do readers see your characters the way you want them to?

8/3/2019 Do Readers See Your Characters the Way You Want Them To?

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The wrong choice of just a single word can be enough to give readers a

completely different (and, from the writer’s viewpoint, wrong) perspective of a

character. Despite the fact that we often see our characters in crisp, glorious,

mega-wattage detail, we sometimes have a difficult time sharing those

details with our readers. We want readers to see our characters as vulnerable

but strong, imperfect but brave, haunted but smart. We want readers to see

our characters from every angle, so they can also see in our characters a

wonderfully human mix of good and bad, strong and weak, perfect and

imperfect.

So far, so good. But few writers are able to achieve this balance the first time

they release their bucking bronc of a story out of the chute. Too often, we

accidentally pile too much weight on one side or the other of the scale—and

end up giving readers a skewed perception of our characters.

Let’s say your character is an average Joe, a cop who’s devoted to the badge,

but who struggles to balance the tough realities of his job—particularly one

failed assignment that got him shot and his partner killed—with the demands

of his wife and kids. Now, you, as the author, know Joe is very realistic,

likable guy. He’s occasionally heroic, but also occasionally scared. For every

day he’s sad about his partner’s death, he’s also hopeful about his son’s

future. He’s sometimes angry with his wife’s inability to understand his job’s

stress, but he’s also aware it’s his responsibility to be there for his family.

There are many ways you might write Joe. At one extreme, in your attempt to

show his heroic, devoted public servant side, you might leave out some of the

weaker, less likable details of his personality and end up with a less thanrelatable, possibly even laughable version:

Joe put the good of the city ahead of everything else—always. He

was just that kind of guy. He never complained, because he knew

he had nothing to complain about. He’d capture the bad guys,

save the world, and be home in time to tuck in the kids.

On the other hand, you might be worried about Joe coming across as too

good to be true, so you decide to focus on his problems, in order to make him

Do Readers See Your Characters the Way You Want Them To?

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more relatable to readers. This is an excellent plan. But you have to be

careful not to turn him from relatable to pitiable. We want to present our

character’s faults, but if we dwell on them too much, we end up with a

character who screams “oh please, oh please, everyone throw a pity party for

poor little ol’ me!” For example, if we were going to don our party hats and

throw confetti in Joe’s honor, we might end up with a celebration that looks

something like this:

Joe nursed the day’s fifth round of coffee and donuts. It was

tough being a cop in NYC—and didn’t he know it? Or maybe it was

just that he didn’t measure up. Why didn’t the commissioner just

fire him and get it over with? He was a pathetic excuse for a cop.

Pa-thet-tic. Hadn’t he already admitted to everyone that he was

responsible for his partner’s death? While he was at it, he should

probably admit he was also a pathetic excuse for a father. Of

course, he didn’t have to tell his wife that. She already knew.

Now if you’re using this paragraph to introduce a severely depressed

character, this internal whingeing might not be such a bad thing. But what

this paragraph does not do is give us a balanced character. This isn’t an

average Joe struggling onward to be the best man he can be in spite of his

circumstances. This is a man who’s blubbering hot, salty tears into his coffee.

When you write your story, but particularly as you revise, be on the watch for

the balance that emerges about your character from the details you present—

particularly his internal narrative. Balance means you present just as muchgood about the character as bad. Readers like characters with problems (yes,

even the occasional blubbering cop), but they also like characters who climb

to their feet after being knocked down instead of lying on the mat with their

eyes rolled back in their sockets.



About the Author: K.M. Weiland grew up chas-ing Billy the Kid and Jesse James on horsebackthrough the sand hills of western Nebraska, whereshe still lives. A lifelong fan of history and thepower of the written word, she enjoys sharingboth through her novels and short stories. Visit

her blogs Wordplay: Helping Writers Become Au-thors and AuthorCulture to read her take on thewriting life.

www.kmweiland.com

www.wordplay-kmweiland.blogspot.com

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