The Personality Page revolves around Myers-Briggs typology, which numerous professionals have criticized as unscientific. The Myers-Briggs personality test, it is said, basically just asks people what kind of personality they think they have and then regurgitates it back to them in a handy, scientific-sounding summary. But this weakness is one of its strengths for the storyteller. Because we are not interested in psychoanalyzing real people. And we are not interested in compiling accurate statistics, or with scientific authenticity. We only want to create convincing, fictional characters out of our imaginations. So we merely need to understand personality traits that are out there, and Myers-Briggs does help us do that.

A Writer’s Site-map to PersonalityPage.com

Overview Information

The following overview pages can help you understand the theory behind Myers-Briggs and determine which personality types would be most appropriate for your character.

• Myers-Briggs Personality Typology - A brief history, and a summary of the theory.
  • The 4 Preferences - A summary of the 4 independent preference continuums used in Myers-Briggs: extraverted-introverted, sensing-intuiting, thinking-feeling, and judging-perceiving.
  • The 16 Personality Types - A brief summary of each of the 16 personality types (4 preferences, each with 2 independent possibilities), each with a link to a personality profile.
  • The 4 Temperaments - The four temperament groupings that David Keirsey developed, each containing 4 personality types.
  • Personality Development from Childhood through Adulthood
  • Personality Type Demographics
  • Personality Type and Political Affiliation

Personality Profile Source Material

Once you have one or more personality types in mind, use the following pages to construct a character profile. Your character profile should not just include verbatim everything associated with that personality type. Rather, you should pick and choose characteristics (from multiple overlapping profiles) that reflect the personality of your character.

• Personality Profiles
• Career and Personality Type
• Relationships and Personality Type
• Personal Growth and Personality Type

What Next?

A personality profile will not get you a deep character. My current process starts with a personality profile, then I flesh out the character with his history, his relationships, his challenges, his ambitions, his fears, his beliefs, and so forth. Of course, then I have to actually tell this character’s story, which is for me the hardest part of the process.

-TimK

In my view, either I’m a writer, and I write consistently. Or I’m not a writer, and I don’t. Therefore, churning out a novel before the end of the day May 10, that exercise does not make me a writer. Just a few hundred words each and every day, that does make me a writer. This misperception many writers and aspiring writers seem to have. It’s as if they think they need to push themselves to the limit in order to get enough time for writing, and that requires something like NaNoWriMo or 70 Days of Sweat.

Or else there’s some lure in the idea that, if you just buckle down and do it, you could actually write a novel in only a month (or 2½ months). I think that’s the wrong attitude to take. Rather, look at it this way: If you can spend just 10 or 20 minutes each day writing, you can finish a complete novel in under a year. That’s right, if you really want to be a writer, you don’t have to give up your life. You don’t have to “find time,” because you can probably find 10 or 20 minutes easily enough. (More on that in a sec.)

But what about procrastination? What about the fact that unless you have that deadline looming over your head, you’ll never get past daydreaming and get to writing? Holly Lisle addresses this (unwittingly) in her How to Beat Writer’s Block e-course. I downloaded a copy of it, because I wanted to review it. I did not think I had writer’s block. Boy was I wrong.

Yes, I had been writing pretty consistently. I sat down each day to write at least a little. But I wasn’t always able to write when I needed to. There were days when the words just wouldn’t flow, or I didn’t know how to continue, or I just didn’t feel like it. Of course, none of these are excuses not to write. I knew that. What I didn’t know is that none of these are excuses not to write well.

I was talking about deadlines. Yes, a deadline can motivate you like nothing else. But 30 days or 70 days is a long time to wait for a deadline. Because you’ll never meet the 70-day deadline unless you impose for yourself a daily deadline, and stick to it, at least for those 70 days (or 30 days). The thing is, if you can stick to your daily deadline for 30 days, you can stick to it forever. In fact, if you can achieve your daily goal for a week, you can probably keep achieving it forever… but only if it’s sustainable.

And that’s the clincher when it comes to NaNoWriMo and its ilk. Now, I never followed up on my New Year’s resolution post (from my other blog), but here’s how the story turned out. I had promised myself I’d accomplish certain things each day: bill at least 5 hours each day, write at least 500 words each day, and connect with at least 5 people each day. I kept that up for a week. Then I started to burn out.

So I had to choose. I could continue insisting on what was clearly an overly aggressive daily goal, which left me no slack, and this New Year’s resolution would end up where most New Year’s resolutions go. That would have been unacceptable, because I needed certain things, or else my family would be living in the street, in which case it wouldn’t even matter whether I ever got to be a full-time writer.

It’s the same way with writing sprint projects. They don’t actually help you become a writer, because they don’t help you establish a writing pace you can maintain.

So I scaled back my daily goals. I bill usually 3-4 hours a day, but more if needed by a client. I try to write at least 500 words a day, but it’s more important that I have at least one writing session a day–more on that in a sec–and I’m letting automated processes, like my blogs and email lists, do most of my marketing for me. The rest of my marketing consists of reading other people’s blogs, participating in Friday Snippets, and marketing-related writing projects (like this blog post, believe it or not).

What does this have to do with Holly Lisle’s Writer’s Block e-course? Well, I was talking about daily goals and deadlines. Holly Lisle’s course has a whole bunch of things you can do to overcome writer’s block. One of the tips I gleaned from this course has to do with deadlines, specifically an immediate deadline.

You start with an exercise. Get a count-down timer. You can use a kitchen timer, or the timer on your microwave, or a computer timer. I fell in love with the timer app for Mac OS/X that Holly recommends, Minuteur (French for “Timer”), which you can download for free. Whatever timer you use, here’s what you do. You sit down to write, and you set your timer for 10 minutes. No more than 10 minutes, at least not at first. You start the timer, and then you start writing. And you write for 10 minutes. You avoid editing. You do not go back to fix anything, because you’ll do that later. It doesn’t matter how good or bad the words are as they come out. Your only objective is to get as many words as you can out onto the page during those 10 minutes. And then when the 10 minutes runs out and the timer goes off, you stop. It doesn’t matter if you’re right in the middle of a thought, or if you’re on a roll. You stop.

What you’re doing is training your mind to realize that when you sit down to write, it needs to get in gear and start writing. You can’t dawdle for a half-hour and then get into flow. No, you need to get into flow now. You’re training your mind to realize that when you sit down to write, it has to take the ideas that have been bubbling through your head and get them streaming out onto the page. If you’ve never actually committed to trying an exercise like this, it may sound unreasonable and stressful. Well, anything new is going to feel a little stressful, but that’s a good kind of stress. However, it’s quite reasonable. Because it actually works.

And here’s what I found. In 10 minutes, I can actually write several hundred words. With practice, I can do more than that. And even though the goal is to write whatever crap comes out of your mind, without thinking critically about it, what I found is that most of what does come out is pretty darn good. Some of it is even inspired.

What’s the lesson here? 300 words in 10 minutes, 10 minutes a day, times 260 weekdays a year, that’s 78,000 words. In other words, you can write a novel in less than a year, if you write for 10-20 minutes every day. But you have to do it every day. You can’t make exceptions because you don’t feel like writing or because you can’t get the words to come out or because you don’t know what to write about. Some of these are bona fide obstacles, yes, but part of being a writer is learning how to get around, over, or through these obstacles.

Every single day.

-TimK

If you’ve ever bought any of the electronic downloads from Holly Lisle’s online web shop, this limited-time freebie is available to you.

Click here to find out more.

-TimK

This year, during the holiday break between December 25 and January 1, the kids and I and Grandma and Grampa piled into a rented minivan and trekked 7 hours to southern New Jersey… where the aunts and uncles and first and second cousins reside. And while I was there, I finally understood why Brothers and Sisters makes me laugh.

But the biggest epiphany I had…

The last time I was in New Jersey was the summer of 1995. It was a year after my grandmother died and a year before my eldest was born. Back then, I knew little about human personality, and even less about how to write fiction. In that time, my entire perspective has changed, and I was honestly amazed at how much real-life character drama passes by right under our noses. The old adage is true: You can get loads of great character ideas by looking at the people around you. Of course, using these character ideas is another matter. But notice just some of the things I noticed about the people in my own family:

• My dad, aunt, and cousin talked football for, like, an hour. I mean, I love a good game as much as the next guy. But to debate the sport for a whole hour? Meanwhile, I had a good nap.

