Unique and Fresh—Just how I like them



Er, if you think I was referring to food, you're wrong. I was referring to characters. But the food thing can also apply to characters if you're a soulless meat-eating dinosaur like me.

Have y'all ever played sociologist? I think it's kind of funny how there are humans who study other humans, but luckily I don't fall into that category because I'm a dinosaur. Duh. But as I study people, I've noticed that we are all so different. I've been wondering, "How can I make my book characters unique, too? How do I make them seem more human?"  

And then I realized that diversity makes characters unique. Just as people are different from each other, characters must be also. But hold up!—Diversity is more than your ethnicity or the color of your skin. Since you can’t actually see literary characters, the primary element of diversity should be in your character’s personality. I’ve noticed two elements that appear to have the biggest impact on diversity in both people and realistic characters: traits and systems of thought.

Traits, such as optimism, shrewdness, and conscientiousness, help individualize characters. People are made to balance each other out, which means that none of our characters should be exactly the same. Sometimes this means they can be complete opposites. Sabrina and Daphne Grimm from The Sisters Grimm are one of my favorite contrasting duos. Sabrina is pessimistic and closed to the paranormal world around her; Daphne is completely accepting and totally optimistic. They balance each other out, adding dimension to each other as characters because of their contrasting personality traits.

What about characters that have the same traits? I always give my characters similar traits, and somehow they end up being the same cardboard cutout. But then I realized that characters can have the same traits as others (most people do) but where their strengths within those traits are should be different. For example, two characters are both organized and artistic. One character organizes the objects in her desk by frequent use, and the other organizes her desk by color code. The systematically organized trait is more prominent in the first character, and the second leans more towards the artistic trait.


This brings us to the second part of our little personality topic. Did you know that people think primarily on creative systems or linear systems? 

Luckily, I can give supple examples because in my family there is a good deal of both types. One of my brothers is an extremely artistic kid, but he thinks very randomly, starting an art project in one corner and then jumping to the next corner. He does things with no specific order, whereas I am always organizing things on a system. I have to have a system or I can’t function. Cleaning my desk I start from the bottom-most drawer and work my way around to the top. See the difference? While we are both organized in our own ways, the way we think is different in terms of primary system (which could probably explain why we don’t agree on much).

How people think will affect how they act. In my brother’s case, he can be scatter-brained sometimes. I can be a control freak because I have to have everything organized by my methods. Characters can have the same traits and still think differently in the same situations. As an example situation, two characters could both have the trait of kindness. They see a beggar on the road, and one’s thought is to give the beggar a ride to a shelter and the other is to offer some groceries they just bought. Systems of thought are really important as you try to keep you characters unique. Identify how your character thinks, how that would guide their decisions, and compare that to your other characters. You should be able to spot if they are becoming twins.

We covered the unique part of this post pretty well, so let’s move on to the fresh part of the meal *cough* I mean characters. What makes characters fresh? I personally love the quirky ones, like Max Ernest from The Secret Series or Willow from Counting by 7’s. Every person has a quirk. For you, maybe your quirk is carrying bubbles with you everywhere. I knew a two-year old who was obsessed with hygiene and eyebrows. Go figure. Find a way for your character’s quirk to affect the way they act. For example, one of my quirks is that I love studying the colors of people's eyes, which can sometimes be problematic. So maybe a character like that can stare at people’s eyes too long.


The second thing I notice that helps cement a character’s personality is their habits. Everyone has habits, be it bad or good. Habits can come from social settings, media, hobbies, and personal preferences. If your character plays video games late at night, maybe they have a bad habit of being wide-awake at a certain nighttime hour. If you feel your character needs something to liven them up, give them at least one bad habit or good habit and make this an active part of their personality. E.g. leaving all the kitchen cabinets open or cleaning their phone screen constantly.

If you’re having trouble coming up with quirks or habits to give your characters, check their backstory. (You might think you know it like the back of your hand, but that’s probably not true because apparently my MC has a little sister that is supposed to be very important to the plot?? Who knew. Point is, if it happens to me, it probably happens to you.) Characters with individualized backstories are more entertaining to read about because what they do in their off-page time leaks into what they do on page. Look at a character’s backstory and try to find a unique personality element—it doesn’t have to be super important to the story—and make it leak onto their pages.

Lastly, we get to find out how your character expresses all of this! People will express themselves mainly through one to two of these methods: speech, thought, or action. Going with the video game thing, a way to express themselves through speech would be to make video game references all the time. Maybe they talk more than anything. If they express themselves primarily through action, maybe they like to hold up finger guns and “shoot” fire hydrant enemies. Or if they think all the time, maybe they just think up strategies to beat the next level and draw them on scrap paper.


 So tell me about your characters. 


What are they like? 
How have you developed them to be unique and different from each other? 
Do they have any habits or quirks that make them unique? 
Do you have any other tips to add to this post? 


Keep your eyes peeled for part 2 of this post, where we come back to the surface and talk more skin-deep. What did you think of this post? Would you like to see more like these? I would love to hear your opinions!

Smiles!
Nicole

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