Finding Characters in the Real World...like at big music festivals
Back in the summer my husband and I attended a 2-day music festival known as Rock The South and now that I've had time to digest the experience I realize two things:
First I should say that you couldn't have asked for a better collection of people. The group we sat with were great people, eager to watch over our seats, and fun to chat with between shows. Even as I ventured around to the many souvenir booths, eateries, and sponsor tents dotting this 4-football field sized area, the crowds were friendly and full of excitement. This is saying a lot if you know anything about the June heat in Alabama. Normally Alabama heat mixed with booze flowing like a fountain a hundred foot from you at any given moment from lunch to midnight is a quick way to find yourself in the middle of a bad event but day one and most of day 2 avoided this chaos. Yes, I said most but we'll get to those details later.
Now back to the "Book Fodder". Most writers tend to be people watchers anyway. Personally, I'm the lady in the restaurant looking from table to table while everyone else's eyes are glued to their phones or the woman running at the park that's taking mental notes of how people interact with each other, how they are dressed, or how they go out of there way to not interact with anyone. Writers notice the subtle details around them as they work to improve their own skills of character and world building. It's part of the process and the more you write the more you'll catch yourself studying people. We can't help it!
Whether you are starting your first book or you have many under your belt you will notice that you pull characters out of the real world. Sometimes this is completely by accident like when you reread your manuscript and notice the diva chick next door looks and acts an awful lot like your sister (WHOOPS). Then there are the moments when you're sitting in a crowd, music moving everyone around you, and your eyes fall on a little, wrinkled skinned, hunched back, grayed haired woman two rolls in front of you dancing like the world around her has fallen away and only the moment she's living in matters.
People like this woman make me take note. They are the ones that inspire characters that readers truly become attached too. I wanted to know her story. I wanted her to tell me how she came to be sitting in the VIP section surrounded by people half her age and with such confidence to dance like she's living the greatest in the greatest hour of her life. Who is she?!?
Well, now that she has become our book fodder she's anyone we choose her to be. She may have lived her whole life taking care of a husband who beat her daily and she spent the morning watching the gravediggers shoveling the last heaps of dirt over him. Maybe her name is Francies and a week ago she took her final chemo treatment. Or maybe she is fulfilling a dying promise to her sister to never stop living. She is now whoever you choose her to be in your book.
I guess the main point you should take away from this post is that you must live life to write believable worlds and characters. Even if the book you're writing is full of vampires or zombies you still need to get out among people and watch how a little girl twirls her finger around her braid when she's about to ask for something she knows she's not got much chance of getting or the smile on a woman's tired face as she gives in to her begging little boy's request for a few more pushes in the swing.
You can't tie yourself to a computer day in and day out and expect that your creation is going to feel authentic if you can't say you've never witnessed or experienced the emotions you want to portray. Now I'm not saying if you're writing about a murder you should go out and kill someone? Nope! But you can understand those emotions by watching the group of people dancing near the stage at a concert and you see a guy grab another guy's girlfriend's rear-end. I was enraged for the girl, I was cheering on the boyfriend as he swung punches, and I was happy as the butt-grabbing jerk got escorted out of the pit.
Now go out and live a little!!
Happy writing <3
-Wenona
- Seeing 18 bands in 2 days is mind-blowingly AWESOME and super tiring LOL!
- 35 thousand people in one location make for some awesome book fodder.
Now back to the "Book Fodder". Most writers tend to be people watchers anyway. Personally, I'm the lady in the restaurant looking from table to table while everyone else's eyes are glued to their phones or the woman running at the park that's taking mental notes of how people interact with each other, how they are dressed, or how they go out of there way to not interact with anyone. Writers notice the subtle details around them as they work to improve their own skills of character and world building. It's part of the process and the more you write the more you'll catch yourself studying people. We can't help it!
Whether you are starting your first book or you have many under your belt you will notice that you pull characters out of the real world. Sometimes this is completely by accident like when you reread your manuscript and notice the diva chick next door looks and acts an awful lot like your sister (WHOOPS). Then there are the moments when you're sitting in a crowd, music moving everyone around you, and your eyes fall on a little, wrinkled skinned, hunched back, grayed haired woman two rolls in front of you dancing like the world around her has fallen away and only the moment she's living in matters.
People like this woman make me take note. They are the ones that inspire characters that readers truly become attached too. I wanted to know her story. I wanted her to tell me how she came to be sitting in the VIP section surrounded by people half her age and with such confidence to dance like she's living the greatest in the greatest hour of her life. Who is she?!?
Well, now that she has become our book fodder she's anyone we choose her to be. She may have lived her whole life taking care of a husband who beat her daily and she spent the morning watching the gravediggers shoveling the last heaps of dirt over him. Maybe her name is Francies and a week ago she took her final chemo treatment. Or maybe she is fulfilling a dying promise to her sister to never stop living. She is now whoever you choose her to be in your book.
I guess the main point you should take away from this post is that you must live life to write believable worlds and characters. Even if the book you're writing is full of vampires or zombies you still need to get out among people and watch how a little girl twirls her finger around her braid when she's about to ask for something she knows she's not got much chance of getting or the smile on a woman's tired face as she gives in to her begging little boy's request for a few more pushes in the swing.
You can't tie yourself to a computer day in and day out and expect that your creation is going to feel authentic if you can't say you've never witnessed or experienced the emotions you want to portray. Now I'm not saying if you're writing about a murder you should go out and kill someone? Nope! But you can understand those emotions by watching the group of people dancing near the stage at a concert and you see a guy grab another guy's girlfriend's rear-end. I was enraged for the girl, I was cheering on the boyfriend as he swung punches, and I was happy as the butt-grabbing jerk got escorted out of the pit.
Now go out and live a little!!
Happy writing <3
-Wenona
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