• One of my aunts is actually afraid of the Internet. This is also the one who has an opinion about everything and would rather tell you what it is than to listen to what you were about to say when the thought occurred to her. (Except that she is proud of the fact that she does not do so when it comes to her team beating the other guy’s team, because she knows he wants her to make a big deal of it, and she knows it’s eating him up inside when she keeps her gloating to herself.) All I had to do was to mention “doing business on the Internet,” and that sparked a tirade that took me completely by surprise. Of course, business is just the first in a long list of things I do on the Internet that makes it indispensable to me. We never got to number 2.

• Another aunt has a hundred and one potty jokes that are actually funny. At one point, I was laughing so hard, I couldn’t breathe. I had to stop and focus on my breathing, because I was afraid I would pass out, I was laughing so hard.

• Most of my parents’ generation are not Internet savvy. They still happily live without email.

• While we were debating the finer points of when it is and is not appropriate to use a cell phone… We were discussing people who talk on the phone while in the car. Ah! I remembered, the Mythbusters did that one, didn’t they? My cousin and I were the only ones who seemed to know about the Mythbusters. But between the two of us, we remembered which episode it was and what they had concluded about talking on the cell phone while driving. (Talking on the cell phone can be worse on your driving than being legally drunk, if you have to split your attention between the road and on the conversation your having on the phone.)

• My kids’ second cousin always carries a book with her and is always reading it. She’s not even in high school yet. Can you say “Rory Gilmore”? Yikes!

• My uncle tends to forget things my aunt has told him, which drives her up the wall. They’re still together, though, and they’ll never get divorced.

• And me! I can’t stand it when incompatible food items touch on my plate. I mean, it’s okay for my turkey, stuffing, and gravy to slosh together. Because they go together. But keep the gravy out of my potato salad or cranberry sauce!

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Actually, the trip inspired me at almost every turn. Indeed, it is true that the best ideas come from real life.

Of course, the most touching realization is that no matter how much your family makes you laugh, it’s always hardest when you have to say goodbye. We’ll have to go back soon and visit again.

-TimK

P.S. That is, if they haven’t disowned me after this post.

P.P.S. I picked up a bunch of postcards from my trip. I’d be happy to send you one. Just click here to email me, and ask for a postcard from Longwood Gardens. First come, first serve, and I can’t get any more until who-knows-when. So if you’d like a free postcard, email quick.

The fiction bug first bit me in 2002, when I had an inspiration for an idea I wanted to write about, and I knew I had to explore the idea from within a story, because it was the only way to make the words personal, concrete, not just to explore an abstract idea. So I sat down to pen the great American novel…

NOT! Yes, I tried. I knew the theme of the story, and I came up with a basic plot and character sketches. But my novel fell flat on its face, because I just didn’t know what I was doing. So I started writing short stories instead, because during this learning phase, if I wrote a bad short story, I would have lost little. If I spent a year writing a bad novel, I would have lost a whole year. Of course, my journey so far has gone on much longer than that.

Back then, I thought the most important element of fiction was story conflict, because conflict is what drives a story forward and makes it worth reading. But I was wrong. I wrote story after story, most of which sucked. Occasionally, I would hit on one that was worth keeping. The first story I wrote that I was proud of I called “In the Past,” a story about a guy who meets a childhood crush and questions his marriage. Looking back at it now, it makes me cringe, because I made mistake after mistake after mistake. And someday I’ll rewrite the parts of this story that make me cringe. Even back then, I knew what I didn’t like about the story, but I didn’t know how to fix it, because I just wasn’t a good enough writer. Still, despite all the mistakes I made, this story is still readable, even today. It’s not going to win any literary awards. But it does work. Even then, I knew it worked, but I didn’t know the real reason why.

Why does the story work? Not because of the story conflict, or because of the plot, or because of the story idea, or because of the use of language, or because of the mood or pacing or choice of point-of-view or the quirkiness of the characters or pop-culture references or anything else usually attributed to story success. Here’s how I know. Let’s look at these one by one:

• Conflict - This is the big one for me, because conflict is central to making a story work. And I myself have harped on it before. But reading “In the Past,” you can see that I set up most of the story conflicts so poorly, they have no depth and little impact. At least the main conflict has some impact, which is good, because then the story would be a total wash. But when it comes to conflict, in general, I did a really crappy job.

• Plot - This is another big one, because so many writers focus on plot first. But what’s the plot in this story? A guy, married with kids, pines for an old flame, falls for her, questions his marriage, and eventually makes a decision. Okay, so it’s in the dictionary somewhere between cliché and crap-ola.

• Story idea - Using the Internet to find a high-school sweetheart (kinda). The story “idea” is what many new writers seek for, as though finding the right idea will make them a writer. But raw ideas are a dime a dozen. And this one, while relatively fresh at the time, involved no big leap of originality. And that’s the way it is with most story ideas. Let’s face it: Most story ideas have been done before. And done and done and done and done again. Roger MacBride Allen noted how he would find an “original” idea, and then be able to fill bookshelves with stories based on that same idea, and I believe it. The right idea can’t save your story, and it didn’t save this one.

• Language - When I wrote “In the Past,” I knew how to write good prose. Really, I did. I swear I did! I just didn’t apply those techniques consistently. That’s why I ended up with weak descriptions, corny dialogue, and awkward scenes. This story ain’t gonna win no liter’ry awards.

• Mood - Mood? What’s that? Okay, I guess there are some scenes that have a half-way-decent mood. The bar. The pantry. The car. Because sometimes I got my conflicts and descriptions right. But this is not a “moody” piece.

• Pacing - Pacing? What’s that? Seriously, what is it? I paid no attention to pacing in this story. I just wrote what came. When I’m writing an episode of The Conscience of Abe’s Turn I pay attention to pacing, because each episode is 5 chapters of about 3500 words each, and the story has to ebb and flow to fit that structure. But with “In the Past,” I just did what “felt” right. The pacing in general isn’t bad, but because the conflicts need work, the pacing also needs work, because pacing ends up being a by-product of how the story explores its conflicts.

• Point of View - Third-person limited omniscient. It’s not rocket science. I still believe this was an appropriate choice for this story. Second-person would not work, and that was pretty obvious, because it’s not about the reader. First-person would have given a different feel to the story, because we’d only hear things that the main character Dylan actually wanted to talk about, and he doesn’t talk much, but that wouldn’t have ruined the story. Point of view is one of those things that if you somehow manage to choose very obviously poorly, you can end up with nonsense (which is easy to fix). But in most cases, point of view is not going to make or break a story. It’s just a tool that you use to tell the story. What is it that makes the story itself worth telling?

• Character quirks - Yeah, the characters have some quirks, or tags, or hooks. Aubrey plays with her hair. Dylan drinks Coke and lime and likes blondes. Katherine talks about politics. But all of these things could change in a heartbeat without making the story better or worse. What if Dylan were to drink scotch and like brunettes? Would the story really be any different? No. Character quirks can add flavor to a story, but they won’t make the story.

• Pop-culture references - I’m not even sure why I added this one, except that I’m a Gilmore Girls fan, and GG is known for its pop-culture references. GG wasn’t the first, either, and it wasn’t the last. Alluding to pop-culture in stories is a time-honored tradition, and it gets a fair amount of commentary. And I included a pop-culture reference or two, which even meant something to the story. However, none of these are really necessary to the story. Like quirks, pop-culture allusions add flavor to a story, but they can’t make it.

My point is that I could have made significant goofs in all of these areas–indeed I did make significant goofs–and the story could still be salvageable. But there’s one thing I have screwed up in other stories, a critical flaw that permanently destroyed my early stories. Some of these stories were based on really cool, mostly original ideas. Or were moody as all get out. Or had well-defined conflicts. But they were missing this most important story element. Even though I hit on it occasionally, by accident, I missed it frequently, because I didn’t know what it was.

And then I discovered Holly Lisle. Specifically, I discovered her Create a Character Clinic. I was so excited by the feature list and the free chapter, I immediately ordered and downloaded a copy. Little did I know, however, how important this one resource would become to me, and how it would change my writing forever.

Because the one thing I did right with “In the Past” was that the characters had character. I didn’t know it at the time, because I just based the characters on traits I saw in real people. And I based the characters’ desires and reactions on how I thought real people would act. What I was doing without knowing it: I had created a deep (for a short story) character that readers could sympathize with. But Holly Lisle had analyzed the problem and created a process that I could use anytime I needed to add depth to any character. As I read through the Character Clinic for the first time, the whole problem, and its solution, just clicked into place. Just like that.

