Hi, everyone! I have the flu this week, so today's post will not be a long one. I have a question for you to ask your characters, regardless if they're good or bad: what did they want to be when they grew up?
Here's why it's important to know the answer to this question.
“When I Grow Up”: Your Character's Childhood Dreams Matter
We often struggle to create realistic characters; they don't always seem believable. We can usually recognize characters that feel two-dimensional, but we don't always know why. I'd like to submit that one of the primary reasons we have trouble with characterization is we rarely ask ourselves how our characters got where they are.
People don't simply appear in their current condition, with beliefs and biases, scars and senses of humor, and all the details that pile together to create the construct of “self.” The combination of nature (your natural inclinations) and nurture (the environment in which you matured) combine to create the essential you. Well, your characters work the same way.
What Did Your Character Want to Be?
With very few exceptions, all characters had a childhood. What did your character want to be when they grew up? When they were young, what seemed like the best future path? What job did they want? What skills did they crave? What misconceptions did they have about that job?
I, for example, wanted to be an astronaut, but I also have a learning disability that affects my math skills. No math skills = no astronaut future for me.
That was actually a hard thing to accept, but it also defined my identity. Knowing I couldn't “do” science-stuff led me to focus more on the arts, which led to taking pride in my creative ability and identifying myself as “a creative.”
That affected my choice of friends, my choice of college, my choice of reading material, and my everyday confidence. Once I self-identified as a “nerd” (i.e. geek, weirdo, strange), I altered my life's path.
Your character's childhood dreams work the same way. The success or failure of that dream (along with developing tastes or changing morals) is part of the journey that brought your characters to their place in your story.
And now, it's your turn.
What did your characters want to be when they grew up? Let me know in the comments.
PRACTICE
Take fifteen minutes and list your characters, then figure out what they wanted to be when they grew up. If you have time left, start thinking about whether they succeeded, and how that success or failure affected the rest of their lives. Post your practice in the comments below!
oh my goodness! just the title of your article has stirred some nuggets for my story!
I hope your nuggets are tasty and beautifully cooked!
Hi Ruthanne,
Thanks for writing this post! I have a character whose path is similar to yours, only the opposite: as a child she’s diagnosed with a learning disability affecting her reading and writing, which crushes her because she feels she’s let her parents down. She goes into paleontology and engineering instead. Bones and batteries don’t care how well she can read and write.
My difficulty with her is how to write her as a fully-rounded character, not as ‘the dyslexic girl’. You suggested childhood dreams as a means to flesh out characters but I’m worried that in this case, my character’s childhood with dyslexia might flatten her instead. The difficulty with characters with disabilities is not letting the disability define them. I don’t want her to become either the Bitter Disabled or the Inspirational Disabled.
To this end I’ve written a few scenes where other characters start treating her differently when they find out she’s dyslexic and she clarifies that she wants to be treated exactly the same. Still, figuring out her childhood just raises more questions. Why does she care about her parents’ approval so much? What did she want to do before she found out? Why did she choose paleontology and engineering, out of all the fields she could still do while dyslexic?
I realise I’ve written this far without actually asking any questions. I suppose my questions would be:
1. How do we write characters with a disability without letting that disability define them? (Not quite within the scope of your post, I know…)
2. How do we explore childhood dreams for characters with less dramatic childhoods? Eg characters who grew up in middle-class families with loving parents. I’m tired of reading about villains or broken protagonists who got that way because of parental abuse/neglect.
Thanks again for the post! Hope you get well soon.
Hi, Stella. I have a could of suggestions to offer here.
1. I have taught people with disabilities and have had friends with dyslexia. My father also had a severe case of it.
When I was young I used dinosaur books to teach myself how to read, and I think my father’s dyslexia later motivated me to read, read, read, read, read… I think it was such a relief to him to know I could read that he was really quite proud, and I kinda liked that. So it definitely encouraged me. If that helps you, please feel free to use it.
