Creating characters

Let’s be honest, the reality is that there hasn’t been a book written over the last hundred years or so that has had an original plot at its core.

Take for example the mystery / suspense / crime genre. The crime of murder is as old as time, or at the very least close to the beginning. So in reality we are just copying Moses when he wrote that Cain slew Abel in Genesis. So for us writers we are doing nothing more than reinventing the wheel.

So what makes my book different from the slew of others circulating out there?

That’s a good a question, I’m glad I asked it.

Writers are nothing more than story tellers and at the heart of any story are the characters, the antagonists and the protagonists. Who they are, and what they have experienced, is what drives the story. At one time or another we have all read a book that we kind of drifted off with after few chapters because the characters simply sucked. For whatever reason, we just could not relate to them. I know as a reader I hate that. It might have the greatest potential as far as the plot goes and then misses the mark because the conversation if too rigid or the character is too “all that” so to speak. What is so special about walking through a hail of gunfire if you are bullet proof?

At the end, heroes are everyday folks who simply rise to the occasion.

One of my favorite quotes is from General George S. Patton who said “courage is fear holding on a minute longer.”

As I was developing my characters I realized that I needed to connect to them first. If I couldn’t, how could my audience. They needed to be real, to have flaws, to have had experienced pain, to have put aside their shortcomings and found the will to forge ahead. They simply held on for that one minute longer.

I don’t know about you, but when I read a book and I don’t find myself laughing, crying or gasping, there is a strong possibility that it is going to end up in the “donation” box before I get to the last chapter.

In writing Perfect Pawn that’s what I needed to achieve, not only for my potential readers but for myself. I wanted characters with whom I could connect with. Not only in what they may have gone through in life, but in how they dealt with it and interacted with one another.

In the end it is a delicate balance, but one I believe I achieved.