Creating compelling characters

Whether or not love at first sight occurs in real life, you need to aim for something like it in storytelling.

I’m not talking about likeability¹ here. Let’s be clear about that up front. There are several storytelling tools that the writer can apply to make readers care about a character, whether they like them or not:

• being resourceful²

• being brave

• being clever (not the same as merely resourceful)

• doing a good deed (“save the cat”³)

• being unfairly treated (“kill the cat”)

• standing up against unfairness or injustice

• doing something we can relate to⁴ - especially if funny, but can be as simple as cleaning teeth, having breakfast, if made into an interesting bit of business

• being in a relationship we can connect with - even two apparently despicable characters start to become relatable if we see a friendship forming between them

• in a situation we recognize - stuck in the rain, needing a pee⁵, late for a meeting, and so on.

• being interesting⁶ - this is how an audaciously badly-behaved, rude or even evil character can be made very compelling: what will they do next?

Next time you’re reading a story or watching a movie, take a look and see how often those tricks are used right from the start.

1. More about that here:

2. A good example is Queen & Country by Greg Rucka. Tara, an MI6 operative, must get through an Iron Curtain checkpoint. To distract the guards’ attention from her forged passport, she slips in a photo of herself in skimpy underwear, which she explains is for her boyfriend.

3. http://www.savethecat.com/

4. As in the opening credits of Harper, when Paul Newman reuses yesterday’s grounds to make a disgusting cup of morning coffee. William Goldman credited the success of the picture to that scene.

5. Seems a little specific and a tad abstruse? That’s what Vincent Gallo and Alison Bagnall did in their screenplay for Buffalo ‘66.

6. “[You need] an interesting character. Not necessarily a likeable one, not even necessarily a relatable one, but an interesting one. The best example of a complex main character in all of science fiction is Robinette Broadhead in Frederik Pohl’s Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Gateway, which is told as flashbacks during Broadhead’s psychoanalytic sessions with a computerized shrink. He’s not at all likeable, but, wow, is he ever fascinating.” - SF author Robert J Sawyer