The Cliché of Beauty

Novelist Lionel Shriver wrote an essay where she claimed that “fiction writers’ biggest mistake is to create so many characters who are casually beautiful.”

Well, now. Them’s fightin’ words.

Because you can't possibly be as attractive as the protagonist in the book I'm reading. Even though you have the distinct advantage of being real.

But before you start pointing to the few books where there is an overweight protagonist or a love interest with crooked teeth, understand that Shriver wasn’t really telling writers they ought to make all of their characters ugly. She merely pointed out that, in fiction, we don’t think it’s strange to be in a world populated with beautiful and handsome people in a much greater percentage than we would find in the real world.

Romance novels are almost inevitable offenders here, but other genres are not excused either. Most books we read are filled with good-looking people. Shriver puts forth a few reasons why this might be. First, our culture has told us that beautiful people are more likeable, and we accept that. Second, beauty is a form of power that characters can use to get others to do things for them.

I’d add a third reason: fiction is about escapism, and almost all of us have had times where we have not felt attractive. So we want our heroes and heroines to be attractive…and we actually have control over this.

The Problem with Sexy Disney Princesses

I was reading an interesting article today that points out that, while Disney creates “strong leading female characters in its movies,” they suddenly get changed before the merchandise comes out: “they’ve all been reduced to flowing hair and off-the-shoulder dresses and coy looks in their post-cinematic incarnations.”

As I soon as I read this, something clicked. You know why Disney movie heroines are brave, wise, and kind, and the merchandise princesses are just sexy?

Because stories do something for women that images cannot.

When a princess is a picture in a coloring book, a figure to hang pretty clothes on, or a design on a notebook, she is there to look pretty. That’s the whole point. And, in just about every other area of life, that’s fine. You wouldn’t necessarily want to buy a dishware set with an imperfect pattern, or seek out wallpaper that was ugly.

Somehow, though, this standard changes change when it comes to people. We instinctively realize there’s more to them than just aesthetics. People are not lawn ornaments that we arrange around our lives for decorative purposes.

For example, take a look at the pictures you have in frames around your house, attached to the fridge with magnets, or displayed on your Facebook page. The images there probably aren’t of perfectly designed and sculpted looks, (unless all your friends are models who don’t allow any candid pictures, in which case I feel sorry for you). Those pictures are imperfect…and completely wonderful, because you know and love the people in them. They are not just images. They are people.

Putting the "Main" in Main Character

In theory, it doesn’t seem hard to establish who your main character is. After all, your main character is the main character because the reader spends the most time with him. If the story is in first person, he’s even the narrator, but at the very least, you probably get his thoughts and perspective, something you wouldn’t from other characters.

Or maybe your main character is the main character because all the stuff happens to her. She’s not just some random waitress who shows up once in the middle scene and has a few witty lines. She is the key to the whole entire plot!

Sorry, but that’s just not enough. I’ve read stories where the main character is not the main character. Sometimes, there’s a gaping hole where the main character should be. Other times, there’s a sidekick who’s practically demanding to be put in the spotlight. Either way, the story won’t work like it’s supposed to without a strong protagonist, the right protagonist. Here’s a checklist to make sure you have one—we’ll call him/her the “MC.”

15 Ways to Make Your Story More Believable

Last week, I talked about how to write convincing fiction using Aristole’s Triangle of Rhetoric. This Wednesday, the focus is on one of his three emphases: logos, or why your story should be realistic.

Actually, the why is pretty simple: people don’t like fiction that’s not believable. The how is a little bit longer. This isn’t an exhaustive list, but here’s an editing checklist of tips for making sure your story doesn’t make readers think, “Wait, what? That doesn’t make sense.”

Characters and Dialogue

• Go through the story and read through all of one character’s dialogue. Is it consistent? Is it distinct from other characters?

• When you have a child character, ask a teacher or a parent who has a child that age read the dialogue and tell you if it sounds right.

• With a dramatic revelation or a death or a love scene, try reading the dialogue out loud and see if it sounds too cheesy or not.

