Would You See Your Character At The Mall?

O.K. I understand the paranormal people will answer no to this, but hold that thought for a second. What I am talking about today is simply making your characters believable.

As an author, it is your job to create the most believeable story for your readers. Obviously, a key factor here deals with character development. Too often, I read stories from authors that have characters acting and saying things that, in reality, they would never behave this way.

One of the first areas where I see this time and time again is the mismatch between the characters actions and their professions. While there are those "exceptions" to the rule out there, we have to look at the way your character acts in that profession and how it aligns with the real world. For example, let's take teaching. If your heroine is a returning student, she is not going to get involved with the professor. Although there might be an attraction, it will not happen. This stems strictly from the Ethics Clauses that are in the contracts of the schools.

Let's try the situations we see over and over again in romantic suspense with the detective becoming involved with a client, or the person they are investigating. Again, this is not going to happen because it not only blows the credibility of the detective, it might blow any potential case and court situation.

The second area we see this mismatch comes from the way you have your characters acting in each situation. This is where a real understanding of human nature comes into play. Let me bring up the romantic suspense situation again. I am always laughing at the suspense stories where the two characters are being chased by the bad guy. This is a life and death situation and yet, in an effort to create the "sexual tension" the author suddenly has them getting it on. Umm, I don't know about you, but if I am in a crisis situation, the odds are I am not going to be thinking about sex.

Consider all of the other emotions. How does a real person, in the real world, act and behave when they are:

• angry?
• happy?
• grieving?
• euphoric?
• etc.????

Just because you need the story to go a particular way does not mean you can ignore how a person will act within a given emotional conflict.

As you edit, you need to stop and look at each scene. Don't focus so much on where the story is going to; instead, look at the emotional context of the story. Look at who the character is. Is everything truly in alignment?

Have fun.

Scott