Here’s an example of the power of character in stories. A friend of mine, an aspiring filmmaker, asked me to consult with him on a script for a short film. As a favor to a friend, I took a few hours pro-bono to help him. The first thing I did was to open up Holly Lisle’s Character Clinic and apply it to his protagonist. We started throwing around ideas just for the first section of the clinic, “character need.” And a light bulb went off in his head. His voice became more excited. Suddenly, things were clicking. His character started jumping off the page for him. And his story engaged him. Just like that. He finally ended up with a much better, more engaging screenplay, which I pray he commits to film.

Character is the most important element of fiction. At least it’s the most important thing a writer needs to keep in mind. Your readers may point to other things as being more important to them. But none of these would work if you didn’t have deep characters.

• Everything else flows ultimately from character: conflict, plot, setting, mood. Conflict always involves at least one character, and it only means as much as the characters do. Plot is a series of events caused by character action (or inaction), and character determines what those events will be. Setting matters only because the characters are there, because they’re part of the plot. Mood comes from all the above and how you meld them together.

• You can make numerous mistakes elsewhere in the story and get away with it, as long as you have engaging characters to pick up the slack. After I saw Ratatouille with my daughter, I complained that it had a major plot hole. Remy (the rat) had all the skills needed to communicate with humans, but he still was unable to. He could understand human language. He could read cookbooks. He could manipulate recipe ingredients and cooking apparatuses. He could cook! (That was the whole basis of the story.) Surely he could have learned to talk, or at least to write. How could he use a chef’s knife safely and at great speeds, but not be able to figure out the intricacies of the pencil? But if Remy had known how to talk, that would have mooted the whole story conflict, and there wouldn’t have been a story. The story was essentially one giant contrived plot device. Walking out of the movie theater, I started to complain about all this. And my little girl–God love her–told me, “Lighten up, Dad!” It didn’t matter to her that the whole story was a contrivance, because Remy was a real character, and if he couldn’t talk, then he couldn’t talk, and that was that.

• People sympathize with characters, not plot devices, settings, moods, or conflicts. This should go without saying. As human beings, we connect with other humans. In fact, there’s evidence to suggest that interactions with fictional characters tickle the same parts of our brains as interactions with real people. That’s why plots only matter in as much as they affect and are affected by characters. Setting only matters when a character interacts with it. Mood is a function of a character moving through the story. And all conflicts involve characters.

• You can often reinvigorate a failing story by revisiting the characters. At the very least, ask, “What would they do?” If you doubt this, try it. Start with a failed story you’ve given up on, and start asking some hard questions about the main character. What does he really need in life? What happened to him to make him the kind of person he is? What beliefs and values control his life? And so forth.

Asking questions, that’s where the Create a Character Clinic starts. And that’s what took my writing to the next level.

If you don’t have a copy of the Character Clinic, click here to find out more about it from Holly Lisle’s site. And remember that the ebook is eligible for my special offer: If you get it through the link on this page, send me a copy of the emailed receipt and ask me to subscribe you to my exclusive “Writer’s Tips” e-Newsletter.

-TimK

For those who order Holly Lisle’s How to Beat Writer’s Block through my affiliate links at the bottom of this post, I’m offering two freebies of my own.

Where to Find Thousands of Great Character Ideas… FREE

What if you had a magic “idea box,” and when you opened it up, character ideas just started pouring out? What would that do for your writing? If you had a magic idea box, you could:

• Produce rich, 3-dimensional characters that readers will remember, because you will make readers laugh, cry, and feel for your characters.

• Cut your writing time in half (or better), because you’ll know exactly where you are with each of your characters and exactly how to deal with any obstacles that arise.

• Permanently overcome a major source of “writer’s block” not knowing how your characters fit into the story.

• Virtually eliminate the frustration of creating characters and the fear that your characters will never be good enough.

• Increase your writing prowess, and earn kudos from other writers.

• Exercise your creative muscle, and make yourself more creative.

• Write fictional characters that people want to get to know and to talk about.

• Create characters that intrigue and excite you.

The magic “idea box” is for real. There actually is a writing tool that can help you do all these things. It starts with something every writer needs, and something you may even have already started. I’m talking about a character journal. A character journal is a long list of character traits. Whenever you need an idea, you go to the journal, and it helps you find the right character trait.

But a tool accomplishes nothing unless one knows how to wield it. And that is the secret to creating winning fictional characters with this tool, how to cash in on your character journal. Once you grasp this truth, you’ll appreciate that ideas really are only worth a dime a dozen, because you’ll have more great ideas coming to you than you ever thought possible.

As hard as it is to come up with great ideas, the raw ideas are actually the easy part. The hard part is taking those ideas and turning them into a story. Because even if you had all the ideas in the world, ideas can’t write your story for you. Only you can do that.

That’s why I’ve compiled this brand new PDF ebook, 1001 Character Quirks for Writing Fiction, with much more than just a list of character quirks. It includes:

• 1001 Character Quirks ready to use in real stories.

• The single biggest mistake writers make with quirks, and the secret to using them effectively.

• 10 ways to enhance character with quirks.

• 12 techniques you can use to generate your own character ideas.

• 8 tips on how to multiply quirks, so you can turn these 1001 quirks into 2000, 3000, 10000, or as many as you want.

• A 3-stage character-development process you can use to create realistic and interesting characters.

• A quick-list of 35 questions you can ask to give your character depth, and which questions not to ask.

• A simple, 5-step writing process you can use to turn any character into a story, even if you’ve never written a story before.

• An actual fictional character, soup to nuts, including a snippet from a finished story starring the character.

• Numerous concrete examples and enlightening anecdotes.

• Free downloads of future editions of the ebook.

This is an $8.34 value, because the core is a list of 1001 ideas, and ideas are a dime a dozen. So, 10 cents per 12 ideas, times 1001 ideas… Actually, it’s worth more than that, because it’s a tool you use to generate your own ideas, as many as you want.

But I’m giving a copy of this ebook away for free to anyone who orders the How to Beat Writer’s Block audio course using the links below.

Exclusive Writer’s Tips e-Newsletter… FREE

Yes, I’ve posted numerous tips and tricks on BeTheStory.com. And I pop my head in from time to time at the online writer’s boards. But I reserve the best writer’s secrets I know, simply because it’s too much work to distill them into a usable form. But…

Now I’ve started an exclusive Writer’s Tips e-Newsletter, full of storytelling tips, tricks, secrets, and exclusive offers, delivered by email and only available to my customers. I created this it for people who order my writing resources. But I’m offering a free subscription to the Writer’s Tips e-Newsletter as part of this offer.

The e-Newsletter is delivered safely and conveniently by email. In these emails, you’ll discover:

• 7 storytelling goofs, and how to avoid them.

• How to use personality profiles to improve your characters.

• How neurological research can make you a better storyteller.

• 6 psychological triggers that are important to storytellers.

• Why different people like different parts of the same story.

• New products and special offers for writers.

• … and more.

Here’s how to take advantage of the offer.

1. Click here to read about the How to Beat Writer’s Block course. You must use this link, because it includes my affiliate link-code.

2. After you order the course, send me a copy of the email receipt from shop.HollyLisle.com. (This receipt contains no personal information except your name and email address.) You can email me a copy of the receipt at timk@jtse.com, or you can use the contact form on my main website.

3. In the above email, ask for your free 1001 Character Quirks ebook and free subscription to the Writer’s Tips e-Newsletter.

4. I’ll confirm your proof of purchase and email you a link to where you can download the ebook and get the e-Newsletter.

This is a simple one-step procedure you can use to barrel through those times when you just can’t get started. You know your characters and their story. You know what comes next. Everything is all set. But you’re not in flow, and the words just won’t come out.

What to do? Very simple: Just sit down to your word processor (or your pad and pencil), and start typing the following:

“Blah blah. Blah blah blah. Blah blah, blah blah blah blah. Blah blah-blah blah! Blah…” and so forth.

Another alternative is “Foo bar baz qux quux blech blebop, and GUE xyzzy.”

Or maybe: “I’m a good boy. Maybe if I do this, some words will come to me. Let’s see, the guy. He has a woman with him. Mama mia! Fubar! Crap. She knocks on the door, and waits anxiously for the door to open. Numerous trouble thoughts raced through Mira’s mind…” And we’re off to the races!

Cool, huh?

The next time you just can’t get started, give it a try.

