Re-post: Letting your characters write the story

 I often tell people that I let my characters write their own story; however it is still up to me to create the basics of the story.

Let’s try this exercise together:

This is a story about four people taking a three day trip from New York City to Chicago. They are going to travel by car and stop at motels on two nights (which they already have reservations for). While going through Ohio they encounter bad weather, maybe even a tornado. Along the way they will encounter other people, eat meals and maybe buy “something” (souvenirs, newspapers, clothes, etc)

Okay, that’s the story.

Let’s invent four college guys: Andrew, Brian, Chuck and Dennis. And let’s give them each a personal history: Andrew is a good student and attending college on a work study program, his widowed mother has worked hard cleaning houses to give her son a good education. It is important to him to keep his nose clean and be careful with his money. Brian is a spoiled rich kid whose mostly absentee parents buy him anything he wants. He gets barely passing grades, doesn’t really try, and sees college and dorm life as one endless party. Chuck is just an average guy with, unknown to his traveling companions, an average cocaine problem. He’s always short on money and has no problem borrowing from his friends with no intention of returning. Dennis is a fairly nice guy, an average student with big career goals so he is really working hard in school. He has a problem though, his girlfriend just told him that she is pregnant and wants to have and keep the baby. Dennis really cares for the girl and wants to do right by her, but he knows that this means putting his dreams on hold.

If you were really writing this story, you would give each character more history, likes and dislikes to build their personalities. Working just with what we have above, we can come up with potential conflicts to the story. Perhaps Brian is the only one with a decent car to make the trip and it is a hot, flashy car – flashy enough to attract the wrong kind of attention from state troopers or small town gossips. Andrew is the one who made the motel reservations and thinking of the expense he chose a reputable bargain no-frills chain which Brian considers slumming and Chuck doesn’t have the money for anyway. In the height of being chased by a tornado and in the middle of an argument about priorities, Dennis finally lets loose with all of his worries and frustrations and walks out.

You can see where I am going. We, as authors, set the basic “points” in our stories but how our characters get from point A to B will be influenced by WHO they are, their past experiences, what problems they have and what their dreams and hopes are. Allowing your characters to write the story means that you are allowing them to “make decisions” based on their own motivations.

Take the same basic story and create four new characters, how about two married couples – Alan and Barbie, Carl and Dianne. Maybe Alan is a workaholic who was pressured into taking this mini trip. Dianne is a devoted wife and expecting her first child, but Carl hasn’t been told yet. Oh, Barbie and Carl have been having an affair. Give them each a history and then let them loose in the story, allow each of their personalities to interact with each other and react to the facets of the story. You will wind up with a totally different delivery than with the four college guys. Try it again with any four people you invent.


 often tell people that I let my characters write their own story; however it is still up to me to create the basics of the story.

Let’s try this exercise together:

This is a story about four people taking a three day trip from New York City to Chicago. They are going to travel by car and stop at motels on two nights (which they already have reservations for). While going through Ohio they encounter bad weather, maybe even a tornado. Along the way they will encounter other people, eat meals and maybe buy “something” (souvenirs, newspapers, clothes, etc)

Okay, that’s the story.

Let’s invent four college guys: Andrew, Brian, Chuck and Dennis. And let’s give them each a personal history: Andrew is a good student and attending college on a work study program, his widowed mother has worked hard cleaning houses to give her son a good education. It is important to him to keep his nose clean and be careful with his money. Brian is a spoiled rich kid whose mostly absentee parents buy him anything he wants. He gets barely passing grades, doesn’t really try, and sees college and dorm life as one endless party. Chuck is just an average guy with, unknown to his traveling companions, an average cocaine problem. He’s always short on money and has no problem borrowing from his friends with no intention of returning. Dennis is a fairly nice guy, an average student with big career goals so he is really working hard in school. He has a problem though, his girlfriend just told him that she is pregnant and wants to have and keep the baby. Dennis really cares for the girl and wants to do right by her, but he knows that this means putting his dreams on hold.

If you were really writing this story, you would give each character more history, likes and dislikes to build their personalities. Working just with what we have above, we can come up with potential conflicts to the story. Perhaps Brian is the only one with a decent car to make the trip and it is a hot, flashy car – flashy enough to attract the wrong kind of attention from state troopers or small town gossips. Andrew is the one who made the motel reservations and thinking of the expense he chose a reputable bargain no-frills chain which Brian considers slumming and Chuck doesn’t have the money for anyway. In the height of being chased by a tornado and in the middle of an argument about priorities, Dennis finally lets loose with all of his worries and frustrations and walks out.

You can see where I am going. We, as authors, set the basic “points” in our stories but how our characters get from point A to B will be influenced by WHO they are, their past experiences, what problems they have and what their dreams and hopes are. Allowing your characters to write the story means that you are allowing them to “make decisions” based on their own motivations.

Take the same basic story and create four new characters, how about two married couples – Alan and Barbie, Carl and Dianne. Maybe Alan is a workaholic who was pressured into taking this mini trip. Dianne is a devoted wife and expecting her first child, but Carl hasn’t been told yet. Oh, Barbie and Carl have been having an affair. Give them each a history and then let them loose in the story, allow each of their personalities to interact with each other and react to the facets of the story. You will wind up with a totally different delivery than with the four college guys. Try it again with any four people you invent.




Writing Exercise: Choose a memory from your own life, create interesting characters to replace the people that were really there and re-write the events allowing your characters to react.

Writing Prompt: Write the first paragraph of a story that involves a gaily wrapped package, a female in a blue dress, broken glass and a liquid puddle on the floor.

Challenge Assignment:  Think of a day or a time period where things "went wrong" and seemed out of your control - Have you learned any new information that, if known, might have seriously changed the outcome? Or woul this negative experience influence you into making different decisions and giving you more control over what happened? Re-write that day or time period and make changes to the outcome based solely on things you've learned since then.