For portraying dyslexia, the disability does not have to define the character, but if you have given your character a disability, I expect there must be a story-related reason for it.
So one way you could do it it to find a few mispronunciation patterns experienced by some people with dyslexia. It is commonly associated with difficulties in pronouncing words. So, for example, ‘example’ may be pronounced ‘igzample’ or similar. The may affect how words starting with an ‘ex-‘ are pronounced. There are many alternatives besides.
Make these minor and you don’t even need to refer to them in the text.
2. You do have a problem here, as you have actually set up your character as having psychological issues involving her parents. You stated earlier “Why does she care about her parents’ approval so much?” which in and of itself means there are some issues involving her parents. They may be loving parents, but she at least must have some issues, or that is not going to be a problem for her.
On the topic of dream portrayal, you could try thinking about what she herself thinks of her dyslexia and what it means for her future. Her fears and apprehensions. Think also how this will (or whether it will) advance your plot.
But I think this puts the cart before the horse, as I think you need to get to know your character better. I refer you to some questions you wrote in your post:
“Why does she care about her parents’ approval so much? What did she want
to do before she found out? Why did she choose paleontology and
engineering, out of all the fields she could still do while dyslexic?”
These can only be decided by you, the author, but you could try tackling them by thinking about developmental psychology. How do children develop their ambitions? What sort of situations may create such insecurities about parents?
One important consideration is how old is she now? Thus, how long has she been dealing with this? How long has she had to harbour her insecurities about her parents? That is all pretty important.
By researching developmental psychology, you should be able to fill in the gaps, thus creating a more well-rounded, deeply developed character.
Good luck!
Hi Davidh,
Thanks for your detailed and thought-out response! I really appreciate your taking the time to write it.
Thanks for sharing how your father’s dyslexia influenced you. Happy for both you and him! I suppose the story-related reason for my character’s dyslexia comes from a similar reason to what Ruthanne blogged about.
My character in adulthood is a very successful engineer/paleontologist who’s confident and capable, but reserved and slow to trust or make friends. I wanted to give her a backstory that explains why she’s so driven but also so reserved. Both stem from her experience overcoming dyslexia. She’s driven to succeed so that nobody will look down on her, but her journey also makes her look down on people she perceives less hardworking than herself.
I know dyslexia doesn’t cause personality traits, but I’m thinking of it as an experience that strengthened existing traits in her (being strong-willed and awkward around people, to being driven and reserved.)
Also found this site because of your advice to look into developmental psychology. Thanks for the tip! http://writershelpingwriters.net/2015/08/the-importance-of-psychological-development-in-character-growth/
I am really happy to have been of help.
And thank you for the link. What I have read on it thus far has been both interesting and helpful.
As writers, psychology is one of the single most useful tools we have at our disposal. Whilst I am no psychologist, I do use what psychology I do know (or that I can research) to define all of my characters. To me, psychology is to a writer what a tape measure and pencil is to a carpenter.
One thing I have also noticed about your character which seems to fit in with dyslexia is that you say that she is “reserved and slow to trust or make friends”. My understanding is that people with dyslexia need sometimes to slow their decision making down and learn patience, so it is easy to see how she may express that in other ways.
Good luck on your story, and I hope you can fly with it!
Thanks! I’ve never thought of psychology that way before, but will certainly be paying more attention to it from now on. Wish you all the best in your writing too!
As a kid, my 58-yr-old protagonist wanted to make people laugh. Though he took comedy training, he became an artist, but still he is someone for whom the question: “Am I funny?” seems to run his life. I’m glad I’ve actually worked this into my story, because I can see how it deepens the character, to have this ghost in the closet. I guess the whole novel is about humour because it’s titled: “How to Die Laughing.”
Fantastic title!
Sounds like a great backstory for an interesting character.
