Characterization Aid

[foeofthelance]

I recently posted a series of chapters of one of my works on another site. Sorry, but it is a bit of military/comedy themed SF, and doesn't qualify as naughty enough to be posted here. Am I forgiven?

Anyway, I got several reviews back, mostly criticizing my descriptiveness. As in, I was giving too much. Ok, easily fixed.

Then I got some more reviews. It seemed my characters were unbelievable, uninteresting, and a while ot of other un- words that weren't very charitable. I don't mind, I asked for harsh criticism if it was merited.

But the problem is, how do I fix it? I can explain the characters well enough (Bright, if overconfident, SF addicted gamer as the narrator, with a bright, if a bit hesitant, co-ed as the female lead. The support cast consists of one politically minded Alien Prime Minister, one timid Alien Biologist, one antaganistic Alien engineer, and two "enhanced" wolves who the have the personalities of really innocent-yet-vicious four year olds. Think a lot of 'Why?' questions coupled with the willingness to disembowel or decapitate anyone who threatens their newfound "pack".)

What I need to do is find someway to make them seem more real. The story is being told from a first person point of view, so I think it would be best done by their tones of voice and dialogue, but I think I may be missing something.

Any suggestions? (If anyone wants to read, PM an email address to send it to. Just remember, this isn't exactly adult, nor is it fanfiction.)

[Madame Manga]

Just from the quick descriptions (probably not fair, but let's look at this from the hostile reader's point of view) I think I may see what your critics mean.

#1: "a bright, overconfident SF-addicted gamer". My first reaction, knowing absolutely nothing about you, is to suspect self-insertion; on the face of it that sounds like every kid who ever dreamed of writing a SF story... or Wesley Crusher. Talk about a millstone around the character's neck! What are the individual traits and history that make him different from all those other irritatingly bright yet socially impaired young gamers out there? What are his genuine human weaknesses? (Overconfidence is not a weakness in the context of a SF story, because it's nearly always just a mechanism to help the writer carry the plot forward. Characters who say, "No, let's NOT investigate what's behind that door" don't get much accomplished.) Whatever you come up with had better be damn enticing and well-thought-out if a reader's going to like this guy or be interested in what he does.

#2, the "hesitant" female sidekick, is another big red flag. It sounds like she's mostly there to try to hold back the bold young fellow with her feminine timidity, and scream when confronted by monsters and/or kidnappers. Maybe that's not what she does, but her counterparts in a thousand bad animes and novels have done so for decades. That sort of character has never been anything but a device to get the hero involved in the plot, or to provide a little eye candy. She is also good for pissing off nearly every female reader, and a lot of the males as well.

And so on. When characters are there mostly to act out your cool plot, and don't have much to them other than their immediate function in the story, they're going to be flat. Round them out independently of the plot before you ever start to write the actual story. It's only once you know who they are -- and I mean down to the ground -- that you know how they will behave when confronted with the situations you're going to give them.

Of course you will tailor your characters to the sort of story you want to tell -- you'd better not have a literal-minded, unobservant guy trying to solve an intricate mystery, for instance. He'll get nowhere. But slotting a round peg into a round hole is dull and predictable. How about something more like "Timid, nonviolent guy has to come out of his shell to fight monsters alongside an exuberant, martial-arts trained girl he secretly likes, but who thinks timid guys are useless wimps"? Conflict is the name of the game -- people need genuine obstacles to run into, genuine problems to solve, and genuine growth to make in the process.

If your reaction to this is, "But I see characters like mine in SF all the time", well, most SF is pretty bad, even the pro stuff. Don't imitate the bad. Try googling for fictional character creation, or general fiction writing help. There are a lot of online resources out there...

-MM

[Guest WFK]

I'm not an expert, granted, but the old line of '90% of what you say isn't coming out of your mouth' is kinda true. If your character is 'hesitant' in their personality, MAKE them hesitant with their actions. Don't make them answering things right away, build upon their inner doubts.

If your character is stubborn, then MAKE them stubborn, with their choices. If they believe something to be true, don't allow anything to change their minds (if they are THAT stubborn)

If your character is dynamic or charismatic, have them around people who are attracted to charisma (pretty much any person), their lines should be smooth, their thoughts should be too. Their actions should be anything that could and would sway a crowd.

Um, hope it helped

[foeofthelance]

Actually, the characters are coming out more as:

Male Lead: Voice of experience. Years of gaming plus years of Scouting have given him an odd yet rich pool of history from which to draw ideas and suggestions.

Female Lead: Actually a bit smarter then the male lead, just not as willing to take control. Aliens and talking wolves and ray guns, oh my! But hey, as long as she knows what to shoot, she's good. (She's there as much to give him another person to talk to as she is there to provide a romantic entaglement later on.)

Alien Lead: Smart and political, but clueless in certain areas, but eager to learn to make up for it.

Wolves: The support squad

Alien Crew: Fluff, and a bit of sympathy at certain points.

[Guest WFK]

So the girl acts at least in some part as a focus for the main character, from what I got. I think that's an element of good writing. Let the characters play upon each other, and slowly reveal themselves. And as far as the fluff minor characters, I think it's okay to have flat characters at times, if only to further illuminate your theme and plot, etc.

Humans/Humanoids *ususally* change though, so just when you think you know the character, they can show a new side to themselves, when in the most dire of situations...the fight, or flight theorum, can bring out your characters like no other!

[foeofthelance]

Change? Nah, they're already set, I just wished they would tell me the bloody choices they made! It is a bit of a pain in the ass when your female lead refuses to tell you who she ended up picking to fall in love with.

[Guest WFK]

LoL. No joke right? You could bounce between forever, like Pong without progress. And that's what it feels like sometimes.