A Goodreads user
asked
Michael Grant:
Hey Mike! I wanted to ask - I want to be an author (hopefully as amazing as you - I love Gone!!!) and I needed some advise... whenever I write, it seems childish, my characters aren't so good and detailed, I don't know how to not give all the information out at once - to stretch it out and make it interesting I've written 107 pages with 42232 words but it isn't appealing and I want to publish something good!!! Help?
Michael Grant
1) Don't fall in love with your characters. You have to have some distance from them to see them clearly. Give them flaws and make the flaws real and consistent. Make them their own worst enemies at times. Don't make them needy for the reader's affection, in other words not too easily likable.
2) No autobiography. Keep yourself out of the book.
3) More specific tricks: Have a photo of the character. It can be some face you find on Google Images, but it should be a face that will become that character for you.
4) Give them a life. Something to do. Something to care about. Something to love or hate.
5) Even more detail, which is not for the book, but for you: Where do they shop for clothes? Favorite foods? Favorite books? Movies? Are they part of a fandom? What's in their room? Describe it for yourself in every detail and remember that the detail has to 'match' the character. A Goth chick probably doesn't have a poster of the Dave Matthews Band on the wall, right.
6) Use secondary characters to define your lead. (And vice versa.) Joe says of Alice, "You are always in such a hurry when you eat. It's like you're afraid someone will snatch it away!" That gives you a picture of Alice. You can see her eating, hunched over her food, shoveling it in. That makes her real, especially since the description is coming from another character.
Do all that and your characters will acquire depth. And remember: character first, always. Be true to the character.
2) No autobiography. Keep yourself out of the book.
3) More specific tricks: Have a photo of the character. It can be some face you find on Google Images, but it should be a face that will become that character for you.
4) Give them a life. Something to do. Something to care about. Something to love or hate.
5) Even more detail, which is not for the book, but for you: Where do they shop for clothes? Favorite foods? Favorite books? Movies? Are they part of a fandom? What's in their room? Describe it for yourself in every detail and remember that the detail has to 'match' the character. A Goth chick probably doesn't have a poster of the Dave Matthews Band on the wall, right.
6) Use secondary characters to define your lead. (And vice versa.) Joe says of Alice, "You are always in such a hurry when you eat. It's like you're afraid someone will snatch it away!" That gives you a picture of Alice. You can see her eating, hunched over her food, shoveling it in. That makes her real, especially since the description is coming from another character.
Do all that and your characters will acquire depth. And remember: character first, always. Be true to the character.
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