I recently published on my blog the first two chapters of a 3 chapter story. The purpose of the story was to help adults see the suffering of a child through the the child’s eyes. I don’t think I really achieved what I set out do. One of the reasons I failed was probably because I focused more on the present with the child and didn’t bring in past or future. This post will really help me with chapter 3. It should be published on my blog the first Sunday in July. Thanks for your help.
This is not the sort of thing many seem to ponder about their characters, so thank you for this post.
My protagonist Clio always wanted to dance variable gravity ballet and write poetry. She wanted to get away from her family troubles with her mind in verse and her body in dance. She wanted to feel the cool air brushing through her hair, across her face, down and through her entire body. She wanted the bracing clarity of Being that only dance ever gave her. She also wanted her mind to dance with poetry. With the right amount of poetry and dance, she felt as if she might melt into the beauty she saw around her and to fall away from the pain of her discordant home.
Zac kept changing his childhood ambitions, but one that stayed with him was to be the zoologist he eventually came to be. He was entranced by the old stories of those things called ‘rats’ that became extinct during the gene hacker wars, and wanted to understand them: how they became so common, and how something so common could be lost so easily.
Taryn wanted to be a musician, always listening to the rhythms of the world around her. She found rhythm to be a means of counting answers to life’s great questions, always seeking to see the mathematical patterns in nature and even in the ways people communicate with each other. She also felt drawn to taking up the saffron to become a Buddhist monk in the Mahayana tradition. She felt this one day when she saw a local monk providing comfort to a dying pigeon-vole. The way the monk took all of the panicked bites and nips from the dying animal, all the while singing it to peace, made her ponder about the spiritual, unscientific side of things.
François-Eugène wanted to grow to be the great warrior he became. Designed to be a warrior, and with generations of genetic engineering to refine his warrior traits, he had little real choice. Even the choice to become a warrior was engineered into him. He could no more choose a non-military life than he could choose a non-breathing one. Phorries have no childhoods. They only have Basic Training.
At the age of six, my protagonist Amal wanted to become a ‘children’s doctor.’ She would never order hurtful injections. Instead, all the children would be given lollipops when entering and leaving her clinic. At the age of ten, she wanted to become the third female President of her country. The first two ruled hundreds of years ago, it was time for another one. Her dad would be proud and might even write articles about her in the same way he wrote about his fiercely strong mother.
When she became a teenager she realized the absurdity of that unattainable dream. She decided she wanted to become a flight attendant so she could see the world. She loved traveling and this way she would tour the world for free. She thought it was genius, but her intellectual father was unimpressed. “At least aim to become a pilot, not a sky waiter.” In the ninth grade, she aimed to become a medical doctor, but by the time she graduated high school, her weak science skills dissuaded her.
When she entered college, she couldn’t declare a major. She had many aspirations, but little confidence to pursue her dreams. She needed money, so she began teaching English to ‘boaters’ from her father’s country. Since then, she became an English teacher, specifically English as a second language. She wasn’t a flight attendant but traveled the world teaching. She wasn’t the President, but in her classroom she ruled with an iron fist. She wasn’t a medical doctor, but in her classroom she handed out lollipops every Wednesday.
Despite the odds against her, she DID achieve, live her dreams. I love it.
Excerpt from the first chapter of the “work in progress”. Protagonist is now 77 years old, getting into his own little airplane for a short flight to where his cousin ( and BFF, Albert) lives.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Funny, how out of all the people in The Pocket, only Albert and I had ever wanted to fly. This love of airplanes struck us both at the same instant when we were only five. It was a summer day and we were playing in my parents’ back yard when it happened.
Out of nowhere, we heard it! And it was low! The engine was sputtering and missing and we ran to climb the fence just in time to see it land in the hay-field behind the schoolhouse. We climbed over the fence and ran to see this yellow marvel. By the time we got there, a young man in an army uniform was getting out of it and he asked us if we knew where he could find a telephone. We both pointed to my family’s house without words. Albert and I were simply awe-struck by this vision, and at that moment we both knew we wanted to fly.