-TimK

Writers can be replaced, as we are constantly reminded. But so can companies. Power is on the move, and though in this town it’s been hoarded by very few, there are other companies with newer ideas about how to make money off of – or possibly, wonderfully, with – the story-tellers.

It struck me how valuable good writers are and how much TV networks–and fans, too–undervalue them. Joss Whedon is an exception to the rule, because he actually has a fan-site. Most fans never truly appreciate how thoroughly they are indebted to the creators and writers of their favorite shows.

A Story of a Undervalued and Skillful Writer

As you know, I am a huge Gilmore Girls fan. Most shows have good episodes and not-so-good episodes. But for 6 years, Gilmore Girls had not a single sub-par episode. Yes, there were some episodes that stood out above the rest. Even these are more than I can count on my fingers. And among the rest of the episodes, there was not a single significant mistake in storytelling… until the seventh season.

You see, here’s what happened. In 2000, Gilmore Girls was created by Amy Sherman-Palladino (who by the way got her start writing for Roseanne, the same as Joss Whedon, just after Joss left that show). Actually, she probably created it in 1999, but it didn’t premier until 2000. For six years, Amy and her husband Dan poured their vision into the Gilmore Girls story. it was like a child to them. It was their life.

Then in 2006, contract negotiations broke down. The Palladinos wanted a two-year contract, instead of the one-year contracts they had been getting year after year. Now, there are many details to be worked out in a contract negotiation. Each side has a whole host of concerns that have to be dealt with. Unfortunately, the WB didn’t even want to talk about it. The network execs never even came to the negotiating table. Apparently, to them, the Palladinos weren’t even worth that. The Palladinos were told to take the contract or to leave.

So they left. And their vision left with them. Gilmore Girls was never the same again. It never had the satisfying ending we expected from Amy Sherman-Palladino. And to this day, fans badger Amy to reveal the final four words she envisioned as ending the Gilmore Girls story.

But it was more than that. Amy is a storyteller extraordinaire. She is someone who epitomizes the writing I aspire to. Most of what I know about storytelling, I discovered by analyzing Gilmore Girls. I first acutely felt Amy’s absence in the 5′th episode of that last season, with a scene that began with the following dialogue:

Rory and Logan are lying on the roof, looking at the stars.

Rory: I’m so happy.

Logan: Me too. [Kisses Rory on the head.] You know you can’t do this in London? The city lights are so bright, you almost never see the stars.

Rory: Yeah, but it’s London.

Logan: Ah.

Rory: Wait, are you tired of London?

Logan: I’m tired of not being around you.

At about this point in the scene, I actually asked myself, “Who the hell cares?” And then I realized that I had never, ever asked that question before, not a single time in any scene of any episode of Gilmore Girls. Six full seasons, and not a single time did I ever want for sympathy with the characters plights. And speaking of plights, what is Rory and Logan’s plight in this scene? They’re happy. They’re together. They’re smooching under the stars. Okay… That’s not a story. Who wrote this scene, anyhow? My 11-year-old kid writes stuff that’s better than this! (Seriously. She does. Way better.)

The following statement may contain some presumption, but I think I’ve earned the right, because I’ve studied Gilmore Girls inside and out. Amy never would have allowed a scene this boring into her story. Because she’s too good for that.

Yet, who gets the 7-year contracts? The actors do. Now most fans disagree with me, but frankly the fans are clueless. Actors are a dime a dozen. Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel are wonderful actresses. But if they had not been available, Amy would have found someone else to play the parts of Lorelai and Rory Gilmore, and Gilmore Girls would have been just as good. They get all the screen time, yes, and all the fame and all the glory. But the real genius behind the show is the woman with the vision. And she doesn’t get a 7-year contract, oh no. She doesn’t even get to talk about a 2-year contract. She just gets issued an ultimatum and summarily thrown out on her ass.

… after which fans proceed to blame her for ruining Gilmore Girls. Yes, you heard me right. And this is all true. Many fans speculated that Amy sabotaged the show by leaving Luke and Lorelai in an impossible fix in the season-six year-end cliffhanger. They claimed she wanted to leave the future writers with a situation they couldn’t write their way out of. As I said, the fans are clueless.

As you know, leaving the characters in an impossible fix is what you do in a cliffhanger. Because otherwise, it wouldn’t be a cliffhanger. (Duh.) In the marrow of my bones, I know that Amy already knew how Luke and Lorelai were going to get out of that fix, even before she wrote that cliffhanger. The fact is that the writers who followed her simply were not good enough to deal with the situation, because they didn’t have Amy’s vision.

Writing Is Hard

That should be clear by now. Writers do not just sit on their arses all day and churn out words. A writer is the visionary behind every great story. You can not just replace writers. Because good writers are skilled creative professionals. Winning writers are not commodities.

The day after Joss posted his open letter, he wrote a follow-up blog post on the WGA strike. In it he said:

Writing is largely not considered work. Art in general is not considered work. Work is a thing you physically labor at, or at the very least, hate…

Writing is enjoyable and ephemeral. And it’s hard work.

It’s always hard. Not just dealing with obtuse, intrusive studio execs, temperamental stars and family-prohibiting hours. Those are producer issues as much as anything else. Not just trying to get your first script sold, or seen, or finished, when nobody around believes you can/will/should… the ACT of writing is hard. When Buffy was flowing at its flowingest, David Greenwalt used to turn to me at some point during every torturous story-breaking session and say “Why is it still hard? When do we just get to be good at it?”

I’ve been a creative professional of one sort or another for most of my working life. And I agree with Joss that you don’t ever “just get to be good at it.” Yes, there are many things you can do to make it easier, and that’s what Be the Story is about, storytelling as a professional endeavor, even if you’re still only an aspiring author, even if you’re still unpublished and unknown. Because one mark of a professional is that you’re always trying new things, always developing new skills, always getting better at your craft.

But does it ever get easy? No. It’s just that storytellers like Joss and Amy make it look easy.

-TimK

P.S. Just in case you don’t know what they’re striking over, the Writers Guild of America posted a short video on YouTube that makes it abundantly clear. (Although, I understand negotiations have moved the goal posts slightly since this video was made.) And I sympathize completely. After all, one of the reasons I’m getting out of software development is that software developers get no residuals.

Now, I don’t know whether publishers would take it seriously. I can only speak as a writer and as a reader. (I have little faith in most publishers to do the right thing by readers, but that’s for another blog post.) But for what it’s worth, here’s my answer:

I’m not sure what you mean by “cliché” and “contrived.” A cliché can’t be contrived, and a contrivance can’t be a cliché, because the two are essentially opposite.

Whether the plot is a cliché… There are two things about clichés: Firstly, they won’t surprise or impress anyone. Secondly, they won’t surprise or impress anyone. That is, on the one hand, you can’t make your whole story out of clichés, or you’ll leave your readers with that “I’ve heard this story before” feeling. But on the other hand, readers will not question whether or not your clichés are plausible. Clichés are clichés because they’ve already been done to death; therefore, everyone already believes they could happen, even if they never could. The Mythbusters do whole episodes where they demonstrate that accepted movie clichés could never happen in real life. But at the movies, no one questions whether these clichés are plausible.

A contrivance on the other hand is one that is implausible. It’s something that does not seem to flow naturally from the rest of the story. You the writer contrived some plot twist and threw it in out of left field, and it makes no sense in the context of the story. In fact, you wouldn’t even have added it, except to generate additional drama or–even worse–resolve some story conflict. You can easily fix contrived plot devices, though. Just give a plausible “reason why” for the plot device. If a contrivance comes out of left field, simply don’t bring it out of left field. The “reason why” doesn’t have to be elaborate. In fact, it can rest on a cliché, because no one ever questions the validity of a cliché. (Readers only question the originality of clichés.)

I guess what I’m saying is, in answer to your question whether your story is a cliché or is contrived: It depends on how you tell it.

One thing you can try, which I find consistently helps, is not to tell a story about your plot. Rather, tell a story about a group of unique characters. You may not have even created the characters in detail yet. Do so. Put together characters for whom this plot makes perfect sense, and your story won’t be contrived, because the characters themselves become the “reason why.” And make your characters unique and interesting, and your story won’t be a cliché, because the characters themselves become the originality in the story.

Keep writing!
-TimK

P.S. I’m sort of on a characterization kick right now, because I just finished releasing 1001 Character Quirks for Writing Fiction: A tool for creating memorable fictional characters, and for it, I had to bring together all my research and techniques on how to make characters deep and interesting.

