One way to draw in your audience is to make your characters appear as real as possible. This helps the reader connect with the characters while caring what happens to them. And if you can make a beta reader cry at someone’s death, you’re doing it right.
A memorable and relatable character can drive a story while keeping the reader engaged. A two-dimensional character just won’t have the same impact.
In other words, no one will care about the character, leading to an awfully boring read.
9 Ways to Create Real Characters
It can take a bit of practice to create a character that people love to follow in a book. The more realistic you can make them seem, the more effective they are at keeping the reader’s attention.
You don’t want to fill your story with a bunch of no-named red shirts who’ll die without having an impact on your audience.
What can you do to make your characters feel real to the reader?
1. Add Flaws and Weaknesses
One of the most common pieces of advice I see for creating real characters is to give them flaws and weaknesses. Depending on these elements, you can make the characters more relatable to the reader.
Someone who is perfect throughout a story just doesn’t work well to keep the reader’s attention.
The great thing about flaws and weaknesses is how you can build them to create a character arc. This is when the character has a major change from start to finish.
For example, your character could start off as a loner who is mistrustful of others and generally hates people. By the end, the character could form a relationship with another and come to realize the value of teamwork.
I know – the example is a bit touchy-feely. However, I think you get the point of how a change can happen within the book.
2. Add (relevant) Behaviors and Mannerisms
Behaviors and mannerisms give your character personality. These can be either good or bad, depending on the story and what you need.
For instance, I have a character in Kingmaker who has a child-like curiosity as he explores a new world. This behavior leads to all kinds of fun conversations as he tries to understand why things are the way they are.
In Shadows of Atlantic City, the main character often draws his weapon the moment he feels threatened or in an unknown situation. But he doesn’t cock the hammer back on the pistol until he recognizes if there is a threat.
You can add all kinds of behaviors and mannerisms to accentuate a character. However, you want to make them relevant to the story. Otherwise, you’re just wasting time.
For example, I didn’t care to take note of what my main character’s favorite Starbucks coffee was because it wasn’t relevant to the plot. In fact, there isn’t a single drop of coffee in the entire book.
3. Describe Thoughts and Feelings
Giving your characters thoughts and feelings is a great way to make them feel real. And like behaviors and mannerisms, thoughts and feelings can be negative.
For instance, I often use emotion to drive major parts of dialogue. I’ll also use shorter descriptions in scenes to highlight what a character is thinking or feeling at that moment.
Of course, you want to make sure those thoughts and feelings are also relevant to the scene and the character’s behaviors and mannerisms.
A great example of this is the character Pelore from Kingmaker. In the second book, he feels a great deal of guilt about how events unfolded. As such, he is constantly trying to atone for what happened.
Just remember that when you’re describing something in a book, it slows the pace. You want to have a good balance between fast and slow throughout your chapters.
4. Create Wants and Needs
Wants and needs can help shape the foundation of a good character arc. It’s all about change, moving from what the character wants in the beginning to what the individual needs by the end.
Here’s an example for you Marvel fans. Tony Stark wants to make money selling weapons and relishes in power. When he sees his own weapon being used against him, he has a bit of an epiphany. By the end of Iron Man, he discovers he needs to pull back from weapon sales and atone for the damage he had wrought across the globe.
Wants and needs can come in all shapes and sizes. You can have major changes or a series of smaller ones as long as it fits the story.
You don’t need to develop these from the get-go. However, the earlier you establish the foundation of an arc or change in behaviors, the more real the characters will seem.
5. Write Realistic Dialogue
One of the most common compliments I receive is how my dialogue is realistic. Not just in comparison to how people talk, but how the speech reflects the character’s beliefs, mannerisms, and feelings.
Writing dialogue involves more than just writing down words, though. Good dialogue involves an emotional balance and actions that accentuate what is being said.
“I love you,” he said.
Or…
“I love you,” he said softly, caressing the side of her face and moving a lock of hair from her eye.
Now, this doesn’t mean that you need to add short descriptions and actions to every single thing being said. But it can greatly accentuate the moment and put emphasis on the actions of that particular scene.
When I write dialogue, I often say it out loud as if I am recording a voice-over. If it sounds cringey to me, then it gets re-written.
