die or move a miniature, but the player who feels that what they do and can do matters to the world they participate in, is invested. That's your goal.

So when crafting the experiences of your readers, players and consumers, look at what the characters do that empowers them to be different and distinguishing. And put the spotlight on it. Everyone will thank you for it.

Later in the week we dive into the much deeper waters of character philosophy (and I'll even talk about alignment for my gaming friends).

Happy writing.

Writing/Gaming - Character 101 Part 2 - Character Description

This is part two of the Character 101 series. The first part is available here.

Earlier this week, we talked about the importance of defining a world and having limitations within that world so that a particular character can be tested, and hopefully overcome those challenges.

While that's great advice, I'm sure many of you have said (and judging by my inbox, some did) "That's great but what about the character? How can the first step in character building be about anything other than characters?"

I point here, as I did to those who asked that for better defined characters, their world is as much a part of them as their clothes or eye color. Batman has Gotham and the Batcave. Superman has Metropolis and Krypton, Harry Dresden has Chicago, Coburn has his apocalypse.

If you can find me a well-crafted character where their world is not a part of them in an intrinsic way, please let me know, I'm curious.

Today, we look at something very concrete and very directly tethered to character.

The rule for part 2 can be summarized like this:

A description that contains audience-relatable elements of either a physical or emotional/mental nature

Your keywords here:

• audience-relatable
• physical
• emotional
• mental

We have all read poor character descriptions. I don't mean descriptions that are intentionally undone (where the author chooses not to give details so that the audience can paint their own pictures), I mean descriptions where they give all the components poorly.

Like here:

Terry worked long hours at the dock. He was a blond, although dirty in both hair and skin. He was tall, but no bigger than the others he worked with. He was strong but not weighed down with muscle.

Yes, I made those sentences up, and yes, they're really bad, but they're bad on purpose. Notice how the description starts with Terry's occupation...an all too-common notion is that if we (readers) know what a person does, we can pigeonhole them. (We make blanket statements that someone of X job looks a certain way, or that by describing someone by their profession, we eliminate a lot of other allegedly relevant descriptors -- and by extension, when you mash a profession onto a set of descriptors that seems inappropriate, you create dissonance and a disconnect for readers)

From there, we move into a messy attempt at double-meanings, trying to tie 'dirty blonde' with dirty-from-work. We end with two ruinous sentences where the respective second halves cancel out the first halves. If a character is no taller than others, then they're not tall. 'Tall' is only capable if you have something not-'Tall' for comparison.

When describing something, the majority of the words used can create perspective. And the use of that word creates a proposition that an opposite concept also occurs. (You cannot understand up if you don't know down, or wet without dry). The character doesn't need to exist in both states, but they do need to exist in whatever states you say they do, and consistency is key. If Terry is tall, then he's tall compared to something-to-be-named-later that is "short". Don't trust that the reader will intuit their own perspectives (I'm talking to you game people -- there are mechanics and dice to resolve these issues) and come to the same ideas you have. 

If you want the character to be a certain way, be decisive and clear about it. Game people, if you want the players to act a certain way, then you need to be a little obvious that the particular situation you're putting players into has clear options (even if there are many many options, make that clear).

Returning to the specifics of description, readers look for 3 types of description. These don't need to be successive, they're not hierarchical and you don't need to do them all at once, but you do need to do them at some point before you get too far into your work.

I. Physical - This is everything tangible and directly observable about the character. The goal is not to drown the reader in  broad information too quickly (then statements get lost and it detracts from importance) but rather provide for them multiple concepts for them to attach to (this is a variation of Velcro theory - you supply them concrete details that they affix their edduced aspirations onto).

II. Emotional - This is a subcutaneous level of description, wherein you describe how the character feels at whatever moment they're being witnessed. If we're on page 30, and the character has just discovered their best friend's wife murdered (hours after sleeping with her), then you can provide us the sum total of emotions up to and including page 30. Yes, this whole story might be resolved by page 340, but here on page 30, we can only work with what we have to date. 

Gamers, do not overlook this level of detail - as your NPC emotions are most often impacted by interaction with PCs and all manner of circumstances around pre-existing agendas. (The megalomaniac going to blow up the city is going to have an emotional reaction to the players diffusing his bomb, for example)

III. Mental - This is a harder nut to crack, unless you're writing in the first-person and can use your exposition to develop this. Mental description is a sense of how more than what specifically a character is thinking. Yes, in the immediate sense, the what should be apparent (it's relevant to the scene/moment), but because sometimes characters aren't actually powered with cogs and drive-belts, you only get a secondhand sense of "gears turning". 