P.P.S. The trick of writing a story about the characters, instead of writing about plot devices– I got that from watching Gilmore Girls.

-TimK

8. Denies any fact that does not fit into his theory of how things work.

15. Instantly knows what others feel.

24. Disorganized (but always knows where everything is).

35. Always hides cash in his sock, shorts, bra, etc.

40. Becomes excited at the prospect of watching a movie, skydiving, eating chocolate, playing the stock market, etc.

59. Always breaks things, trips over things, etc.

63. Feels familial affection for or attraction to cats, horses, cows, etc.

75. Distrusts people who talk with an accent, have blue eyes, can’t remember his name, etc.

84. Refuses to fight with anyone wearing glasses, smaller than himself, etc.

90. Insists everyone call him by a different name each day, depending on his mood.

104. Believes that God is a sham created by the clergy to get money.

115. Always bragging about past accomplishments, even made-up ones.

122. Refuses to use microwaves, cell phones, computers, etc.

138. Rude to everyone.

143. Professes multiple, incompatible religions.

159. Overly sensitive sense of smell, hearing, sight, etc.

163. Hobnobs with a certain person only in private.

174. Always looking for a cure for a disease or condition he has.

188. Shouts “I’m here!” (or something else) when startled.

194. Speaks every errant thought.

209. Upset when faced with a messy room.

217. Tall, but envies those who are short. (Or the reverse.)

223. Never laughs; treats every joke as though it were serious.

232. Always laughs at the wrong things; offbeat sense of humor.

248. Must control everyone and everything.

254. Carries batteries (and toys) with him everywhere.

266. Carries cookies in his purse.

271. Makes Batman noises (e.g. Bam!, Pow!, etc.) at an antagonist to express anger, dissatisfaction, etc.

284. Has 2 differently colored eyes.

291. Never asks for help; always tries to do everything himself.

305. Knows many facts in his expertise, and always corrects everyone else.

312. Always sucking on a Certs or lollipop, munching on pretzels, etc.

329. Relates everything to a fable or allegory.

334. Always replies to any email within 24 hours.

347. Nudist.

355. Loves playing catch with kittens.

361. Always uses a handkerchief to touch a public telephone, chair, etc.

376. Lives to role-play.

385. Reads every newspaper and website; watches every news program.

397. Always gets off on a tangent, tirade, etc.

405. Eats Buffalo-sauce-and-Blue-cheese burgers, mustard sandwiches, etc.

412. Frequently says the wrong word, makes Freudian slips, etc.

420. Hates to sweat, and is turned off by people who sweat profusely.

434. Can drive at excessive speed, weaving in and out of traffic, without getting in an accident.

446. Loves to sing “99 Bottles of Beer,” etc.

459. Names and becomes attached to stuffed animals, caterpillars, rocks, raindrops on the window, etc.

461. Takes every question as a criticism (or complement).

473. Always works very hard, but has no concrete goals.

486. Never talks about his past (or future).

491. Insists on remaining the same, even while everyone else is changing.

507. Always says he worked hard, in order to justify the result of his work.

514. Feels no sadness, anger, nervousness, etc., but can fake it pretty well.

523. Wakes promptly at 6 PM; falls asleep at 10 AM.

535. Prattles on about trivia when there are significant matters to discuss.

544. Willing to do anything for information (if for a greater purpose).

559. Could never accept that his close friend has a fatal flaw, even if true.

564. Can’t swallow pills.

573. Never expresses his feelings about someone else, until they explode.

580. Becomes depressed unless given a steady stream of positive feedback.

598. Always faces an emergency by taking command of the situation.

603. Has drawn up a list of transgressions and a revenge appropriate for each.

618. Turned on by any woman’s name (or man’s) with a certain sound in it.

623. Believes Tupperware parties, AA meetings, etc. are actually planning meetings for a secret underground conspiracy.

631. Always knocking things, leaving things on the floor.

645. One day each week, instead of working in the office, takes his laptop and works in the park, coffee shop, etc.

656. Brags about a new game he made up using a see-saw.

664. “It’ll never make any difference” only strengthens his resolve.

670. Has psoriasis on his scalp, underarms, private areas, etc., and scratches.

689. Loathes to be photographed.

696. Always treats everyone with respect, no matter their class or station.

709. Becomes mired in grief when his favorite fictional character dies.

718. Asks for exactly the same thing over and over, even after being told repeatedly that it’s infeasible, impossible, unavailable, etc.

724. Agrees quickly (by silence), but later comes to a different conclusion.

733. Sees all art as “whatever you interpret it as,” including family photos.

743. Practically gives money away, knowing it will come back manyfold.

755. Brilliant strategist; always seems to have planned for any contingency.

760. Easily deceived by anyone who uses words he doesn’t understand.

774. Always finds an excuse not to tell a woman how he feels about her.

788. Always tweaks what he’s already completed, to make it better.

795. Needs to be the center of attention.

809. Accomplished illusionist. (But uses this skill only subversively.)

816. Always looks and acts stupid, but is a passionate master persuader.

824. His online persona is of a different age, sex, etc.

831. Can find happiness with any lover.

845. Prefers computer sex to the real thing.

852. Loves to wear costume jewelry, tricked out clothing, etc.

867. Raises chickens, pigs, etc.

877. Has a crush on Underdog, Superman, Wonder Woman, etc.

883. Can’t stand to do the same thing day after day.

895. Intensely passionate in what they pursue and believe.; frequently blowing up or screaming because of this passion.

904. Will accept almost anything as “normal,” once it is explained to him.

912. Always wants someone to help him, even with the simplest tasks.

928. Always forms an emotional attachment to fine cars, collectibles, etc., even if owned by someone else, and feels slighted if the they are mistreated.

930. Never looks a person in the eye, and always talks in a monotone voice.

944. Always tries to be nice, and always ends up insulting someone.

959. Always gets others to agree first to something he doesn’t want, knowing it will make it easier to get them to agree later to what he does want.

964. Loves sailing, motorboating, yachting, waterskiing, etc.

977. Puts maple syrup, salt, butter, etc. on everything.

985. Always offended when he discovers that someone listened to him just to shut him up (and then didn’t follow his advice).

992. Miriam Stockley’s song “Perfect Day” makes him cry, feel happy, etc.

Author Holly Lisle recently started a writer’s newsletter. Naturally, I subscribed, because I swear by Holly Lisle’s writing resources. But even though I’m a hard-core fan of her advice, the content in this newsletter has been so spot-on, it blew me away. (In retrospect, I don’t know why it blew me away, because Holly has never given me any reason to expect anything less.)

This is a free newsletter in which Holly answers writers’ questions, reveals professional secrets, dispenses tips and tricks, and lets you in on special offers. It’s definitely worth trying out, even if (for some bizarre reason) you decide not to stay subscribed. It’s easy to try. You can do it right now in a few seconds. Here’s how:

1. Click here to go to Holly Lisle’s newsletter sign-up page, then
2. Type in your email address and click the button.

-TimK

The advice is basically, if you want become a better writer, you should write, write some more, keep writing and writing and writing until you become a better writer. Some authors even take great pride at how much they’ve written that’s never been published. They take pride in the number of rejections they’ve gotten, because it makes them feel like they’re pursuing their dream, even if they’re not getting anywhere.

None of that makes you better writer. That makes you a so-so writer at best. If you want to be a better writer, especially if you want to be a truly great writer, here are 7 steps you can follow that will actually make you a better writer, and not just a prolific one.

1. Read - Ironically, Brian Clark knows this, because he’s a copywriter. All top copywriters have a swipe file, a collection of outstanding ads that they use to make their own writing better. Well, great ads do you no good if all you do is collect them. You have to actually read them. As a copywriter, you should read a top-performing sales letter every day. And as a fiction writer, you should read a little fiction every day. How else can you experience what actually works, learn from the successes of others, and internalize these lessons so that you can replicate them?

2. Watch TV - Yes, I’m serious. This is true for fiction writers, but equally true for non-fiction. You should watch a little TV or a movie every day, because the audio-visual format expresses ideas in a totally different way than prose does. That allows you to experience the story on a completely different level than if you had read it. In particular, TV gives you a high-level viewpoint as reading simply cannot. Now, I’m not saying you should watch every piece of dreck that hits the airwaves, just as you shouldn’t read all the dross that ends up printed between two hard-covers. But the best TV and movies, the best documentaries, the best ads, you should be watching them.