Reading your text aloud helps you process the information differently because it’s being converted to speech. Not to mention that it gives you a chance to hear how the text will sound in someone’s head as they read.
So, reading aloud in any context can help you edit all kinds of text in your manuscript.
6. Don’t Skimp on Relationships
Part of any realistic experience is based on the relationships we make, right? Whether good or bad, those relationships influence everything from what we say to what we do.
The characters of your book are no different.
The more relatable you can make those relationships, the better. In some instances, even fulfilling a reader’s fantasy can be exceptionally effective. A good example of that is how well romance novels perform.
You also want to make those relationships realistic, with their own benefits and drawbacks. No relationship is without conflict to some degree. Of course, the degree of that conflict is up to you and how your characters interact with one another.
This also includes the relationship between the protagonist and antagonist. Not all relationships are positive.
7. Use Personal Experience
When in doubt, you can use personal experience to give a character realism. This doesn’t have to center around yourself, though. You can add people you know in real life as well as their mannerisms and behaviors.
In fact, one of my books is full of people I know in the real world complete with how they behave toward others.
Speech patterns, body language, interpersonal social skills…you can flesh out some real characters based purely on your family. There are a lot of possibilities to make someone in your book stand out.
You can also get quite a bit of inspiration from people-watching around town. Just make sure you’re not being creepy about doing so.
8. Use an Actor Model
I often use real actors to model the characters I write. This is especially true if those actors have been in a movie that is similar to my current book.
I view my books cinematically and know what I would like to see if they were made into Netflix movies. I’ve found that it’s actually quite a common practice.
Not only does using an actor model give me a base for describing the character, but I can also incorporate behaviors and mannerisms that were represented in the movie.
Or, I can take bits and pieces from several actors and roles to create an ultimate protagonist or antagonist.
9. Avoid Too Much Origin Story
Adding a character’s history can bring it to life. But there is such a thing as adding too much of an origin story. It’s best to sprinkle the relevant information throughout the story.
Keep in mind that descriptions and backstories will slow the pace of the book. And since you want to balance out that pace, you want to sparingly use historical references of the character.
Then again, it really comes down to how you structure the novel.
I’ve read books where entire chapters are dedicated to past events. But those were laced with actions and dialogue that really didn’t slow the pace.
However, I’ve also read works where the origin story took up the majority of the book. For me, it created a disconnect from the current plot and made for a bit of a boring read, overall.
Plus, jumping back and forth too often and too abruptly can confuse the reader. You don’t want to give someone whiplash when they read your book.
Not All Characters Need Fleshing Out
Do all characters in your book need to feel real? Not necessarily. It’s OK to have background characters that are there to serve a single purpose, whether it’s the ambiance at a coffee shop or an army being burnt to a crisp by a dragon.
One of the most common uses of throw-away characters is in the Star Trek universe. It’s a running joke that if you’re wearing a red shirt, you wouldn’t live long in that particular episode.
Sometimes these throw-aways were given names, but they didn’t have much to do other than get killed by some alien, explosion, or accident.
My point is that you don’t need to name every single being in your book. The only ones that really matter are the ones you’re trying to get your audience to love or care about what happens to them.
In the original manuscript for Kingmaker, there was an elf who sacrificed himself to save the group. Initially, he was a red shirt that needed to die. But thanks to the suggestion of a good friend of mine, I gave the character a bit more life before that scene.
The end result was a few readers saying how they were sad about that character dying, which is what I wanted.
Nonetheless, not everyone in your book needs to be fleshed out in such a way. Sometimes you just need a group of people to get crushed by a boulder.
Usually, I’ll create bios of characters that I plan on keeping while exploring who they are in the story. Everyone else is a red shirt.
It’s All About Emotional Connections
If you can pull any kind of emotion from a reader, then you know you’re on the right track. This can be everything from absolute hatred to lust. And that emotional connection is what keeps people reading.
You just don’t get the same effect from a two-dimensional character that doesn’t seem to have a life of its own.
Creating real characters can only go so far, though. If the plot and story are bland, it could undo all of the work you put into character building.
But that is a story for another time.
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