FSN - Day 10 - Your Character's Back Story

[ladyseishou]

Day 10 - 21 days until the start of NNWM




Welcome back Nano Writers! Last week we played around with some ideas - ideas with personal meaning - and wrote a “proto” type premise for our story borrowing a convention or two from our favorite genre and asking “what if” and “how” questions.

This week, we’ll start to fine tune our premise by taking a closer look at the main characters of our story…

The protagonist: often but not always, the character whose actions or personal quest answers the “what if” questions we’ve asked and fashioned into the story’s premise.

The antagonist: the who (or what) that stands between the protagonist and his quest - the person (or thing) that drives the character from his familiar and sometimes flawed surroundings of Chapter One to the story’s inevitable conclusion.

And depending on your story, you will probably have one, two or more characters who either offer to help your protagonist complete this quest or become yet another roadblock/lesson that the protagonist must overcome/learn before he can move forward with his quest.

But for today and for the rest of the week, we’ll focus on our “hero” and “bad guy” - the characters we need to get together “in the room” to generate the conflict that is the engine that drives every scene, every act of our story and keeps our readers interested and coming back for more.

So today, let’s invite our protagonist and antagonist to share a cup of coffee with us so we can find out a little more about them, starting with their backgrounds. Why back story and not a laundry list of physical attributes? Because and somewhat arguably, where we come from, our past, is what shapes us most as the people we are today.

So spend fifteen minutes today writing down a short history for your protagonist and the same for your antagonist (even bad guys deserve a little understanding). What are some of the things your characters might be willing to tell you if you ask? How about…

• Where were you born?
  
• Who are/were your parents? Brothers? Sisters?
  
• Was your childhood happy?
  
• Favorite teachers? Advisers?
  
• What did you want to be when you grew up/became an adult?
  
• Childhood secrets? Fears?
  
• Who was/is your best childhood friend?
  

As you might guess, this list could become quite extensive and today’s challenge was all about picking out three things - so be sure you get your character to tell you at least three very important things - something that could and probably will affect the outcome of your story. And one way we can do that is to write out your premise on an index card and set it up so that it’s front and center while you write your list. And for each item you add to your list, ask yourself:

If your your premise is the question, does this bit of back story answer:
who, what, where, when, why or how?

For example, for my premise from yesterday:

A London detective, assigned a prostitute’s murder, discovers the victim was a changeling and must solve the case before the Fairy King exacts horrific retribution.

Here are three facts from my protagonist’s history that are important for my story (or may be - flexibility is key here as well) :

My detective was told that he was adopted by his parents and continues to fear that he will never know who he really is unless he finds his real parents. Hence why he became a detective.

My detective lives in Victorian London. Crime scene investigation is still in its infancy but my character always seems to have a sense for “unusual” crimes. This answers where my character lives at the beginning of my story as well as when and what he does for a living.

My detective’s parents are fairies and he himself is a changeling. This answers (in part) how my detective knows that the victim was a changeling.

I will do the same for my antagonist: the Fairy King, the “prostitute’s” father…


So what do you say Nano Writers? Questions or comments? Ready to invite your protagonist to relax on your writer’s couch as you ready your notebook and ask “what can you tell me about your childhood?” Remember to keep writing!

Comments

[cheyinka]

Sigh. I think I'm jettisoning the story idea I was toying with, and the other one that had occurred to me, leaving me with a) rewriting my first year's attempt without rereading it (i.e. trying to do it 'right') b) going with an idea I considered in two previous years but didn't use c) coming up with something brand new in 20 days. (I'm really not okay with not having a solid idea by the 30th.)

[ladyseishou]

Still maybe something sci-fi? This is a good time to experiment with ideas to find one that feels right. If you need a second opinion or someone just to listen, we're here for you!

[dark_kana]

I'd go with either a complete new idea, or going with the idea you considered the 2 previous years but didn't use... :-)

[lap_otter]

I've had that problem the last few years and never had much success in just generating an idea. But going through the exercises that ladyseishou has posted has given me the bare bones of something, and I can see it getting a little better every day (that I work on it--bad otter! bad!) This year I had the same options as you--rewrite an old one, try to fall in love with an idea I've had that I haven't yet used, or come up with something brand new. I started out kind of hating all those ideas, and now I love them (but I'm going with the new one for now).

SO UH I guess what I'm saying is, I sympathise, and good luck!