3. Analyze - Don’t just read and watch TV. Read the best books over and over again, and watch the best shows over and over again. I’ve watched the first 6 seasons of Gilmore Girls more than a dozen times. And it’s not because I like the show anymore–though I do. I keep watching it, because Amy Sherman-Palladino did an exceptional job, and I want to replicate it. So I watch it, not to enjoy it, but to identify storytelling practices and patterns that she uses, which I can then use in my own stories.

4. Use good tools - I swear by Holly Lisle’s Create A Character Clinic and her Create A Plot Clinic. I also use an idea journal to generate ideas for characters and plots. I also use a dictionary and thesaurus. These are tools that help me plan my stories and execute them. For copywriting, I use templates and checklists. And so forth. In whatever niche you’re writing, it pays to invest in good tools that will help you increase the quality of your writing.

5. Write better - I say write “better,” because as a writer, you should be writing a little every day, even if it isn’t much good. You’ll never be a writer until you actually write. So do write, write, and write some more. But if you want to write better, actually take what you’ve learned and use the tools you’ve collected to put it into practice.

6. Share - Join writer’s critique groups, show your work to other people, get feedback. You don’t have to listen if the feedback doesn’t make you a better writer. But you do need to show your work to others and get feedback in order to become a better writer. In particular, show your work to people who are unlike you, to writers who are better than you, and to aficionados who will rip your work to shreds. (Then ignore them, except for that one nugget of truth you had completely overlooked.)

7. Start over again - So many experienced writers believe that they have reached their plateau. But the best of the best never stop learning, never stop trying new things, never stop reading outside of their genre, and so forth. They’re forever broadening their basis of experience, because that makes you more intelligent and makes you a better writer. Don’t think you don’t need to try a new technique or a new tool, because you think you’ve already got your groove or have already established your process. Stretch yourself. Challenge yourself. Try a new process. You might surprise yourself.

Improvement in writing, as in any endeavor, doesn’t just happen. The old adage is bull: If at first you don’t succeed, don’t try, try again. Because if you keep doing the same thing, you’ll always get the same crappy result. If you want a better result, you have to try something different. So writing by itself doesn’t make you a better writer. Only challenging yourself to step outside of your comfort zone will make you a better writer. And this requires that you systematically expose yourself to new things, new influences, and new experiences, and that you understand how these affect you.

-TimK

Holly Lisle hit the nail on the head on her website in her advice about how to write a fictional character:

I’ve read a number of otherwise-decent writing books that have you start out creating your character by giving him a hook — some little device that characterizes the person… It doesn’t hurt to do this, but I recommend that you do it later rather than sooner…

And don’t mistake a few nervous tics and a jaunty saunter for characterization. Your own character is what’s inside of you — what you’re made of when things get ugly and hard… Your character has nothing to do with whether you wipe your bangs out of your eyes with the back of your hand or always wear something yellow, and the same is true of the people you’ll be creating and writing.

As you know, I swear by Holly Lisle’s Create A Character Clinic. I use it as the second stage in my character-building process.

The first stage is to get a sense for what kind of personality the character has. This is optional, but with a complex character, I find it helps me first to know whether she’s outgoing or reserved, task-oriented or theory-oriented, logical or emotional, organized or messy, and so forth. I use resources like:

• information on Myers-Briggs personality types from The Personality Page,
• the DISC temperament model (and I highly recommend the discussion of DISC on the Manager Tools podcast),
• any psychological research on personality traits, personality types, or temperament indicators– and there is lots.

For a complex character, I find this makes it easier to use the Create a Character Clinic. Because personality types talk in generalities, but the clinic drills down to specifics. Knowing her personality helps me understand why she responds a particular way in a certain situation, but the clinic forces me put her in a situation. It forces me to think about what specific things are most important to my character, what experiences helped her round out her personality–or limited it, what she does for a living, who she has a relationship with, what hobbies she has, and what fears and aspirations she holds.

By this point, I can put my character into an arbitrary situation and know exactly how she’ll react.

For example, she’s waiting in line at the grocery store, and the customer in front of her gets into an argument with the cashier. The customer claims she shorted him $5. He gave her a $20 bill, and she gave him $10.32, but it should have been $15.32. The cashier says she gave him the correct change, counted it out to him and everything, and she even saw him pocket the $5.

“No I didn’t. You didn’t give me a $5 bill,” he says.

“Let me see what’s in your pocket,” she replies.

“No. What’s in my pocket doesn’t matter. There’s a $5 bill in there. I came in with it. That doesn’t change the fact that you shorted me.”

Into this situation, I can put each of the main characters from The Conscience of Abe’s Turn, and I know how each reacts.

• Ted gets involved early, by introducing an off-hand comment into the conversation. He politely asks the customer if he can see the contents of the customer’s pocket. Before that, though, he asks the cashier if there were any identifying marks on the $5 bill she gave the customer. He finally suggests that the cashier call the floor manager over, because only she can decide what to do next. He knows she may decide to give the customer a $5 bill, to foster goodwill. But the only way to resolve the issue is to count down the cashier’s drawer. If the drawer is $5 over, that would prove the cashier shorted the customer.

• Clydene, Ted’s wife, goes through essentially the same thought process as her husband. Very early in the conflict, she determines that they ought to call the floor manager, because that’s going to be the most likely outcome anyhow. But she says nothing. Rather, she first thinks the whole argument is rather silly. I mean, it’s just a lousy $5 bill, for crying out loud! She laughs to herself at how ridiculous it is. Then as the conflict progresses, she starts getting annoyed. She looks around to see if there’s another aisle that she might move to. She starts adding up the effort it would take for her to remove her groceries from the belt, putting them back in her cart, plus the time she’d spend waiting in another aisle. Then she asks whether that would save her time or just cost her more time. It’s a gamble either way, of course. Fortunately, before she comes to a conclusion, the cashier decides to call the floor manager and asks the customer to wait, while she starts on Clydene’s order.

• In the exact same situation, Mira feels a tightness in her stomach. She considers pulling out $5 from her purse, to offer it to the customer so that everyone can be happy. But then she asks herself whether he would be more likely to find that insulting, or whether the cashier would get angry at her for butting in. As the situation develops, however, Mira becomes angry. Suddenly, she blurts out, “It’s only 5 lousy dollars!” She rips $5 from her purse and thrusts it at the customer. “Here! Now you have your $5, and,” turning to the cashier, “your drawer will balance out.” What happens next depends on how the cashier and customer react. Regardless, the floor manager notices the ruckus and walks over to ask what’s going on.

• Michael enjoys the little scene and lets it play out a while just so he can see where it goes. He noticed little clues, like the fact that the cashier did indeed give the customer a $5 bill, and that the bill had a pen mark on it. But he doesn’t care so much about those things. After a while, he smiles and coolly remarks, “You know, it’s only $5.” Then he pulls out his wallet and extracts a $5 bill, offering it to the customer. Both the customer and cashier in unison decline, and the cashier suggests that she call over the floor manager.

• Sam also sees the cashier count out the customer’s change, including the $5 bill. He also notices the pen mark. And immediately he gets involved. As soon as the cashier says she saw the customer pocket the $5, Sam butts in with, “Let’s see what’s in your pocket.” When the customer, indignant, refuses, Sam identifies himself as a police officer, tells the customer to get out of the store, and promises to have him arrested if he doesn’t comply. And that’s not an empty threat. Sam could and would actually have him arrested.

Then I finally can consider character quirks.

As the third and final stage in my character-building process, I consider quirks that would make my characters more interesting, more distinctive, and more memorable. Now, in the first stage, I already gave the character some traits you would not expect for his personality type. And in the second stage, I gave him some distinctive hobbies, aspirations, fears, and so forth. But now I can fill out the character with personality.

I like to use an idea journal for this. That is, I keep a list of character quirks. At any time, when a new character quirk occurs to me, I write it down. Then when I’m building a character, I use this list to generate ideas for the character’s quirks. Sometimes, I can just use a quirk from the list as-is. But more often, I use it as fodder for one idea-generation technique or another. So…

• Ted always speaks in a dignified, formal tone, even in casual conversation. Think Alan Shore (James Spader’s character in The Practice and Boston Legal).

• Meanwhile, Clydene sits alone in her home office and plays the guitar when she needs to unwind or think.

• If Mira’s apartment burned down, she’d say, “At least now I don’t have to hire movers.” And she’s not afraid of getting arrested, because “at least it’s for a good cause.”

