To me, when writing, the characters usually come first. Not in the way of a name or how they look, but usually how they feel and the first action I can see them doing. I wrote HARROW CITY based on me sitting on a balcony alone, wishing I could dive into the swimming pool below. That was the start of that entire story idea. From there I pictured a girl, far from me, who was alone because she was trapped and the room behind her was her prison. Developing that, I created my witch-heir, Nova, and then Tollen, the magician, simply followed.
When I first thought about writing IMPERIAL INFILTRATION, I could imagine a servant girl moving around a dining table, collecting dishes and talking with other staff. She was small yet part of something bigger in the palace she worked at. I knew her sister had left but there was the rumour of that sister returning, but not as Aritha knew her. The names came after I had the image of that scene because I knew who I wanted my younger sister of the two to be, why she was there and what she was facing.
Upon that story taking shape, I took pieces of my own experience to better understand Aritha and what she was feeling having lost her sister. I created Aritha to be a stronger version of what I wanted to be. She'd been grieving, broken and lost, with nowhere else to turn but give herself up to a life of a servant, but she still went on. I tweeted the other day, jokingly, that I wanted a tattoo saying, "What would Aritha do?" because despite everything, she's my strong character. Her sister, Reya, is the praised one, carrying their legendary name better, going further places, but Aritha battles every day just to stay upright in the harsh conditions of the palace kitchens, serving and working. What would Aritha do? She'd take a deep breath and go on.
I'm planning a story called EVERYTHING AROUND US and some characters will be battling with something they need to overcome within themselves. I'll write them broken but then I'll write them becoming stronger. I write my characters in similar situations I've been in, in the barest sense, and then see how they overcome them to draw on that.
I don't entirely create a character off someone because once you start dropping those sorts of hints, everyone is all, "So if I'm this character, then who is this person in real life?" and that gets super annoying. But if their story fits (what I've already created) with something I know I can see and experience, I'll take a little piece of that and drop it into them.
Each of my characters represents something for me to follow and explore. Aritha shows determination that I can write when I feel like I'm losing my own. Reya is the personification of searching for something bigger and following dreams. In HARROW CITY, Nova shows being trapped in her own world and wanting to break free but being unable to, watching everyone else go about their lives when she can't. She can only remember the Before in her story. Tollen represents wanting to be someone else when he's been forced into a mould of what other people wanted him to be. He finds the strength inside of himself to break free from that.
I won't go on with a character until I can know their initial thoughts and situation. Sometimes, I see that it's something from their past and I write that down until I can pave the way forward. Other times, I see them building up from what tried to knock them down and work backwards, finding what that thing was.
Basically, I use my characters when I've fixed them in their place in a story to explore their lives and to find inspiration to go on myself.
No comments:
Post a Comment