Mental description is a chance to see the character's planning skills, their intelligence and their understanding of motivations and consequences in action. This is commonly expressed in mysteries as the moment when the sleuth gathers all the suspects together and explains who the killer is. Or the final moments of a heist when the mastermind reveals the plot has been on-going since page one, sentence one. 

The composite of these three factors builds a full character. To get you started, here are some questions to fire up your character forges:

I. Physical

1. Aside from the obvious details of what the character looks like, what traits are they proud of? Ashamed of? Effort to hide? Effort to show off? 
2. What things would this character change about their appearance if the circumstances allowed it?
3. How important to the character are the aspects of his physical description? Does he value his height? Does he identify himself by his physique? Does she draw pride from her eyes?

II. Emotional

1. What gets this character out of bed in the morning? What would send them running back beneath the blankets for a do-over?
2. Can you identify your character's three most frequent emotional states? What causes each one?
3. Imagine a fight between this character and their nemesis. What buttons are getting pressed, and whose doing the pressing? Now imagine this same fight between this character and someone they loved.

III. Mental

1. Is this the sort of character others go to for help and guidance, or is this a character who seeks out others? (Or are they only seeking others out for approval of their own plans?)
2. How far ahead does this character plan? Does that plan include contingencies? If you had to sum up the character's planning ability in a word, what word would you use?
3. Does this character overthink? Does this character fly by the seat of their pants?

I hope these questions help you, I have others if you're curious. 

Next week we'll add more to characters, and I'll revisit our sample character Timmy. Enjoy your weekend.

Happy writing.

Writing/Gaming: Character 101 - Part 1: Overview & 'The Sandbox'

Good morning. On this particularly sleety and craptastic morning (the ground and the sky are the same color. I'm not sure if that counts as a Lovecraft moment or not), I want to start the new series on this blog, Character 101.

This series will be in up to 8 parts....(definitely 6, but there are two additional components we can bring in later). Now some of you have heard me talk about the first 6 steps when I taught this as a workshop 2 years ago - but a lot has changed since then, so update your notes. And unlike those previous workshops I'm not going to cover the whole list up front and reference it in every post. (So pay attention, and ask questions/leave comments if you get lost)

Character 101 is a series of posts aimed at ANYONE doing ANYTHING involving characters. This applies to novelists, short story writers, screenwriters, game designers, module creators...even somewhat to board and card game people, (though not all parts would apply there).

Much like my previous post about characters not being awful, this is more a walk-through on how to specifically do that - and although I don't present the components in order of magnitude, every piece is an equal facet in making the gemstone that is your character.

Granted, if you're only making some secondary characters or NPCs or background fluff, you don't need to do all these steps. Maybe apply one or two. But if you want your main characters: your protagonists, antagonists, chief NPCs, mentors, sidekicks, love interests, bullies, your fan favorite characters to stand out and get some attention (like eye-popping, 'Wow' attention), then this whole series will benefit you.

Now, let's go make your characters better.

Character 101 - Part 1 - The Sandbox

The Sandbox rule can be written out as follows:

A set of boundaries and a playground within those boundaries that is at times limiting or limited, causing the character to be tested.

If you had to highlight the key parts for this rule, look at the beginning and end of the sentence:

• set of boundaries
• a playground
• at times limiting or limited
• causing the character to be tested

No character should exist in a vacuum. They don't just float aimlessly in Void-space, nor should they. They need to have some sort of area where they exist. Sometimes, this is a whole world, or on a more localized sense, this could just be the place(s) where the action occurs. 

If we're writing the classic Oscar the Grouch novel, then we're likely talking the trash can on Sesame Street and the surrounding areas. If you want to craft a game about masterless samurai in feudal Japan, then you'll probably want a province, a town or two and the surrounding forests. 

Basically, the 'playground' I'm talking about here is the world of the character. Even if that means the whole world, don't freak out and think that you have to create this monstrous real-time updating construct and deal with every living thing and every event on it all the time - you don't. You only need to concern yourself with the world of the character.

If I'm the character, then right now, all you'd be writing about is me in my immediate surroundings (the office in the house), my immediate goals (to write this post then go do laundry) and maybe my plans for later in the day (go out and meet new clients). Notice that you don't have to consider...the fate of a Sierra Leone diamond mine or the traffic in Acapulco when you're working with me as a character. Yes those things exist, but they're not in the scope of THIS character, and therefore not part of what you need to add to the recipe. 

Over time, you'll discover that the playground for a particular character doesn't have to be so large in order to be "good". 

Note: As I've said elsewhere, you're really going to do yourself a disservice the more you hang on to notions of "good" "right" "best" or "is it okay if..." as all those thoughts are subjective and contextual. Kill that doubt and move forward. If you need help, ask.