• Michael loves to make fun of his antagonists by mimicking or caricaturing them.

• And Sam distrusts and suspects anyone with a strong intuition, anyone who seems to know things without having experienced them first, especially someone who knows what other people will do before they do it.

Quirks can’t make the character.

I love character quirks. (I mean, what else would you expect from a Gilmore Girls fan.) But what makes a character real is not the quirks. A character’s quirks make her more interesting, more memorable. I love that Lorelai talks a mile a minute, that she is quick-witted and that it sometimes gets her into trouble, that she eats like a horse but never gains a pound, and that she runs an entire inn but can’t manage her mother… But what makes Lorelai real is that she wants to start her own business, but can’t imagine leaving her old job; that she secretly buys Luke’s old boat, because he’s acting rash and doesn’t actually want to get rid of it; that she shares secrets with Sookie that she won’t share with her boyfriend, and vice-versa.

On the other hand, a character like Kirk… Quirky is an understatement. I can’t describe Kirk, except to say that he’s not a man you want to bring home to meet your parents. It is said that when a scene got slow, they would just throw Kirk into the mix, and that would fix it right up. He is a unique, entertaining, and memorable character. But was he ever a factor in any major storyline? No.

Could he even have been part of a major storyline? I think not! He’s too inconsistent to be a real character. He’s just too quirky. Every episode, he’s doing a different crazy stunt. Very entertaining, yes. But he’s not a real character. He’s more of a plot device thrown in to liven up the action. You never truly care about him, because there’s no depth to him.

That’s why I think of character separate from quirkiness. Of these two, character is more important. So I like to get that nailed down first. Once a character has character, I can always add quirks that are consistent with it, that enhance it. But I don’t know if it’s possible to do it the other way around. And if I had to choose, I’d rather get to know a deep, 3-dimensional character than a quirky one. Quirks can show me who a character is, and they can make a character more fun or more interesting. But at her heart is her character. That’s the core that makes a character seem like a real person.

What do you think? Do your all-time favorite characters all have quirks? And do the main players in your favorite stories all have deep character?

-TimK

P.S. Keep an eye out on these pages for a new writing tool, 1001 Character Quirks for Writing Fiction: A tool for creating memorable fictional characters. I’m currently getting it ready for production, and I plan to offer a limited pre-production run soon.

[Update: 1001 Character Quirks has been released as an ebook. Click on the link to take advantage of the special, introductory offer.]

In the penultimate scene of Because I Said So, for example– And by the way… SPOILER ALERT! In an overwhelming display of passion that I can only call “heart-wrenching,” Johnny interrupts Milly’s seniors cooking class, in order to profess his love. In the middle of this impassioned speech, with Milly on the verge of tears, one of the seniors in the class interrupts with, “Could you hurry it up, because we have to pee!” Cue cymbal crash. Then again, during the big kiss, the seniors begin pairing off for their own big kisses.

When I was watching this, I didn’t think it was funny. I thought it was awkward. I didn’t know how to feel. It broke the mood. My wife, who came in only during the last 20 minutes of the film, did think it was funny. If you caught the full impact of the scene, you probably got thrown by how the writers tried to spice up a poignant moment with a couple of cheap laughs. If you thought it was funny, you probably didn’t feel the poignancy. It’s one or the other, not both.

This problem, mixing the ridiculous with the sublime, is actually one case of a more general rule: Kill only one bird per stone. For example, you can have a plot-based thread and a character-based thread both in the same story. But make sure you treat them as separate threads, because you don’t want to confuse your audience. Or in copywriting, make sure each ad supports one and only one action. If you’re trying to get the reader to send away for your free promotional DVD, don’t also try to sell them your latest product in the same ad, because your prospects won’t know how to respond to your ad. And if a scene is supposed to be serious, don’t try to make it silly as well, because your audience can only feel one thing at a time.

On the other hand, I have seen writers successfully mix the ridiculous and and the sublime… kind of.

In the same movie Because I Said So, earlier in the film– By the way, a pretty good story, if you haven’t seen it. Yes, a pop-film, but t’ain’t nothin’ wrong with pop film. And this one is way better than most others I’ve seen. I’ve watched it 3 times so far. Another SPOILER ALERT! In an earlier scene, Milly is furious at her mother Daphne. She storms up to the house, calls her mother’s name, hears Daphne call, “Yes!” and then charges into her mother’s room just in time to catch her in the act. That was funny.

Why was it funny? On the one hand Daphne was angry at her mother because of something she had done. That’s serious. And because she was angry, she misunderstood her mother’s call. All this time, we the audience could see it coming, step by step, until the punchline. In this case, what I felt, I acutely appreciated Milly’s hurt and anger. At the same time, this joke uses a classic humorous gambit–the funny misunderstanding–and about one of the world’s oldest awkward subjects. How can it help but be funny? In fact, Milly’s story thread served as a motivation for the funny encounter, making it more real, more immersive, and therefore more funny.

Another case that comes to mind is M*A*S*H (the classic TV series). Hawkeye Pierce is always cracking jokes, usually jokes about the death and destruction of the war. How can you make fun of a subject so grave? This is something I personally have great trouble with. In fact, I’ve said I so miss Bill Clinton, because G.W.’s presidency has been marked by conflict and terror. Yes, Slick Willie had his share of conflict and terror, even more than King George. But there were so many other more entertaining things that took center stage, thanks to Congress. Politics was never so fun, and may never be again. But now… Despite my conflicted feelings, I still find M*A*S*H both poignant and funny.

Because Hawkeye’s jokes do not just make fun of the war. They make fun at the expense of the war. Hawkeye’s humour is sarcastic, if not sardonic. For someone who roots for this protagonist, his antics are a breath of fresh air in a suffocating situation… Which is exactly what Hawkeye was caught in. That’s why, I think, I can find M*A*S*H both ridiculous and sublime.

What do you think? In what other situations may a writer mix the ridiculous and the sublime without getting into trouble?

¹ This story, called The Conscience of Abe’s Turn, is actually an online drama serial.

When she suddenly broke off their engagement, and then went and married her daughter’s father… Of course, we also understand what pushed her to this. Luke did. He was pushing her away, making her second place, being insensitive to her needs. I miss the old Luke, who was always there for Lorelai, no matter what. He’s always loved her, even before they were dating. And whatever problems they face, we know they’ll never be truly happy unless they find happiness together.

This might be the last season of Gilmore Girls. And what do fans like this do when their favorite show is about to be canceled? Answer: Everything they possibly can to keep it going. They don’t want GG to end at the current, seventh season. So there’s the “Great8Mandate” write-in campaign. And there are numerous online polls, which GG fans vote on in droves. There are petitions. And then there are blogs and forums, and almost every TV blog or forum out there has at least one comment on it begging for a Gilmore Girls season 8.

As I write this, there are only 4 episodes left for Luke and Lorelai to reconcile. And fans are getting very nervous. They want Luke and Lorelai to reunite. But how can they possibly do so in only a month? After all the bridges they’ve both burned? How do you get by all the anger and hurt, and find love and contentment, that fast? It just doesn’t happen. I tried to soothe their fears, reassuring them that Luke and Lorelai can indeed get back together, even get married, this season. I even described exactly what kind of thing would have to happen to make it work, and why. The only question is whether the writers go ahead and do it.

But fans are not writers. Our hero has gotten himself into a fix. And the fans think that he can’t get out, because they can’t see a way out. Of course, that’s what makes for great drama. Because when he does get out of the fix, free to save the world, we’re overjoyed. Fans don’t understand storytelling. And that’s why I pray the writers of Gilmore Girls ignore fans when it comes to the story. I pray they don’t let the fans tell them how to write a good story.

Because the fans keep saying we need to give Luke and Lorelai time to get back together. Amy Amatangelo, the TV Gal, reflects the opinion of many Gilmore Girls fans:

I am on “The Great8Mandate” bandwagon… We deserve a proper farewell. Or as TV Gal reader Rebecca put it an “unrushed conclusion.”

An “unrushed conclusion”? Okay, here’s the problem. An “unrushed” conclusion is a boring one. Like dialogue, pacing is not about what’s realistic. It’s about what’s plausible. And when fans say “unrushed,” they mean they don’t understand how Luke and Lorelai can possibly get by the China wall that currently separates them. In other words, if the fans can’t see how the conflict will be resolved. But if they could see how the conflict will be resolved then the suspense goes right out of the story. I can’t think of one top story that has an unrushed conclusion. They always have dramatic, mind-bending, tear-jerking conclusions that leave you saying, “Wow!” Unrushed conclusions suck.

