How to Make Your Characters a Little More Human

A simple exercise for fiction writers.

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Writers perform miracles when they produce a piece of fiction. They are creating whole worlds from nothing more than their imagination and some words.

They are putting those words together in a way that no one, in the history of humanity has ever done before. That’s incredible, when you think about it. Even a bad story is a miracle, when you look at it that way.

It’s also extremely hard work. One of the hardest parts of it is populating those worlds with people who feel real to the reader. Characters must be more than flat words on a page for a story to be everything it can be.

I’m going to share a simple exercise here that will help you to blow some life into your characters.

Everyone is flawed.

Have you ever had the experience of coming up out of a novel thinking — OMG, how did that much time pass? Or started to read and been unable to put the book down until there are no more pages to turn?

When that happens, you’re in the narrative dream. Anytime a reader slips so far into the story that they stop being aware of reading. Their real world falls away.

Being pulled out of that narrative dream, even for a fraction of a second, chips away at the reading experience. There are lots of things that break the narrative dream — but I want to focus on one right now.

The narrative dream is broken every time the reader becomes aware that a character is fictional. That happens most often, of course, because the character isn’t quite human enough.

To fuck up is human. To be fucked up is also human.

Pardon my French there, but readers don’t want perfection. Because it isn’t real. And if it isn’t real, it isn’t believable. And if it’s not believable, they’re pulled out of the narrative dream.

No one wants to be pulled out of the narrative dream. That means it’s our job, as writers, to create flawed characters. Even our heroes need human flaws.

A flaw is a trait that causes a person to make bad decisions.

It drives them in the wrong direction. A character flaw is the ultimate threshold guardian, because it is the thing inside the character that keeps them from their goals.

Here’s something that might blow your mind. It blew mine, when I was first taught it by a professor during graduate school. Every character flaw is rooted in strength.

Every single one. Whatever it is that’s wrong with your character, it starts with what makes them the best version of themselves.

Let’s take a look at some strengths and their corresponding flaws.

Curiosity

Curiosity taken too far can become recklessness, obsession, or distraction.

Alice is famously curious — and that leads her right down that famous rabbit hole. It also causes her to eat and drink things she probably shouldn’t and stick her nose in places that get her into trouble.

Intelligence

Intelligence taken too far can become pride, hubris, inflexibility, or an inability to connect to other people.

Sherlock Holmes is arguably the smartest fictional character there is and he describes himself as a ‘high-functioning sociopath.’ His intelligence keeps him from connecting to other people, leading to antisocial behavior.

Bravery

Bravery taken too far can become recklessness, inhibition, or a lack of self-preservation.

Katniss Everdeen is extremely brave. Her courage keeps her family from starving to death, which is good. It also causes her to volunteer to die in her sister’s place.

Enthusiasm

Enthusiasm taken too far can become fanaticism, zealousness, obsession, or delusion.

Don Quixote is incredibly enthusiastic about his desire to embody chivalry and knight-like qualities. And that leads him to not see things the way they really are. He becomes zealous and delusional.

Try it yourself.

Here are a few more strengths you can play around with:

• Leadership

• Loyalty

• Honesty

• Empathy

• Ambition

• Dependability

• Fairness

• Generosity

Think about your character and their most positive personality trait — their strength. Then consider what happens if they take that too far.

Once you have a good handle on that strength/flaw circuit, give it a try with your main character. How can knowing what will happen if their biggest strength goes too far help you to make that character more human?

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This post is the topic of this week’s Write Brain newsletter.

Shaunta Grimes is a writer and teacher and an out-of-place Nevadan living in Northwestern PA with her husband, three superstar kids, Art and Louie the dogs, and Ollie Wilbur the cat.

She is the author of Viral Nation, Rebel Nation, The Astonishing Maybe, Center of Gravity and Here I Am.

Check out her bestseller, How to Outline a Book in Three Hours. And join the Slow Writing Movement at the Book-a-Year Project.