– – –
From second chapter:
“I sure wish I had me a real airplane,” groaned my best friend, Albert, that hot summer day from the tall weeds he was lying in beside the creek. Even his dog, Bones, was lying listlessly, only flapping his tail occasionally, being half-fed on the leftovers
from our lunches of cold chicken and cornbead.
“Yeah, me too.” I swatted ineffectively at a horsefly that kept landing on my sweaty arm. Ten-year old confidence and hope swelled up in me and I bragged, “Then we could be flying around up there where the air is cool and all, and I wouldn’t have these damned horseflies to bite me.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
It is my belief that a solid character arc, like any constructed object, needs a somewhat solid foundation on one end or the other to maintain itself in position long enough to hang a good story on it. And a good buttress along the way only serves to strengthen it. In this case, the foundations are seen at the beginning.
I wonder how to put that on the other end – run the story and then demonstrate the foundation. That would be the work for someone with more experience than myself. Heck, this works for me now, I’ll not mess with what seems to work well enough.
(I took a half hour for this one)
My character is in his thirties. He went to seminary, thinking he wanted to be a pastor. But shortly after becoming pastor at a small local church, he began to realize perhaps this wasn’t what he had had in mind. In this scene, he’s explaining those early years and his current struggles to a close friend.
“I’ve wanted to be a pastor ever since I was a little kid. We’d go to church on Sundays, and I’d sit in the pew next to my mom and dad, and the preacher would come out on stage in these long, black robes, and he had this voice that just had…an authority to it, and when he spoke everybody was quiet and thought what he said was important. I remember his words ringing in the space around my head, and even when I didn’t know what they meant, I knew he was right. He was from God, and he was telling us how we needed to be, and he was right.’
‘So, to be honest, little Rob was probably in it for the power. And for the food.” He laughed. “Pastor Martin would come over to our house for Sunday dinner about once a month, and my mom always went all-out to give him his as much of his favorite foods as he could handle. She made the best biscuits, and in the summer she always made a cherry pie, and he could have seconds and even thirds if he wanted it.” His arms spread wide.
“And I just thought, ‘That must be the best life ever!’” He laughed.
“There was more to it as I got older, of course—although mashed potatoes will always have a strong pull on my heart,” he admitted, amused.
“But I remember when Pastor Martin used to eat with us, he had this quiet authority that just seemed to infuse everything around him. When Pastor Martin ate potatoes, it was different from when I ate potatoes. And when he talked to my parents, he talked to them the way adults talk to each other, and his words spread this quiet, inconspicuous grace to them.”
He paused, considering. “It’s difficult to explain, and I didn’t really realize that it was happening until I got older. But my mom would be all excited after he left, asking my dad if the pie turned out okay and wondering if maybe it was time to buy a nicer set of dishes. But as she washed up, and when she sat in her special chair in the evening–she had this special chair that only she would sit in–she’d get reflective, and quiet, and more…more at peace. I didn’t notice that part until I got older, of course, but that’s really what drew me in when I was old enough to understand it. I wanted to speak grace to people and have my words slowly resonate out, like when you just gently strike a bell with a little mallet, you know?” He demonstrated with a quick, precise flick of his hand.
“You know how you can just feel the sound rippling and vibrating slowly outward, until the whole bell is vibrating and gives off this sound? I wanted my words to resonate through people like that.”
Wow, tough. Very tough. My characters live in first century Rome, and I can’t speak for half of them, because they were actual real people (the Disciples of Christ).
But for those who are fictional, in the book I just published on Kindle, (the same series I’m writing book 2 for currently) there were four:
Marcus, the protagonist, wanted to be anything but a Roman soldier, which is what he became.
The other three, Justus, Lucas, and Felix, all were predestined to be soldiers as well, and were okay with it. None of them had dreams about what they wanted to be, because from the day they were born they were destined to be soldiers of Rome.
