Creating Characters Kids Will Love

by Elaine Marie Alphin

To successfully write books that children will read and treasure, you need to discover what makes a kid want to curl up with a book in the first place. CREATING CHARACTERS KIDS WILL LOVE can make the difference between publishing success and failure. The book explains how characters, more than any other story element, draw kids to the page and keep them hooked from the beginning to end. You'll find dozens of methods you can use to make your own characters more lively and compelling.

Genres: Writing, Nonfiction, Reference

232 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

I was born on 30 October 1955 in San Francisco, California, and attended Lafayette Elementary School in San Francisco. Then my family moved to New York City, where I attended William H. Carr Junior High School. This is a school picture of me from my junior high school days. After that we moved to Houston, and I went to Westchester High School and on to Rice University.

Reviews

[Ronel Janse van Vuuren · Rating 3 out of 5]

(It was recommended on a writer’s blog – I can’t even remember whose it was – with much gusto. And maybe someone else will find this book a better teacher than I did. Here are my thoughts.)

This book is all about creating believable characters.

But it has a few faults.

Let’s start with this: the book was published in 2000. (I got a first edition to read.) The “Read the Pros” section after each lesson has books from every decade… yes, these are good books (some have been republished with new covers, some have been turned into movies or TV shows). But what worked in the 90s and before will not, necessarily, work in 2019. Children’s books have drastically changed in the last two decades – something that hasn’t happened in almost forever (which is why the “Read the Pros” section didn’t need to look at only recently published books at the time of this book’s publication). This book is great for someone writing between 1950 and 1999… but not 2019. It needs a revised edition! One, the book is bulky and unwieldly at 20 by 27 centimetres. The size, layout and illustrations gave me horrible flashbacks of primary school textbooks. An easier to handle format/size would be great. Two, this book has sound advice – an updated “Read the Pros” section and advice about different age groups (young reader, lower middle grade, upper middle grade, lower young adult, upper young adult, college young adult/new adult) instead of generic younger readers and middle grade readers – with a hint of older readers – will make this book a real treasure. Three, some things just irritated the hell out of me: p125 has “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” which is fine even though I’m accustomed to “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” – but who is Malloy and Snipes? Is that supposed to be Malfoy and Snape? Grr. And p172 “Mr Rotweiller”. Ick! The spelling…

But… The lessons in this book are good. There is sound advice (if you skip the part about following teenagers in shopping malls – that will just get you arrested) and lots of exercises for you to try out the things you’ve just learned. Going by that, I understand why it was recommended. It’s a good book when you’re just starting out as a writer – and hadn’t read much in the way of children’s books. But nothing can really beat reading the genre you want to write in: this book has great advice about creating believable characters, but if you don’t read enough middle grade/young reader/young adult/whichever children’s age group you write for, you won’t know what is expected from those characters and will still fall short. (Which goes back to the inherent flaw of this book: it needs to be updated!)

[Mari]

not worth going through

[Garry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good advice carefully and clearly given. Lots of suggested reading...with helpful points on what those authors/books do particularly well. An array of exercises to get the juices flowing, ideas generated, and stretch those writing muscles. Nothing earth shattering or eye opening here, but for new and new-ish writers looking for a patient and friendly guide to new terrain or encouraging voice reminding you what you need to, well, remember this is a quick and accessible guide to character creation and development.

[Elizabeth Houseman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some good content, but nothing mind-bending. The last four chapters weren't really necessary (in my opinion) because they were more about how to interview people than how to write characters. Still, there were some great tips for anyone unsure of how to portray children in fiction, and plenty of book recommendations and "Try It"s included.

[Sheri · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of great reads for Writing and getting structural ideas. And I liked all the ideas for beginning new pieces. I haven't had writer's block just liked all the suggestions for new ideas. Still wasn't sold on buying a copy for myself.

[Lauri Meyers · Rating 4 out of 5]

In depth instruction about character development, point of view, internal conflict and plot development, types of characters (from aliens to grown ups to real adults in nonfiction.