Book description
Vivid and memorable characters aren't born: they have to be made
This book is a set of tools: literary crowbars, chisels, mallets,
pliers and tongs. Use them to pry, chip, yank and sift good characters
out of the place where they live in your imagination.
Award-winning author Orson Scott Card explains in depth the
techniques of inventing, developing and presenting characters, plus
handling viewpoint in novels and short stories. With specific
examples, he spells out your narrative optionsÂ-the choices you'll
make in creating fictional people so "real" that readers
will feel they know them like members of their own families.
You'll learn how to:
- Draw characters from a variety of
sources
- Make characters show who they are by the things
they do and say, and by their individual "style"
- Develop characters readers will loveÂ-or love to hate
- Distinguish among major characters, minor characters and
walk-ons, and develop each appropriately
- Choose the most
effective viewpoint to reveal the characters and move the
storytelling
- Decide how deeply you should explore your
characters' thoughts, emotions, and attitudes
