Beth.

[bringing_words]

One of the things I'm concerned about with this story is how to imagine characters which are realistic.  I think it's an area I've always found difficult -- a bit like dialogue.  This possibly stems with the way I interact with others, since I tend to find it hard to relate well to other people, and I want my characters to have a sense of 'normal'

Comments

[comedychick]

I want my characters to have a sense of 'normal' that I don't possess.

I literally LOL'd at this line, because I can relate. ;) But I think it's good to have characters that aren't too 'normal' anyway. My Dick is mostly normal, I guess, and I still think he's a little boring. Oh well.

At what point does the story start? I get the feeling you should open it with the "Oh shit I'm pregnant" part and fill in the backstory as you go on. That's basically the inciting incident, right?

Personally I don't think you're going to have to worry about Mary Sue stuff with this character. :)

[bringing_words]

It is good to have characters that aren't normal. Normal is boring :D

It's funny you should ask about how I'm going to begin the book. I tend to write really out of order -- I have an overarching plot that I keep to (sort of) but I skip around all over the place depending on which section I'm feeling drawn to at the time. So I hadn't really thought about how I was going to begin it! I mean, I started a beginning, but now it's not quite the way I want it, because both Beth and John have changed since then (it was right when I started the idea for the story).

Haha, I hope you're right :)

[comedychick]

I'm glad I had a very clear beginning for Adrift, because I did the same sort of thing with skipping around which section I wrote. The beginning of the story can be one of the hardest things to work out, though, since it's basically your only chance to draw readers in!

[bringing_words]

Definitely! I'll have to play around with it.

[ashgaelsonaria]

Hmm.
I am not a particularly social person but I have little difficulty getting into the mind of my characters.
Weather this is because I am a big fan of table top rpg's (I own much G.U.R.P.S., Shadowrun, White Wolf) or if it is just an aid to my gaming but my writing started out as background stories for my Pc's which generally had everything on paper already.
Stats, skills, negative and positive traits all quantified in a semi numerical way that made them easy to interpret.

[bringing_words]

I can get into the mind of characters, I'm just not sure what they're thinking is what other people are thinking!!

One of the sites I read suggests doing a whole traits/skills list, and allocating points like RPGs, but I can't get into it, for some reason. I just look at the list and baulk! Guess I'll have to work through it another way!

[n3m3sis43]

I don't possess much of a sense of "normal," which I think is okay? It just means my characters aren't always so normal either. I've heard that for people who aren't naturally character-driven, writing either "interviews" with your characters or random character sketches from their POVs can help.

Technically, I do write a lot of character sketches, but it's usually not intentional. It's just what comes out first when I try to write, and it takes a lot of work before the plot starts to creep into my head. And then I usually eventually get ideas for backstory, too, even if it's not going to go in the book.

Oh, and I'm not really an appearance person, either. It took me a long time to get an idea of what most of my characters looked like. I didn't so much decide it as wait for them to decide it for me. And even then, I hate writing the characters describing their appearance and basically won't do it. Since I have a million POV characters, I cheat and have them describe each other. :)