Building Character

by GylzGirl

There are 1001 "How to write" books out there that can tell you all the elements you need to establish a compelling character in your writing.  However, when you're writing fanfiction, that part has been done for you.  Your job is to maintain reader's expectation of the characters that they know while presenting them in new and interesting stories.

Nothing will lose your audience faster than their favorite character's portrayal being off.  They will stick by you through grammar, spelling and punctuation errors by the dozens, but if they don't recognize the character you have in your fic as the one they know and love, they will be on to the next story before they even bother to finish yours.

How do you keep the characters true to themselves?  Walk the walk and talk the talk.   You have to be an observer before you can be a reporter.  Pay attention to the way the characters speak:  accent, stutter, regional or age specific slang, recurring phrases.  By the same token, watch for mannerisms that are character specific.  These can be subtle but can make the character ring true for your reader.

When writing your character's dialogue, you must make sure that it is "in-voice".  I find the easiest way to determine this is to go to a room where you can be by yourself (because if you do this in front of people, they are liable to call the local sanitarium on you) and speak the dialogue you have written down.  Not only does this help eliminate those instances where you have something that looks fine on paper but no human would actually speak that way.  But, if you try to put yourself in character, you should be able to tell if it sounds correct to them.  If I'm running over my Giles dialogue, I'm doing his accent.

Of course while it is possible that any character can say any thing at any time, just like any real person, there are certain things that will make your words truer to character.  Think about things like, what sounds more like Giles, maybe or perhaps?  Would Buffy be more likely to call someone a big jerk or a git?  Some of these are regional problems.  There are certain sayings that you may not realize are local to your area because you live there and everybody you know would use that.  Just remember, Giles isn't a native of Los Angeles, and Buffy isn't from London.  If you're from some place other than where the character is from, it helps to acquire a beta reader in that area.  With the Buffy fandom, it can be a mutually beneficial relationship as the Americans can keep foreign authors' Scooby Gang in-voice, and the UK/Australians can keep Giles, Spike, Ethan and the other Buffy Brits from sounding too Yankee.

Mannerisms are subtle tools that help imbue your character with authenticity.  We've all seen Giles with his hands in his pockets, or running his hand back through his hair in frustration.  Including little nuances like this into your fics will up their believability factor.

I'm sure you've heard the phrase "Show don't tell."  Well this is especially true with characters.  You can tell me the guy in your story is Rupert Giles until the cows come home, but if you don't show me by having him move, speak and conduct himself the way I expect he might in that situation, I won't believe it's him.  And consequently, I won't believe in the rest of your story either.  The reason we are fans of the show at all is because we have come to love the people that populate it.  We care about what happens to them.  If you can't recognize them in the fic, people won't care enough to read it.

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