EPUBBING with NICOLA FURLONG

Intro: I occasionally teach a writers’ workshop at our local Camosun College on how to write a mystery novel. The students eat it up, telling me that they’re learning lots of practical and usable tips and techniques, so I thought I’d offer bits and pieces of the workshop in my Friday Mystery Writing blog posts.

The information is gleaned from my little non-fiction e-book primer called Youdunit Whodunit! How to Write Mysteries and offers my tips, techniques and information suitable for crafting of all types of genre writing.

So, even if you write romance, sci-fi, fantasy or horror, please keep reading and learn with us crime writers.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT (Part 17)

The last group of posts have focused on the point of view (POV) from which to tell your tale.

Most recently, we’re moved into creating the people who populate your story. I nicknamed this step: Haven’t We Met Before?

There are three types of CHARACTERS who populate fiction: Major, Secondary and Minor.

Obviously, your major characters are the most important and require the bulk of your thoughts, so take some time and get to know them…intimately.

Don't Be Shy

This is simplified if you ask a lot of questions, moving from broader basic information, to more intimate details and finally into fun and quirky stuff. In episode 16, we began by musing about personal details.

You’re Invading My Personal Space

Today, we did deeper and get even more personal.

Armed with your budding characters, begin to flesh out their temperament and PERSONALITY TRAITS, choosing four interesting ones that help determine speech patterns, thoughts and actions.

These four traits will help you bring your character to life when you are writing their dialogue, movements, reactions and feelings.

Consider PRIME SUSPECT’S Detective Superintendent Tennison’s qualities; she’s pig-headed, acerbic, driven and insecure. (more…)

Intro: I occasionally teach a writers’ workshop at our local Camosun College on how to write a mystery novel. The students eat it up, telling me that they’re learning lots of practical and usable tips and techniques, so I thought I’d offer bits and pieces of the workshop in my Friday Mystery Writing blog posts.

The information is gleaned from my little non-fiction e-book primer called Youdunit Whodunit! How to Write Mysteries and offers my tips, techniques and information suitable for crafting of all types of genre writing.

So, even if you write romance, sci-fi, fantasy or horror, please keep reading and learn with us crime writers.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT (Part 16)

The last group of posts (most recent: ) have focused on the point of view (POV) from which to tell your tale.

Most recently, we’re moved into creating the people who populate your story. I nicknamed this step: Haven’t We Met Before?

There are three types of CHARACTERS who populate fiction: Major, Secondary and Minor.

Obviously, your major characters are the most important and require the bulk of your thoughts, so take some time and get to know them…intimately.

Leopard (credit E. Polinsky)

This is simplified if you ask a lot of questions, moving from broader basic information, to more intimate details and finally into fun and quirky stuff. In episode 15, we began by musing Tombstone details.

You’re Invading My Personal Space

Today, we did deeper and get a little more personal by diving into answers for these personality queries:

• What are their key values?

• What’s their inner motivation: why is she or he doing what she or he does? The answer to this shapes the story.

Strong motivations stem from potent emotions or inner wounds, like undying love, obsessive hatred, blind ambition, envy, grief, vengeance. Characters with conflicting motivations are more interesting.

• What are their hopes, fears and dreams?

• What are their hot button issues? Their health? Their finances? Their relationships?

• Why are they like this?

• What do they like and dislike?

This outta take you a while; it’s challenging work but should be fun. After all, these are YOUR people. So…how’s it feel to be their creator? Pretty cool, eh?

If you found this of interest, you may wish to see the previous How to Write a Mystery novel posts.

…Of course, there’ll be MORE how-to write a mystery tips and techniques continued in the next Friday post as we push further to develop the three types of characters that commonly populate genre fiction in: You’re Invading My Personal Space, Part 17.

Intro: I occasionally teach a writers’ workshop at our local Camosun College on how to write a mystery novel. The students eat it up, telling me that they’re learning lots of practical and usable tips and techniques, so I thought I’d offer bits and pieces of the workshop in my Friday Mystery Writing blog posts.

The information is gleaned from my little non-fiction e-book primer called Youdunit Whodunit! How to Write Mysteries and offers my tips, techniques and information suitable for crafting of all types of genre writing.

So, even if you write romance, sci-fi, fantasy or horror, please keep reading and learn with us crime writers.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT (Part 15)

The last group of posts (most recent: ) have focused on the point of view (POV) from which to tell your tale.

Now, we’re moving into creating the people who populate your story. I’ve nicknamed this step: Haven’t We Met Before?

There are three types of CHARACTERS who populate fiction: Major, Secondary and Minor.

Obviously, your major characters are the most important and require the bulk of your thoughts, so take some time and get to know them…intimately.

Hey, don't I know you? (credit: E. Polinsky)

This is simplified if you ask a lot of questions, moving from broader basic information, to more intimate details and finally into fun and quirky stuff.

So in the next few posts, we’ll do just that:

First, ponder some Tombstone Questions to bring life to your gumshoe:

• What’s their name? Avoid confusing the audience with more than one character with same initials or similar names.

• How old are they?

• Who are they?

• What do they look like? NOT a photographic representation, just bits to help the reader’s imagination. You don’t want them to be disappointed when your story becomes a hit movie, do you?

• What do they sound like? Do they have an accent? An interesting vocabulary or vocal tic?

• What do they do?

• Where did they grow up?

• What was their childhood like?

This outta take you a while; it’s challenging work but should be fun. After all, these are YOUR people. So…how’s it feel to be their creator? Pretty cool, eh?

If you found this of interest, you may wish to see the previous How to Write a Mystery novel posts.

…Of course, there’ll be MORE how-to write a mystery tips and techniques continued in the next Friday post as we push further to develop the three types of characters that commonly populate genre fiction in: You’re Invading My Personal Space, Part 16.

Find out further information or how to purchase my mystery-writing primer e-book, jam-packed with ways to immediately improve your writing, by clicking Youdunit Whodunit! (only $2.99 US)