(Although at least two of them – Felix and Lucas – wanted to be soldiers.)
Writing historical fiction (especially that long ago) is always difficult because the farther you go back, the less you know. But from what I’ve researched, nobody ‘dreamed’ of what they’d be – they became what they were told to become. And in their case, they became soldiers, guards in Jerusalem during the crucifixion.
You have made a very interesting point in this about “what things were like” however I feel compelled to ask…
How much licence do you feel you can take to connect an historical piece of fiction to a modern reader? You might be right, but I have a hard time believing that children, even first century children, didn’t have dreams and aspirations. Even if those dreams were overshadowed by what must be.
It is a tricky question though, especially in the structured world of historical fiction.
As a writer of SF, I sometimes create characters who are not themselves human, but nonetheless must have humanity if they are to be characters.
That which is human aspires and fears. That which is human dreams.
The century in which a human lives does not make he or she any less or more human, so I agree with you, Rodgin K.
That said, any dreams you do portray in story need to be culturally relevant if they are to be credible.
It is tricky, and I’m brand-new at historical fiction writing (just published my first book on Amazon). However I’ve read a good deal of it, so I’m familiar.
I think the general license that we have is that, no matter who we are or what point in time we live in, humans are humans. People have emotions, feelings, reactions…
We were all created the same, and we (I believe) have not evolved into different creatures. If I lived in AD 1, I would still have a personality. The whole idea of whether or not they had dreams growing up depends on how they were raised. Were they brought up in an environment where dreams weren’t an option?
What I use to connect with readers is emotion: fear, joy, anger, sadness, etc. These have always existed, and in that manner, we are exactly like those who lived 2000 years ago.
The compulsion to obey, follow rules was so dramatic in ages where there were no unemployment support, etc. In this sense we are pampered into an – at times – unrealistic expectation of dreams, aspirations, of reaching for the Moon and beyond. Who ever had the strongest muscles, welded the sharpest axe/sword – he was the one who could reach for his dreams (of his local world domination).
And don’t even get me started on what women, girls were allowed to dream. Just thinking of this makes me feel at least 3,000 years old!
I see why few would dream of what they may become when that was generally laid out for them, but they must have dreamt of something.
Perhaps they dreamt of the husbands or wives they may have, or the children they may produce, the animals they may own, the wedding they may have, the battles they may win, the parents they may honour — or dishonour (as nightmares must surely have existed).
Whatever they dreamt, those dreams can help to define them, characterise them, taunt them, challenge them, inspire them or terrorise them.
True, you have offered some very valid points. That’s why I love commenting on here – I love reading responses!
What you said really makes me think. Today, we think of dreams like modern kids have – of careers, stardom, etc. It’s hard to relate to those in history. But they might have dreamed of winning battles, becoming great and powerful men.
Thanks for sharing!
You are welcome!
Of course another interesting notion is the question of the dreams of slaves.
In first century Rome, slavery was very common, and my understanding was that the relationships between slave and owner in the Roman Empire was not what we may expect from our 21st century vantage points.
It would be interesting to explore that: the dreams of slaves in a culture that didn’t question the propriety of slavery.
It’s only 300 years since the propriety of slavery was being questioned.
Yes. And it would be interesting to explore the dreams of slaves in a culture that didn’t question the propriety of slavery.
I agree with the points the other commenters have made – at this period in history, people had stricter expectations placed on them from birth to maintain the social order, but children still have their dreams, even if those dreams must be repressed. In fact, this could make for a poignant flashback in your story of a character’s younger self having their dreams crushed by reality.
Well put.
Excellent post. I have always known their dreams, but it never occurred to me to articulate or discuss them. By looking at the protagonist’s dream of wanting to be a father and protector, I can more fully flesh out what is at stake if he fails. Similarly, by looking at the foil’s dream of wanting to be a pro BB player and failing, I can then understand and explain why he is always so disgruntled. Thanks for this insight.