• If you’re writing a character who speaks only broken English, make sure the vocabulary he knows and the grammar he uses are consistent. What I usually do is figure out what I could say after two semesters of Spanish, and what grammar mistakes I would make at that point. Sometimes I literally translate what the character says into Spanish, then back again.

• Ruthlessly eliminate any information-dumps: places where you used dialogue to tell the readers something they needed to know, but that the character probably wouldn’t say out loud.

•  Villains tend to be primary offenders for unrealistic dialogue. If you understand what motivates your villain and makes her personality unique, you won’t have to resort to cliché lines. (See also the evil overlord list. This is hilarious and contains all the cliches you could possibly use with your villain.) 

• One simple, yet overlooked question: would my character be smart enough to think of this? Make sure you know your character’s general intelligence level, how perceptive they are about social things, and how good their memory is. Then keep it consistent.

• Have someone involved in theater read over your story specifically for dialogue mistakes. They usually have a pretty good ear for how people talk.

Two Questions of Motivation

I’ve mentioned before that I love the question “why?” as a writer. It allows you to make your characters more realistic, because you understand the choices they make and the thought processes that got them there.

So, as an author, I’ve found two questions that will help you understand what motivates your character. These two questions are also useful for understanding whole societies: why certain people fit in and others don’t, what the unspoken rules are, how characters can manipulate large groups of people to get what they want.

But, on a more personal level, I often ask these questions of myself, because I like to understand why I do the things that I do. Tends to cut down on the stupid choices, at least a little bit. So, when I speak of “you,” you can also read it as “your character,” and vice versa.

Three Backstory Strategies

I’ve discovered recently that the stuff that happens to a character before the start of the story is critically important, even if the reader never hears about any of it.

That’s right. You don’t need a flashback every other page (or worse, awkwardly staged dialogue intended to give the readers information) to make use of backstory. Backstory makes a character who he is when the story starts.

Think about yourself. Right now, if someone were to make a movie of your life, starting today, there would be some items of backstory they’d need to tell the audience. Who you are, how you got here, significant relationships, anything traumatic that is currently influencing you.

But there are an awful lot of things they wouldn’t feel the need to include. Not every shot from your mom’s photo album would need to be shown. Not every minute of home video would make the cut into the montage. But without those boring, unnecessary things, you wouldn’t be the same you. So they’re important, just not shown.

Hearing Myself Talk

Here’s a fun fact about writers: sometimes, we learn things as we write that we did not know before. We discover we believe something as the words form under our fingers, or we use the writing process to figure out why we believe something. Our own fictional heroes will say things that surprise and challenge us. We end up with an insight written on a page in our handwriting that we did not see coming.

Ask the nearest writer you can find if this is true. They’ll agree with me. I’m not crazy, honest.

Well, I still might be crazy. But not for that reason.

This week, I was working with a character who did not want to talk about her family or her past or anything remotely related to herself. And I learned something.

That was an extremely easy goal to accomplish, because most people like to talk about themselves.

And by that I mean I like to talk about myself.

In Which I Apologize to a Fictional Character

I’ve never been really into the whole anti-hero thing. Recently, I realized that all of the main characters in my stories, while flawed in certain ways, have some things in common: they’re intelligent, they have a strong sense of justice, and they love other people.

Right now, I’m working on a story with a character named Barton.

Barton is a rude, anti-social assassin. Not exactly my typical hero.

He’s not as smart as I am, and he’s also fairly impulsive. This is annoying because I think of all of these great, complicated plans that would solve all of his problems, but I can’t realistically make them happen because Barton wouldn’t do them. (Those of you who don't understand the idea that the characters in some way determine what the author can and can't do...just trust me on this.)

He does not work well with people. In fact, when he can help it, he doesn’t work with people at all. This is annoying because everyone knows that when you have a big challenge to overcome and several people around with different skills, teamwork is the best way to go. Not alienating everyone around you by bossing them around and insulting them. That doesn’t work out so well.