So, to build the best world for your character, think about their routine. Think about where they live. Think about what they do. Your set up here is to be concrete initially. Facts and statements are ideal right now. Those basic Who/What/When/Where questions come in handy here (we leave off Why and How for the moment) 

Yes, you can easily get a legal pad and make a chart. 

Let's suppose I was going to make a character called....Timmy, so my chart starts like this:

Timmy the Character

• Wakes up every morning at 8
• Is currently a 'salad technician' at a restaurant
• Is 18
• Lives with his parents in a condo on 16th Street

No, I didn't prioritize those facts, I just listed the things that came to mind as I sat here. There really isn't a best order of magnitude, as this first column is just to list some of the pieces of Timmy's world.

So those are Timmy's facts, and in turn they are also boundaries. Timmy is 18, so he won't have the experiences of a 90 year old war veteran. He's male, so he won't know anything about the struggles of being a girl in middle school. He wakes up at 8, so he isn't going to have the same experiences as the crackhead who sleeps all day. Facts are good, and facts are boundaries. (Without these boundaries, Timmy is essentially an omnipotent, omnipresent, limitless deity).

Because Timmy is limited we've now planted the seeds for desire. Think of your own life here as well, you may be reading this at a job you no longer love, you may be reading this late at night because you're afraid what your spouse will say if you tell them you want to be a writer, you may be reading this thinking, "I could do a better job..." Whatever the reason you provide, there is a desire you can tether to the fact. 

Let's go back to Timmy and see if we can find some desires for him based on the facts we gave. (If you're making a chart, these desires are a second column)

Timmy the Character

• Wakes up every morning at 8 >> Wants to sleep in longer
• Is currently a 'salad technician' at a restaurant >>Wants to be a professional sculptor
• Is 18 >> hates that people think he's a 'dumb kid'
• Lives with his parents in a condo on 16th Street >> wants to move into his own apartment downtown, nearer to where he's seen college-age girls

Whenever you create limits on a character, you also plant the seed to exceed or overcome those limits. And yes, the character should want to overcome those limits (those conflicts are plot points) and the method the character goes about moving from his limitation toward his goal is essentially a plot unto itself. 

You could stop here with the chart, but you can also go one step further to see how each plot develops. (This would be a third column on your chart)

Timmy the Character

• Wakes up every morning at 8 >> Wants to sleep in longer  >> Starts setting his alarm later and later, angering his mother
• Is currently a 'salad technician' at a restaurant >>Wants to be a professional sculptor  >> Applies for a class in sculpting at night school
• Is 18 >> hates that people think he's a 'dumb kid'  >> Spends all his free time reading college textbooks and trying to sound like a grad student.
• Lives with his parents in a condo on 16th Street >> wants to move into his own apartment downtown, nearer to where he's seen college-age girls  >> Intentionally gets off at the wrong subway and bus stops so he can be around girls, hoping they notice him

We've built Timmy up pretty quickly, and given him a lot of different qualities and possibilities for our stories, games and wherever else we want to deploy him.

The key to that third column is that the plan the character undertakes to make the second column happen SHOULD NOT BE EASY. If it were easy, the character would have done it already, and they wouldn't be limited by it not-being-done. The challenge for the character is critical for the audience to emotionally invest in the character - we want to see him succeed (or not, if he's an antagonist), and we will only get to do that if we see the actions taking time and being done over the course of pages/chapters/sessions/etc. 

If a character's desire (also called a motivation) goes untested, then it isn't important enough for us to hear about. Having said that, let me also say that you don't need to detail EVERY motivation and develop them all before advancing your story. 

Remember Rule #1 of Writing - Writing is the act of making decisions. You decide what motivations to pursue, when, and to what degree. You decide how to express the desires and the plans and their consequences. 

The short formula for today's lesson:

1. The world of the character is the immediate facts and desires they experience/want

2. The desires are goals they've not yet realized and they will have to work (change their current state) to achieve them.

3. The plan they develop and engage to sate these desires is material for plot. 

Welcome to Character 101. 

In part 2 (due out later this week) we'll talk about character descriptions. 

Happy writing. 

(If you have questions or comments about today's lesson, leave some comments below. I would love to hear from you.)

Pitch 101: Part 3 - Velcro Theory and the Audience

This is part 3 of an on-going series on how to pitch your product. Part 1 and 2 are available here and here.

Happy Year of Our Alleged Impending Apocalypse! If there was ever a catalyst for you to be productive and successful, it has to be the chance that suddenly all life as we know it could wink out of existence. It's practically a Doctor Who plot. In fact, I think it was.....

