Tuesday, October 6, 2015

What My WIP Is Teaching Me

I am so excited about my WIP, which is a fantastical thing.

The fact that I'm excited, not the WIP. Necessarily.

It's a full blown high fantasy, full of magic and mystery and milk. Milk? Yes, milk. Actually, no, there's no milk, but "milk" starts with "m" and I was looking for another m word so I just stuck with that. What even is this paragraph?

This WIP presents a lot of firsts for me. I've been learning so, so much while writing and these characters have been stretching me in ways I didn't think was possible. I've realized that a lot of my characters are copies of each other as well. And it's not just me--I've come to realize this is how it is in most books. Even in books where we're lucky enough to come across a unique MC, the supporting characters all fall back into either black or white. Or vice versa. Unfortunately, people are neither black or white; our personalities are millions of shades of gray. There is so much originality in our world!

I've been working really hard on communicating that originality. I've been focusing a lot on the speech and reactions of certain characters. Also, I've been working hard on withholding information. In the movie The Lady in the Water (really bizarre movie, never watch it), there's a character who is a film reviewer or something like that. After coming home from a movie premier, he says that the movie was terrible because everyone walked around and said what they thought.

That really struck me. I'm an extrovert, and I definitely say what I think a lot...but I probably don't communicate fifty percent of my thoughts. Characters are really two-dimensional (if not even one-dimensional) when there is no distance between mind and mouth.

My MC is definitely more introverted than extroverted. That's been weird to write, because usually I write extroverted MCs. However, writing an introverted MC has taught me a lot. One, I can't rely completely on dialogue to tell the story. Dialogue is one of my biggest strengths, but a lot of times, I let it overpower my descriptions of the setting, body language, etc.

My dialogue has improved even more, though. I also had the realization that all of my characters talk similarly. Again, not realistic!

There is a large cast of characters in this WIP, and I was worried about making them all the same. Additionally, I was concerned that they would all just get lost and my readers wouldn't be able to tell the difference between them or remember them.

I've fixed this by the different things that they say. For example, I have one character who says everything twice. I have another one who never speaks besides when spoken to, another who asks a million questions, and other one who just talks constantly to fill the silence. Of course, these are general, but I've fleshed them out more in the story (as you'll hopefully see some day!) I've found that it's important to figure out how the character expresses himself verbally in the stages of pre-writing character development.

So! My mind is full of different characters, plot points, and great motivation for writing. Unfortunately, life has been absolutely crazy, so I haven't had as much time to write as I would like. However, I'm inching closer to completion...one word at a time.

What has your writing been teaching you lately?


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12 comments:

  1. Great post Anne Marie! I constantly worry that all my characters sound the same too - I deliberately try and write characters out of my comfort zone (e.g. my MC is an extrovert, I'm not) and I like to think that somehow, that injects a bit more life into them. I learnt a lot when writing my first novel - and I'm learning even more now that I'm onto my second - if anything, I have to work even harder on my characters to keep them believable/make sure they have some kind of journey throughout the three books (they tend to do what they want, which is very irritating...).
    Your novel sounds amazing btw - can't wait to read it one day :)!
    Rachel :)

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    1. Thank you, Rachel! I think it definitely does inject more life, as well as make us writers think more, when we write characters that are opposite to ourselves. Nevertheless, as you said, characters will do what they want...

      And you are just the sweetest! I can't wait for you to read it.

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  2. Wonderful post. I have to make sure my characters don't talk like me ☺. I have to pull out the word "really" a lot and use more common words and slang. So not me but makes my characters more real and more accessible.
    I will have to challenge myself and add a character that is not like me or my friends in any way and see where that takes me.

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    1. Thanks, Kathryn! I love what you said about it not being you...as writers, we really have to leave our comfort zones when it comes to speech and a whole host of other things.

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  3. Um...there should definitely be milk in your story. I was so excited for a second there. :)
    I mean, what would LOTR be without drinks at the Prancing Pony or mead in Rohan? Milk. I say go with it. :)
    Anyways... :) I mostly write characters who are introverted (like I am), so my one extroverted main character was a huge challenge to write. She needed twice as much editing from my critique partners to get her right, but the experience taught me so much!

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    1. Faith, you are too funny!! Oh, definitely, now milk is going to make an appearance. Thank you for sharing that experience with me and commenting!

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  4. Oh it is so hard juggling multiple characters, they all tend mix together.
    It can be fun though, as long as they have distinct personalities. I am terrible at it, and I always find that some characters sound the same.
    Writing can be such a pain XD

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    1. It really is the ultimate struggle!! Thanks for commenting, Skye =)

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  5. Great post! I enjoyed reading it! I'm going to try to keep what you said in mind when I really start writing again. :) I definitely want to have multiple-dimensional (is that how you say it??) ;) characters in my story, not have them all sound the same, etc.

    Oh! Just thought I'd mention... Have you heard of Braden Russell? He has a great blog where he talks about writing and gives advice, among other things. I greatly enjoy his posts! Here's the URL, in case you might wanna check it out: http://thestorymonger.com/ :)

    -Micaiah-
    adventuresbeyondthehorizon.blogspot.com

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    1. Thank you, Micaiah! Multiple dimensional (or delusional) characters all the way! I have never heard of him and I'll be sure to check him out! Thanks, girl =)

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    2. Welcome! :) I hope you enjoy some of his posts!

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  6. So exciting that you're enjoying your WIP! I hope you continue to love writing it (and maybe even editing when you get to that part ;) ) It was so neat seeing your face pop up on the ChriTeNo thread. The online world seems to get really small when I start following lots of Christian teen writers and they all pop up in the same places lol :D

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