Blog Archives

Why Complete Character Charts?

Posted on Sunday, June 27, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Character charts are lists of questions that a fiction author must answer. It’s a good way to get to know their characters. The charts are the best way for an author to get to know the character and what makes…

Your Character-s Morning Routine

Posted on Sunday, March 28, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

One good way to get a handle on your characters is to figure out how they start their days. Sit down and come up with a morning routine for each of them. It can help you to bring them alive.…

Tagged with: characterization, characters, routines, writing, Writing Techniques
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Using Fan Fiction As A Writing Exercise

Posted on Sunday, January 31, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Fan fiction is the practice of writing stories for your favorite TV shows, movies, books, etc. These usually use the worlds, characters and norms created by someone else. This is perfectly legal as long as you don’t claim it as…

Tagged with: characters, fan fiction, plotting, setting, writing, writing exercise
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Starting with a Character

Posted on Sunday, August 9, 2020 by pebblepup — 1 Comment

OK, a character has popped into your head and you’ve fleshed her out into a full character sketch. Now what? Write a story around the character. How to do that? Well, ask your character. Ask the character about his ambitions.…

Tagged with: characters, fiction, Novel, plots, short story writing, stories, writing, Writing Techniques
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

How many characters does a story need?

Posted on Sunday, March 15, 2020 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

The answer is — it depends. It depends on the story itself. What are you trying to do. Are you writing a novel? Or a short story? In a short story, you can get by with a single character. Someone…

Tagged with: characters, fiction, fiction writing, plot development, short story, writing, Writing Techniques
Posted in Writing Techniques

Character Spirituality

Posted on Sunday, March 24, 2019 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

In the process of developing your characters, you should consider the character’s religion and spiritual leanings. Religion is important to a lot of people in this world and they may be readers. Religion can be a thorny issue. Now it…

Well Rounded Characters

Posted on Sunday, March 17, 2019 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

As readers we like our characters to be realistic. Authors need to add flaws and virtues to their characters in order to engage the reader with the story. We remember the characters who come alive best. Those characters have flaws.…

Tagged with: character development, character flaws, character strengths, character traits, characters
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Make Your Characters A Little Weak

Posted on Sunday, March 10, 2019 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Good character development means making your characters as believable as possible. To do that you need a mix of characteristics and traits. Make your characters beautiful and vain, homely and giving, beautiful and unassuming, ugly and evil, lovely and evil,…

Characters And Their Families

Posted on Saturday, February 23, 2019 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

As authors, we need to know everything about our characters. Most people have relationships and our characters should as well. How do your characters get on with their families? What kind of friends do they have? How do they react…

Characters at Work

Posted on Saturday, February 16, 2019 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

As authors, we want people to believe our characters are real. OK, not so much, but we do want them to be believable as people. People have jobs or careers. Our characters need jobs and careers as well. In life,…