I had my writing accountability hour with friends tonight and got to work on some character sheets for the two main characters in my “Lake Murder” book. I’m going to try out dual POV (point of view) for the first time, so I felt like I needed to spend some extra time with both of them. My writing tool, Scrivner, has a starting template for character sketches, so I spent an hour this evening transferring some notes and fleshing out the characters.
The Scrivener sketch starts with these prompts:
- Age
- Location
- Role in the story
- Goal
- Physical Description
- Personality
- Occupation
- Habits/Mannerisms
- Background
- Internal Conflicts
- External Conflicts
- Other Notes
I’ve never done a structured character design before–I typically pants it by just starting to write in their voice and then come back to create a character summary once I have a baseline. I’m trying a different approach to tease out some plot. It’s been an interesting process with these characters because when I first came up with the premise for this book I was going to have it be singular POV, but the love interest ended up being too compelling to me . . . I had to have her share the stage. I actually have more background and ideas for that character now.
I’m hoping this story will continue to pick up steam . . . I just need to figure out that murder plot.
With Love,
Natalie