Character Questionnaire

There's a book I read, called "No More Rejections" by Alice Orr.

One things she suggests, as a great way to go deep into your character, is to create a Character Journal.

The way to compile a Character Journal is to visualize yourself AS your character. You need to sit and tell yourself, "I am (my character), I am (my character)," until your mind and heart and body actually respond AS your character and not as you. Once you've hit that point, you have exercises of questions to ask yourself.

For the exercises, you want to spend about an hour just writing AS your character, and you need to be positive about the good stuff you WILL write. DO NOT expect to get through all the questions in one sitting. Expect to come back to them again and again, and expect to get new ideas and reasons and revelations each time you come back.

Here are some of the questions to start. I recommend checking out Alice Orr's book "No More Rejections" to get her full exercise in total, but these questions will (hopefully) give a jump start to you creativity.

One recommendation of my own: find a notebook, a journal, a memo pad, anything that reminds you of your character and that you can visualize your character using. It makes it a lot easier to go deep as your character.

Keep in mind these are not all the questions Alice Orr supplies. For her full exercise and advice on how to go about writing your journal, check out her book. It is fabulous.

Have fun with these!

Remember, write AS your character, not as you.


I. My Basic Biographical Information

My full name is____________________
I was born in (place name) ___________
My heritage is (racial, ethnic) _________
The other places I have lived are______


II. Additional Biographical Information

My birth (or adoptive) family consisted of…
The member of my family I am closest to is…because…
The member of my family I am most distant from is…because…
As a child, I would describe myself as…
The most significant experience of my childhood was…
As an adolescent, I would describe myself as…
The most significant experience of my adolescence was…
My education background is…
My general health is…


III. My Physical Characteristics:

What I like about the way I look is…
What I hate about the way I look is…
I believe that other people think I look…
My style of dress is…because…


IV. My General Character Traits:

If you ask me what I’m like as a person, I’d say I’m…because…
I would describe my habits (neatness vs. sloppiness) as…
I would describe my attitude toward life in general as…


V. My Outstanding Character Traits:
The most significant thing I’ve ever discovered about myself is…
The thing I believe in most strongly is…because…
The thing I care most about in life is…because…
The thing I enjoy, or have enjoyed, most in my life is…
The thing I dislike most in life is…because…


VI. My Personal History:

I have worked in the following jobs…
My future professional ambitions are to…
My favourite hobby or leisure time activity is…because…
My best friend ever was…because...
My current place of residence is…I like or dislike it there because…


VII. My emotional history:

I am most inhibited in the area of…because…
I have a phobia about…because…
My greatest frustration in life is (or was)…because…
My greatest regret in life is (or was)…because…
The time in my life I was most enraged was…because…
The time in my life I was most humiliated was…because…
The time in my life I was most heartbroken was…because…
The time in my life I was most excited was…because…
My deepest fear in life is…because…
My darkest secret is…because...

I hope you discover a dynamic character with these questions!

God bless.

Me: Fantasy Writer

My favourite type of writing is fantasy. I love to write really in-depth fantasy, the kind that takes a lot of thought and plotting to make it believable. I think that's just my perfectionist nature coming out. I can't stand to write something that just doesn't make sense.

My favourite fantasy tales are the kinds with dramatic conflicts and climaxes. I enjoy the tame, romping tales like "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" or "Dealing with Dragons". But my heart really gets captured in the tales of "Lord of the Rings" or "The Riddlemaster of Hed", where there is a world at stake if Good fails.

I also really appreciate Orson Scott Card. I believe he mainly writes science-fiction, a genre I'd like to explore later on in my writing life, but he makes excellent pointers on how to craft the perfect fantasy world. I heartily recommend his book to any serious sci-fi/fantasy writer. It is called "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy," and I believe all fantasy writers...heck, even all writers!...will thorougly enjoy it.

Don't forget, there's a contest going on right now! Head on over to Cat's Mathoms and check it out. Enter! Submit! You could be the winner of the one-of-a-kind Writing Buddy. (hint hint)

Plot... and Some Contest Details! :)

Sometimes, plot is the hardest thing for me to create.

I can come up with a character no problem. Pretty much anyone I meet on the road has a story that I can craft. Each person I see has a face that says, "You don't know me, but my life is written in my eyes." Character, or at least that first glow of a new MC, is easy for me.

Plot, now, that can be a bit tricky.

I think I either don't have enough, or I have too much. If I don't have enough, my characters don't have a chance to shine. If I have too much, then my readers waffle away, muttering, "I don't know what she was getting at with all those subplots." Thankfully, I generally come up with too much plot. It's easier to cut the fat off a chicken than to add meat to something that's already dead. You know what I mean? (Hey, it was a nasty analogy, but it worked!)

When I rework an idea, a lot of times I have to pare at my plot, to make sure all the fatty uneccesary bits are all scrapped, so that I'm left with only the lean juicy bits that make a story fantastic.