So, let's move right along to Part 3 of Pitch 101, and build on what we already know about USPs (Unique Selling Points) and types of pitches. Today, it's going to get a little tricky, as we'll turn the pitch around and consider it from the barrel-end.

Have you ever asked yourself what the audience hears when you pitch? If you've ever pitched to me, you know I have this...quirk/habit of making very clear whether or not you have my attention. This is remarkably helpful for people, but not everyone will have such a transparent audience.

I know the assumption is made and repeated in lots of books and websites that you're fighting an uphill battle when you pitch, that you have only a few gasps of air to relay, hook and interest your audience, and while that is occasionally true, I do have to tell you that the majority of that fear-mongering is designed to drive you deeper into those books and to rely on them, rather than your own natural abilities to be interesting and appealing.

When you pitch, you're not fighting a losing battle. You may have already lost, if your thinking is so negative or sentimental or emotionally suggestive, but the actual act of pitching, the speaking and exploring the idea is not a lost cause. Just as earlier we talked about the foundations of the pitch as being USPs, now we consider the foundation of your target audience-- Interest.

Let's assume you've got three products: A book, a script and a game. For the sake of future arguments, let's say they're all related and that you're developing a "property" (fancy way of saying you're thinking of stuff, write that down and impress your friends) about....Eskimo Assassins.

In the novel, you tell the story of Tim, the Eskimo Assassin sent to Washington to kill a corrupt senator.


In the movie, you tell the same story, but throw in a B-plot about how Tim falls in love with the senator's daughter, saving her from her father's tainted legacy. (Yes, I did totally roll my eyes when I wrote that.)


In the game, you offer the chance to BE Tim. 

We come to the first idea of the lesson:

I. Know the audience. I like the word 'know' more than the word 'consider' here, because you have to be a little deeper and diligent in your thinking. You have to know the sort of people you're talking to, and know what makes them receptive and what turns them off.

In the above 3 products, you're not talking to the same audience 3 times. The book has one group, the script a second and the third a completely different pool. Yes, they may overlap in some regards, but many of those overlaps don't really concern your pitches (they all wear socks, they all think the Star Wars prequels are awful, etc)

Here's the second idea:

II. Find the 'hook point' of the audience. When you think about your audience, the ideal group of people/consumers/aliens/humans who have purchased your product, there were several things that led them to pick up your creation and give you money for it. But of all the factors that contributed or led to the sale, ONE was special for them. That one item (hopefully a USP) 'hooked' them. 

A hook point is the moment where they shift from aware-of-your-product to interested/wanting-your-product. Ever audience has them. When I say audience, I mean at both the macro (group) and the micro (the individual) level.

This is where people freak out. They see that they have to hook the audience, think that their material is rubbish, think that they cannot do it and despair. Common thinking. Absolutely wrong thinking, but it happens.

Write this down, stick it on the wall of the room where you work on your projects:

Velcro! Be the velcro!

Third idea:

III. Velcro theory. When I was a kid, velcro was a godsend. It took me quite a while to get comfortable tying shoes, and years later, that memory of the texture and sound of velcro has stayed with me.

Velcro works by connecting little loops with little hooks.

I'll say that again -- little loops with little HOOKS.

HOOKS. And loops.

Your pitch has hooks in it. Your audience has loops. That audience wants to grab onto the pitch and stick to it, following it along until they're buying your product late one night in a posh hotel suite on their way to a party. (or something, I don't know where you guys buy your games, but hey, it's life)

Build your hooks out of the USPs and whatever your natural talents are. You do have them. You may speak well. You may smile and be beguiling. You maybe express visual ideas clearly. You know your talents. Apply them to expressing your USPs.

The loops you're trying to snare are the interests of the audience, which you've discovered by knowing the audience. That book agent you've just queried, do you think they really have the time to read 800 words about Eskimo Tim? NO. You need to get right to the heart of the action and the story.

The movie producer with the checkbook? They're looking for beats and character growth. Movie Eskimo Tim better have that.

The game purchasing audience? Layout, boobs occasionally and some interesting mechanics all help. (And nice paper....and PDF support....etc) RPG Eskimo Tim has to hit some key targets

Practice making velcro. Get some paper, divide it into two columns. Call one column "Me" and the other "Them" (or if you want to be professional "product" and "audience")

Down the Me/Product column, list your USPs.
Down the Them/Audience column, write out who that appeals to. (Name them)

For example:

Eskimo Tim is a character with a troubled past
-----  people who enjoy stories about redemption


Eskimo Tim RPG is a game with dice pools and incentives
------ people with a large number of d20s


You're going to really be comfortable with Velcro for Part 4 - Pitch Autopsy.

Happy writing.