Happy Wednesday, everyone! Today I’m so honored to have my friend and fabulous romantic suspense bestseller, DiAnn Mills, guest posting today. When I was an aspiring writer, DiAnn was such a person of inspiration. I admired her talent and her kind and outgoing personality. I know you’ll enjoy hearing from her today!
Our characters can be stubborn. Just when we think we know them inside and out, they toss us a wrench. We struggle to push them into a storyline that forces them to change and grow—or slide downhill as in the case of antagonists—then they behave contrary to how we sketched them.
We work hard at shaking them inside out to ensure they are unique, memorable, and fit the plot and genre. Our goal is to achieve the proper balance of complexity in an unpredictable story.
What causes characters to spin in the opposite direction?
Sometimes the problem with our characters is not what we believe about them, but what they believe about themselves.
Lies, big and little, influence the character’s dialogue, behavior, and how they journey through our story.
What are some of these lies? These pesky confidence-destroyers and killers of relationships, careers, views of God, and distorted truth stop our characters from reaching their full potential.
Your characters have a rich backstory that has molded and motivated them into who they are in chapter one, line one of the story. Every moment has the potential to create misconceptions about life.
For example, your character may believe:
- I have no choice but to be perfect.
- Life isn’t fair.
- I’ll never be happy unless I have lots of money.
- Everyone is out to get me.
- God’s love must be earned.
- Morals are a personal preference.
- Relationships are 50/50. Any less and I’m outa here.
- The only way for someone to love me is for me to take care of them.
See what I mean?
How characters respond and initiate action regarding their lies show who they are. You can use these additional internal issues to add stress, tension, and conflict to the story. Create situations that force characters to face their lies head-on and you demonstrate powerful crafting.
How does a writer find the resources to help their characters out of their psychological mess? I use psychology books, consult psychologists, and research quality websites that focus on human behavior and counseling techniques.
Writers may need to stick their characters into a chair and find out how and why they are misbehaving. When you discover what prompted their lies, establish means to get rid of them. The result is an unforgettable novel that will entertain and inspire readers.
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Question for you:
What lies do your characters believe? Leave a comment below.
About DiAnn Mills:
DiAnn Mills is a bestselling author who believes her readers should expect an adventure. She creates action-packed, suspense-filled novels to thrill readers. Her titles have appeared on the CBA and ECPA bestseller lists; won two Christy Awards; and been finalists for the RITA, Daphne Du Maurier, Inspirational Readers’ Choice, and Carol award contests.
She is the director of the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference and the Mountainside Retreats: Marketing, Speakers, Nonfiction, and Novelist with social media specialist Edie Melson. Connect here: DiAnnMills.com
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So thrilled to have DiAnn with us today! Hope you’ll enjoy her fascinating post on characters and will take time to say hi and welcome her.
Great post, DiAnn! Thanks so much for visiting our blog today. 🙂
Wow… So good. My character in my recent novel holds very strong, very conservative views of herself. She also has trouble believing that she’s anything special. She sees God as someone based on how well she follows the rules. Of course, everything she believes is turned upside down. Her male counterpart has a ‘hero’ complex and is weighed down with guilt that he hasn’t been as ‘good’ as he could have been, that he wasn’t in a certain spot he should have been. His journey will be addressed more in the second book. But it’s been fun to help Cady discover her self worth and how God really doesn’t love her just for her ability to follow the rules.
Hi Anne,
Thanks for dropping by 🙂 Sounds like a really strong story! Thanks so much for sharing.