He’s probably the hardest character I’ve ever worked with. And this is annoying because it shows that I am an immature writer who has some work to do. Writing Barton made me see very clearly that I tend to give my protagonists certain traits, keep their weaknesses in areas I’m comfortable with, and make them, well, kind of like me.

The Face is the Window to the Soul

This is kind of a more specific follow up to the post I wrote about writers and creepers several months ago. It’s a very simple writing tip: watch people’s faces.

The key is being observant, noticing the little things and then knowing how to describe them later to bring a mental picture to the minds of the readers. See what people do when they’re happy, when they’re about to cry, when they’re lying (make a truce/treaty in a strategy board game if you want to see this one), when they’re about to fall asleep in the middle of a sentence, when they’re so mad they’re about to punch you in the face (okay, it would be better if they’re mad at someone else and about to punch him in the face).

What do they look like? How would you describe their facial expression, or the way their eyes look? How do you, as an outside observer, know instinctively what emotions they’re feeling? Is their voice affected too?

Then write those things.

Survivor and Stuff

Recently, several of the Focus on the Family interns have been watching an old season of Survivor. Before I started it, my perception of Survivor was some island where people ate bugs and did obstacle courses and stuff, which didn’t seem like my kind of show.

So imagine my surprise when I started to really get into it. Yes, shouting at the TV, making predictions, dreaming that night that the interns went on Survivor and someone put scorpions in my sleeping bag . . . it was pretty bad.

I finally figured out why I love the show so much. Once you look past all the drama and manipulation and backstabbing and lying, it’s really just a strategy game.

Well, actually, if you look past the drama, manipulation, backstabbing, and lying, you miss most of the strategy. That’s because it isn’t a clinical kind of strategy game where you objectively move pawns based on set rules. You’re dealing with people, and people have emotions and personalities and complexity that a black-and-white chessboard doesn’t.

In Survivor, you would think it’s all very clear-cut. There is one goal: outlasting the other competitors to win a million dollars.

But so many things complicate that goal. And the contestants themselves do most of the complicating. That’s why reality TV works—because people are interested in other people, and this gives them a chance to see a group of real-life characters as they really are, playing a game with high stakes when they’re tired, hungry, and stuck in the middle of nowhere.

The Five Hate Languages

Not going to lie, the first time I was asked which of the “Five Love Languages” I expressed the most, I immediately thought I should be choosing between Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, or French.

Romance languages. Love languages. They’re similar, okay?

I soon found out that the actual love languages are Quality Time, Physical Touch, Words of Affirmation, Gifts, and Acts of Service. Then I was talked into taking an online quiz (with such subtle, soul-searching questions as, “Do you feel valued when people affirm you?” or “Do you enjoy receiving gifts?”).

Apparently I enjoy spending time with people and having them say nice things about me. Which I never could have figured out apart from this invaluable assessment.

All that to say, in my humble opinion, the Internet doesn’t need another Love Language quiz. So, I decided to put my own twist on this topic. I call it, “The Five Hate Languages,” and it will help you figure out how you (or a fictional character, if you’re a writer) react to people or situations that hurt you.

Not-Actually-Official Myers-Briggs Test

Most people spend years studying psychology and getting fancy framed degrees in order to put together theories and tests like this. Me? I put on a sweater that resembles a lab coat and speak in a fake British accent as I planned out these questions (everyone knows British accents make you smarter). I could also put together a quick bar graph on Excel with made-up statistics if you like.

No? Well, then, you’ll just have to take this test as it is: a fun kinda-sorta Myers-Briggsish exercise. I tried to be as accurate as I could without being boring. (Most of these tests are as dry as a crouton.) There are four sections for each of the four pairs of traits that I’ve talked each Wednesday.

Pick whichever answer that fits the best, even if it’s not exactly accurate. They might possibly be a little exaggerated in either direction. Sorry about that. It was just too tempting.