I feel that this is even more important when dealing with a villain you wish to make the reader empathise with. Someone you go “Man, this guy is really just X” until they do things you can’t justify. However, it would be applicable to any character.
Arcus Firefly is an elf. He is still relatively young by elf standards (think 28ish in human equivalent), and has been sent back to be a liaison with between the Queen and the druids.
I don’t have his earliest years and childhood dreams figured out (though I will be approaching that next as I have time left) but as a teen/young adult he and his sweetheart made grand plans to run away from the capitol and the fast paced political life of intrigue and indulgence and live a simple, quiet, “better” life among the druids. When he had his opportunity he left, following the plan. He waited a year for his beloved only she never showed. She couldn’t leave it all behind and instead left him.
As a younger child, Arcus often dreamed of returning things to the “old ways”. He wished to be like the heroes in the folk tales he was raised on, taming dragons and keeping the hordes of barbarians at bay with nothing but his blade and a few friends. As the politics became more dastardly around him and the technology continued to progress, he dove deeper into the stories, doing his best to keep himself firmly rooted in the past.
While he was of noble blood, he and a few others of his age found themselves rapidly lost to the others of their peer group who continued to seek ease and pleasure. Arcus continued to avoid these things, instead seeking all knowledge of the old ways, which led him to the druids and his grand, unfulfilled plans.
He most certainly views his dream as a failure as he has spent the last decade alone, living with and like the druids. It is his past connection with the capital that gets him sent back as a liaison. He is now bitter, with his only true hope being in his beloved pulling him out of the pit his life (and more importantly life view) has sunken into.
Would love to read this!
Nice prompt, Ruthann! I interviewed all of my main characters on the subject:
SAM: I always knew I wanted to be a mechanic. I started helping at my parents’ auto shop as soon as I was big enough to pick up a tool and I fell in love with it.
ANITA: Same! My family works on the plantation back home; my mother works in the fields and my father flies a crop duster. When I was really little I helped in the fields and then when I turned ten Pita started teaching me to fly the crop duster. And it was just – the first time I took off I knew that was what I had to do, you know? I was just meant to be a pilot. What about you, Doc?
LEIKO: I, uh – I actually wanted to be a priestess, when I was little, or a nun.
ANITA: Really?
LEIKO: Yeah. I was really religious when I was kid, but I ended up deciding it wasn’t for me. I wanted to honor my beliefs and still be out in the world. So I turned to medicine. How about you, koibito?
SHANNON: When I was real small, I wanted to be a miner like my pa. That was what you did where I’m from, didn’t really know any better. But then I met Briar Ashley. She was the sheriff at that time, and came to the house to break up a fight ‘tween my folks – wouldn’t be the last time either. I just took to her. She was kind to me and my sister, and I found myself wantin’ to help folk like she helped us. One thing led to another, and when she passed on, I ended up sheriff. Your turn, Pilar.
PILAR: I wanted to get married and have a family. Didn’t think much beyond that. Cap’n?
KAYA: I wanted to fight dragons.
A couple of years back I wrote a song that sort of linked to this. Can’t share it one here since it isn’t in English. It dealt with how we forget all the dreams that we had for ourselves and how we never really end up where we want to in life.
Here is a very poor and direct translation:
“How did I forget the dreams of a man, the heart of a child, holidays on the farms and the smell of tobacco. Late night stories on grandpa’s lap and a warm bed that waits”
I have always tried to incorporate a similar technique in my short stories, etc. but found it very difficult to do it in a realistic way. The story I am working on is an existential short story where the protagonist simply wanted to enjoy the magic and beauty of life, his dream was to share that with like minded people but where ever he looked he merely saw shadows of the past in places where he used to live that dream, (He runs a book store b.t.w), such as the rickety coffee table in the corner that gathers dust are the sofa that only seats ghosts.