Now, for a fun update. My contest for the Writing Buddy will open on August 1st, so sharpen your pencils and be prepared, because it is going to be a contest. :) Hope to see youse all soon!

MC Plotting

When I write a story, whether or not I've gotten a plot yet or not, or just the idea of the general plan, my main character usually comes first.

No matter how great an idea is, as soon as I get a storyline in my head, the first thing I think is, "Now, who will be the person that gets to have this adventure?"

I have to establish whether the material is suitable for a boy, or a girl. (For now, he's a boy. ) Once that's settled, I can start getting the MC's features sorted.

I have to decide on overall features, first. Will the MC have brown hair, or blonde? Will he be a red-head? What origin will be demonstrated in build, features, skin colour? Spanish? German? Will the MC be a tow-head of Polish descent, or olive-skinned in the manner of Italians? Will the MC be short, stocky? Tall and lithe? Small but slender? Tall but thick like a bull?

Once overall look is established, I go in for the further detail. What happens when the MC gets angry? When he gets sad? Does he have thick, expressive eyebrows or thin emotionless ones? Does his mouth get line-tight under pressure, or does he chew on his lips? Does he use his hands to express himself? Is he voluble, or quiet? What signs does he portray to signify his mood?

Once I've got that all established, I go into conflict. What moves my MC? What drives him through the story? What catapults him into the plot, to make the story activate? Why does he react this way, or that?

Once I've asked all my questions, I've got my developed MC, complete with flaws and weaknesses and strengths, ready to make my story a reality.

What's even better is that, now with Alice Orr's helpful suggestions, I can even take him one step further and write his thoughts into a journal. Don't you love becoming your character?

Wednesday, Words and Worlds

You know what I love? When I pick up a book and the setting is so believable you can't stop reading.

I just finished reading the Stoneheart trilogy, by Charlie Fletcher. What I loved about this is that the story begins in modern-day London, but after the MC, George, commits an act of minor and semi-accidental vandalism, the story is catapulted into another layer of London, a mysteriously similar and different London where statues come to life. It was really interesting, and though I didn't like some of the language that peppered the book, I couldn't stop reading until I'd finished the whole trilogy. Took me about five days to get through all three books, and that's because I (unfortunately) have to work some days of the week. :-)

Another book I read, and one that is part of a series (or perhaps a trilogy. I can't be certain about that) is called The Fire Within, and that was another really engaging, don't-stop-until-you're-done kind of read. The author, Chris D'Lacey, plants you in a normal, everyday kind of world where a tenant, David Rain, moves into a house for rent that specifies the tenant must have a tolerance for cats, kids, and dragons. That in itself is engaging, but when you discover the landlady, Liz Pennykettle, actually creates the dragons out of clay, and that they are, somehow, alive, WHAM! You're in a suddenly different world where everything is normal except for the fact that dragons are existing in one house.

What was the last book you read, where you really connected with the worldbuilding that was created for the story?

Wednesday, Words and Worlds

I'm doing a summer NaNoWriMo right now, and the thing I love about NaNo is that it allows you to write without worrying about editing. In fact, as I write, I'm discovering nuances about my world that I hadn't really fleshed out yet, and I simply input it into the story for later, so as I'm going through and editing I've got this tidbit of a gem that screams "REVELATION!" at me.

I love world-building. It's something I absolutely adore to do. In bed at night I sometimes think up a character who has these specific powers, and it is SUCH fun coming up with a world that explains these powers and makes them acceptable. I love that whole element of writing.

My favourite world-building comes from places that I've seen, or lived in, and have experienced.

For instance, awhile ago at work, I thought of this dialogue between two characters, one who is older, and the other who is the flippant MC.
It went something like this:

"Life," said Oldie expansively, lifting his glass to the sun and watching the light dance within the crimson depths, "is like a glass of wine."
He paused, and I waited for him to go on, but he didn't. He just stood there with his glass, and seemed lost in a reverie.
I guess that was all the information he was going to impart at this moment. Joy. I got to wait until tomorrow to see why life was like a glass of wine.
Tomorrow, I doubted I'd care.

Somehow, I visualized this MC as a boy, somewhat flippant and street-smart, but I had no setting for him. I simply had a bit of dialogue, and a definite opinion of who he was: a thief, a (sometimes) brat, but a lovable, loving character at heart.

Then I went to Scotland, and WHAM! I had found my setting. Scotland is the home for this thieving MC, a stone city more ancient than the hills, and filled with a magic that has yet to be born.

I'm into the world-building part now, and that is such fun, because the land is going to resemble Scotland, but there are going to be very different rules for my world, especially concerning magic.

Yay! A new story!

In fact, that story is my NaNo novel. Isn't that something? And, you know what's more exciting?  I can see a trilogy being born. Which means, I don't have to let go of my MC sooner than I need to. DOUBLE huzzah!

God bless. :)
Cat