For you writers out there, use this test on your characters too. It can be really fun. I found out that my latest narrator has the personality type that I’m supposed to marry, according to the (almost entirely bogus) analysis on one of the Myers-Briggs websites out there. Also, I asked my sister which character in that story she identified most with. She picked the one with her exact same type, even though he’s a very different kind of person than she is. Coincidence? Maybe. Anyway, it’s interesting.

And be honest with your answers, kids. You can’t cheat on a personality test, although you’re welcome to try.

Pretending to be Myers-Briggs, Part 3

When we were discussing the topic of emotions at the lunch table one day, I made the observation, “My brain can beat up my heart.”

Sometimes this is true, and I can tell my emotions to sit down and shut up. And other times it’s definitely not. I’m a thinker-feeler. I love debate and heart-to-heart conversations. My driving force is justice, or maybe mercy, depending on the day. The theological problem of evil hit me with a two-punch blow; I struggled with it on an experiential “heart” level and a logical “mind” level.

By all accounts, my personality shouldn’t exist. But it does, because we’re people, and people are more complicated than tests used to categorize them. Because I’m a thinker-feeler hybrid, though, there’s always a lot of conflict going on in this area of my personality.

It’s not a professional boxing match. It’s more like the part in Remember the Titans when Gerry and Julius start punching each other, someone casually yells, “Fight!” and everyone shows up to cheer and take sides. I’m sure it would be fun to watch my brain and my heart go at it.

Sabbath Reflections: Five Steps to Being a Character

Characters are a big deal in the writing world. I talk all the time about how to make characters seem real and endearing, how to make conflict flow out of them, and how to analyze their personalities.

However, I haven’t written about one very important character: you.

If you’re like me, you often wish you were half as interesting as the characters you create or read about. Compared to them, your personality doesn’t seem so dynamic, your comebacks so witty, and your inner resolve so…resolved.

Let me tell you a secret: I’ve always wanted to be a hero. There is a strand of the epic inside me. I want to fight for something that matters. One of my earliest memories (no joke) is a daydream of saving someone from the burning McDonalds Playplace, where I was somehow paralyzed in the process. In my four-year-old mind, it made sense.

Pretending to be Myers-Briggs, Part 2

This week, we move on to Sensing vs. iNtuition. (Yes, spell check tried to automatically correct the deviant capitalization. Fight back. The people who created this test were geniuses. Spell check is just a computerized tool. Who are you going to side with here?)

Introvert and extrovert have entered our daily vocabulary. Pretty much everyone knows what they mean, and they sound like words too, which is a bonus. But it would sound pretty dumb if I called people who fit into these next categories “Sensors” and “Intuitors.” (Although they do sound like some kind of mutant superheroes with mental powers.) So I’m going to use the terms S and N by themselves, because that sounds slightly less dumb.

Once, my sister asked what the difference was between an S and an N.  A friend of ours said, “The example most people use is how you describe something like this apple.” We decided to give it a try. Here’s how it went.

Erika: That’s an apple. It’s the size of my fist, red—probably Red Delicious—a little bruised…um…there’s a stem. There’s a sticker on the bottom. That’s all I’ve got.

Me: An apple, Red Delicious…I hate those—why do they call it delicious when it’s gross? Snow White. The Fall…except that probably wasn’t an apple. We just portray it that way because red represents temptation, which fits with the Fall. The season of fall, when you pick apples. We went to an apple orchard once, and even though they were freshly picked, the Red Delicious apples still weren’t delicious. William Tell. Newton. Wasn’t that how he discovered gravity? I think I learned that in elementary school. School. Teachers. Children’s alphabet flashcards….

And it went on and on and on.

Pretending to be Myers-Briggs, Part 1

A while ago on Facebook, a few friends of mine posted a helpful informational picture-thingie (there is probably a trendy name for this that I’m too uncool to know). Its title was “How to Care For Introverts,” and despite the fact that it made introverts sound like houseplants, I found it very interesting.

Some of the tips were “Never embarrass them in public,” “Don’t interrupt them,” and “Enable them to find one best friend who has similar interests and abilities.” (Although heaven knows how you enable that…set them up with an online best-friend-finding service that tests their compatibility?) The last one, of course, was “Don’t try to remake them into extroverts.”