His love for the written work had drove him to buy a struggling second hand book store, but the shelves had become little more than sepulchers for the sundry of books that call them home. Through the window he can see a thriving coffee shop, where he constantly notices how mundane and vain life had become, since technology had removed the need or want to read a hard-copy, rather staring into a screen. He knows how he can fix his life but is reluctant to do so.
I guess the trick is to actually take a look at our own lives (the dream, the path, the destination) so that we can better understand the concept. I think it would be far easier to write a realistic character after we understand the river of life, with all its streams, waterfalls, rapids and pools.
Your character needs his dreams! How does he fix his life?
He feels that he can grasp his dreams with a simple wave of his hand, but chooses to shelter it in the artificial warmth of his pocket. The context is quite important to understand the wave. The story deals with how we stay in our comfort zone instead of taking risks in order to reach our dreams.
The problem I found was not so much in describing his dreams or how to reach them but rather in conveying them in a realistic way.
In my first book, The Wolf Pack, my protagonist was orphaned and became a street child. He was later found by a magician who apprenticed him. He was a wild child who found the discipline of magic very difficult, but wanted nothing more than to become a fully qualified mage, which he did.
Having trouble with my iPad so had to start a new comment!
I can’t imagine creating a character without knowing about their history. It seemed to come instinctively to me, even before I knew anything about writing and was just beginning my first book. I know the background of all major characters and many minor ones too.
Hope you feel betterRuthanne! A personal response to this post: I had daydreams as a child of becoming an actress. I was shy, introverted, quiet but on a stage I could become any character I wanted. It changed my future personality. I can see how consideration of dreams enables a character to blossom. Thanks for this post!
Akiko Yamada was born into a family of spies. From early on, she was trained in espionage, and has never known anything else. Her parents instilled her with their own moral values. Though only fifteen, she very likely will follow in her parent’s footsteps.
Tom Olsen makes a decent living as a car salesman for a major car dealership. Buisness has always fascinated him, and he has long dreamed of owning his own business, if he can just figure out what he wants to do. He may become a small business owner yet.
Kathleen Oetker Olsen wanted to be an engineer, but she met Tom in college and the dream seemed to fade.
Raymond Kasprowicz admired the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lou Ferrigno, and Fanco Columbu as a child. He saw himself as the next Mr. Olympia. As a teenager he did compete in some local bodybuilding competitions, but he never did very well. His passion for health, fitness, and discipline led him to become the successful martial arts instructor he is today.
A great cast of characters! A story that brings such different people together will be very interesting indeed!
Thanks. This story started with one character, Akiko. As part of her back story, she was rescued from a fire and had little memory of anything before that. I needed foster parents, so I created the Olsens. Then, as a key to help unlock her past, I needed a martial arts instructor. It has been an exciting trip of discovery for me, and I hope I’ll be able to deliver that to my readers.
Isaac Varshvarsky was destined to be Britain’s 1978 100-meter-dash Olympic champion. His father ingrained the idea in Isaac’s head since he was born and Isaac never wanted anything else in the world besides becoming a champion. Because of this pressure put on him from when he was younger, he always told himself his body was a liability, and soon his body became the only thing good about him. He denies his sexuality in fear that it would be bad for his image and career and pushes everyone else away except his father, who is the only person condoning and encouraging Isaac’s dark mentality.
Sounds like a compelling backstory!
Thank you for this Ruthanne! I was only thinking of writing up to maybe 600 words for this practice. I’m at 3000 words, and it’s just the beginning! You got my creative juice flowing with this one.
I applied this to my most recent charater. He feels justified in causing havoc in a big hospital. His beloved grandfather died, while the nursing staff were involved in change over to the night shift. I added to the story comments – where relevant – of how he would go out hunting with his grandfather. How the older man taught Joel of honouring the importance of Life, of a clean kill, of never killing more game than you need for your table. Of how to move silently, in the manner of Ninjas. It has filled my story into relevance. thank you, Ruthanne, for this post. Most useful.