Fact of life: extroverts often don’t understand introverts…and, possibly to a lesser degree, introverts often don’t understand extroverts. Being only 10% extroverted on the official Myers Briggs scale, I am going to pretend that I am in some strange middle group that is either super conflicted or mysteriously above petty personality preference distinctions. Therefore, I will dispense wise advice from my position of authority on this subject.

Sabbath Reflections: A Character Study with Micah

No, Micah is not a kind, bearded psychiatrist with a C.S. Lewis quote on his wall and calming music playing in the background.

He’s an Old Testament prophet. (Although he probably also had a beard. Or maybe that’s just my stereotype from too many flannelgraph figures and coloring pages where all the men had beards.)

One of my all-time favorite verses is Micah 6:8, which says, “He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

There it is. So simple. If you want to know where God has gifted you, why you struggle in certain areas, or why other people act the way they do, just look at this verse.

One kind of strange-sounding way I’ve applied this to my life as a writer is to use it to analyze my characters. Out of the three categories on this list, what comes easily to them and what does not?

Sabbath Reflections: The Most Boring Story of All Time

Once upon a time, there was a girl who met a guy.

And they lived happily ever after.

Lamest story ever. (And, no, cynics in the back, this does not describe every chick flick ever made. I literally mean a story that’s made of only those two sentences.)

No one would be interested in a story like this? Why? As a writer, I should give a technical, jargon-filled explanation. But, let’s face it, it’s just boring. For us to think that something actually happened in a story, there must be some opposition. We have to be afraid for the main character and wonder if he’ll ever achieve his goal, or we won’t really feel like cheering at the end. We need conflict.

Except when it’s our story.

What Mafia Taught Me About Antagonists

Just so everyone is clear, we are talking about Mafia the game. It is not, in fact, some kind of assassination spree where we smoke cigars and talk in strange accents. The basic premise is much less violent: everyone gets a card that indicates whether they are a citizen or a mafia member. Before each round, the mafia members kill someone, and at the end of each round, the citizens lynch someone, attempting to get the mafia out of the game.

Besides being a very fun and entertaining game (especially the Star Wars version), Mafia has taught me three things about making my villains more complex. Here they are:

1. The antagonists we dislike the most are the ones we once trusted.

My sister is a master of this one. When she’s the mafia, she’ll talk to people on either side of her and get them to trust her. They work together the whole game…until my sister is killed and reveals her true, sinister nature. Or, even more likely, when she wins and all the citizens are dead. Looking back, the citizens can see exactly how they were manipulated, but, at the time, they never saw it coming.

Let me tell you, that kind of backstabbing betrayal makes for a very dramatic scene. The same is true for writing. Sometimes, it’s good to have a villain we love to hate. When the sides are clearly drawn in the battle of good and evil, we all know that the guy dressed in black on the black horse with the black skull-adorned weapon is the bad guy.

At other times, though, it’s fun to use an antagonist who isn’t so obvious. When the protagonist (or even some of the minor characters) trust a character who then turns on them, that’s interesting – if it’s done well.

Playing Settlers with Protagonists

In this post, I am officially breaking every rule of writing to a general audience, including, but not limited to, avoiding insider language, being too specific and technical, and using an illustration that may not be familiar to all of my readers. I acknowledge this and accept any horrible penalties that may be inflicted upon me by the muse and/or some mysterious board of editors who police things like this.

That said, even if you’re not familiar with the board game Settlers of Catan (which you really should be), this quiz can still be helpful. Just ignore the terminology.

We’re going to do an analogy here, so track with me. In Settlers, the goal is to win the game. In your story, the protagonist’s goal is…well, whatever his goal is. As the writer, it helps to know how your protagonist will try to reach that goal, and how he will react to people who stand in the way. These kind of tendencies are the same that can be seen in others while playing strategy games. Thus the analogy.

Take the quiz for your protagonist and deal him a hand (or her, but I use the masculine here because I think he/she gets annoying).