Rushing the ending can make it all the more powerful. If it seems like Luke and Lorelai just can’t reconcile, doesn’t that make it all the more powerful when they do? And this is true no matter how unrealistic it is. It doesn’t matter whether the ending is believable, only whether it’s plausible. And whether or not it’s plausible depends more on the characters themselves than on real life. Once you have strongly sympathetic characters, as Gilmore Girls does, you can do almost anything you want in the story. And if the characters go along for the ride, the audience will, too.

When Steven Spielberg directed Jaws, the story goes, when he got to the end of the movie, where the shark dies– Peter Benchley had written the original novel and the screenplay. And Spielberg’s ending was different than the original ending. Benchley disagreed with Spielberg’s ending, because he said it was unbelievable. He said no one would believe that an air tank would explode like that or that it would explode a shark like that. Because none of that could possibly happen in real life. And as the Mythbusters proved, Benchley was right. The ending to Jaws could never happen in real life.

But Steven Spielberg said, he’s had the audience on the edge of their seats for 2 hours, and he’s going to give them a satisfying ending. He said the story was going to go out with a bang. And you know what? Spielberg was right. In theaters, when the ending came, audiences cheered. They not only believed the impossible; they exulted in it!

It has nothing to do with what would happen in real life. It has to do with the drama. It has to do with identifying with a hero who, being in an impossible situation, somehow overcomes, triumphant. It’s the plausible impossible. And that’s what I want to see of Luke and Lorelai.

What do you think? Is it better for a story to have a rushed ending? Are there case in which a story should have an unrushed ending?

-TimK

It’s like “The Monkey’s Paw.” This is a classic short story by W. W. Jacobs in 1902. (You can read it at amlit.com.) In the story, the mummified paw of a monkey has magic that grants the owner three wishes. When Herbert White got the paw, he was warned that it was dangerous. Still, he figured he’d try it out. He wished for £200, and he got his wish… in the form of a settlement on the death of his only son. He decided right there to destroy the paw. But his wife pleaded with him to use it to bring their son back. So he wished for the resurrection of his son. We can only surmise that this second wish was granted, because whatever came banging at their door that night could not possibly have been human. In desperation, he made his third and final wish, and all was quiet again.

It’s a pattern you’ll see in every great story. It’s what makes timeless myths work. And it persists across media, genres, and cultures. Writing guides based on mythic structure go into much more detail than I’m going into here, like Christopher Vogler’s classic The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, revered especially by filmmakers. At the same time, he covers less than I do here. He explains clearly the hero’s journey that Joseph Campbell identified in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, but gives us few hints as to why it works or what we might do to break it.

But I digress. Let’s look at the basic pattern. First, introduce the protagonist. He is someone we identify with, and he faces some problem. The problem can be with another person. Or it could be that he must battle the elements of nature. Or it could even be a psychological conflict within himself. Or it could be some combination of the three. In “The Monkey’s Paw,” Mr. White wants for adventure, and perhaps a little money. Whatever it is, in every story is a conflict, a dissonance, that demands to be resolved.

At first, it’s a small conflict. It may be hardly enough to get worked up about. Our hero tries to resolve the conflict. He proceeds in the way that seems most natural and sensible to him. But this attempt backfires. It only serves to make things worse. The plot thickens. He ends up in a worse situation than he was before. In “The Monkey’s Paw,” Mr. White wished for £200, but this money came at the expense of his son’s life. What’s more, he’s locked into this new situation. He can’t go back. He can’t undo his failed attempt. This is important to keep the story moving forward. He must press on. He must go forward.

So he does. He tries to solve his new problem, which only serves to make things even worse. Don’t call it melodrama. It’s storytelling. Then just when our hero is facing rock-bottom, he makes one final attempt and succeeds. Or fails. Whichever, there’s no more conflict, and the story is over.

A story, at root, is anything with a story arc. That is, establish a conflict, thicken the plot, and resolve the conflict. The precise conflicts and resolutions vary, as does how the plot thickens. Some stories replace one problem with a different, bigger problem. Others just make the existing problem worse. Some stories thicken the plot only once. Others draw out the suspense until you feel your head is going to explode. Some stories allow the hero to win. In others, the hero loses. In yet others, the hero wins one thing at the expense of another, a bittersweet resolution.

And when I say “anything with a story arc,” I do mean anything.

• News stories grab, summarize, and detail an event or an issue, playing off of a conflict in the audience: your desire for information.
• Editorials incite, enrage, and persuade by leveraging opinions and emotions.
• Essays and speeches engage, involve, and educate. The best ones keep you interested through your thirst for knowledge.
• Advertisements describe a problem, irritate you regarding that problem, and then pose a solution.
• Even music is made up of phrases of dissonance and consonance. The chords go from stability to instability and back again. The more dissonant the chords become, the greater the emotional effect when the music returns.

The same conflict-thickening-resolution pattern is everywhere. It permeates human nature. Stories are universal. As Christopher Vogler wrote in the preface to the second edition of The Writer’s Journey:

The Hero’s Journey is not an invention, but an observation. It is a recognition of a beautiful design, a set of principles that govern the conduct of life and the world of storytelling the way physics and chemistry govern the physical world. It’s difficult to avoid the sensation that the Hero’s Journey exists somewhere, somehow, as an eternal reality, a Platonic ideal form, a divine model. From this model, infinite and highly varied copies can be produced, each resonating with the essential spirit of the form.

Amen. Long live the story. It will never die.

-TimK

Two Weeks, One Screenplay, Are You Up To The Challenge?

It’s “the NaNoWriMo for screenwriters,” the 14-day screenplay, and it’s almost upon us, June 3 - 17, at 14DayScreenPlay.com. The challenge is to write a feature-length screenplay in just 14 days. Starting at midnight Saturday morning (June 3), ending before midnight Sunday morning (June 17)&mdashYes, that’s 14 days—can you create a 90 to 120-page screenplay?

-TimK

As an aspiring screenwriter, have you ever felt left out by the aspiring novelists and their NaNoWriMo? What kind of a silly name is NaNoWriMo anyhow? No one can even pronounce it right! It’s much easier to pronounce “14-day screenplay,” and it rhymes! (Well, I guess “NaNoWriMo” would rhyme, too, if we could actually say it.)

The next 14-day screenplay is coming up fast, June 3 - 17, at 14DayScreenPlay.com.

(By the way, the part above, about NaNoWriMo, is just funny silliness, good-natured ribbing at what is actually a great annual event. )

-TimK

-TimK

In a story, starting a fight is an easy way to make the mood tense. But conflict can do more than just make a story feel tense, suspenseful. Conflict engages the audience. It makes us sympathize with the characters and root for them. And it heightens other emotions in the story.

Conflict draws us in

Frequently, when the conflict makes the story tense, it’s actually heightening some other tension in the story. For example, C.J. West’s Sin and Vengeance is a true, page-turning suspense novel. The suspense comes not just from the conflict between the protagonist and antagonist, but also what we expect the antagonist to be capable of. He terrifies us.

This happens because conflict draws us in: Conflict enables us to feel sympathy for the underdog. In a Romance, the romantic parts are about love unrequited or passion unfulfilled.

Conflict enables sympathy

Tom Sawyer is a sympathetic character. Even though he’s always doing naughty things, getting into trouble, we don’t like to see him punished. And then when he develops a crush on Becky Thatcher, our sympathy increases. And when he witnesses a murder and Injun Joe is out to get him, our sympathy increases again. Our sympathy lets us feel for him, even feel the same way he does.

I also talked about conflict in the season-six finale of Gilmore Girls in another post. The reason for the strong reaction fans have to the finale is the sympathy they have for the characters. And this sympathy would not happen were it not for the conflict. The sympathy is so strong, in fact, that fans get upset because the conflict. (Is it possible to make a story too immersive?)

Romance unfulfilled

This Gilmore Girls episode also includes romantic elements that make us want to cry. This happens when romance is unfulfilled.

Casablanca is another example of a movie that makes some people cry. It’s because Rick is in love with Ilsa, but their love can’t be, then will be, then will never be.

Casablanca actually didn’t make me cry, though The Notebook did, as I mentioned in the last spotlight. Movie critics have described The Notebook as being a sappy romance story. But such a story works, for a simple reason, romantic tension. We have conflict; it draws us in, makes us feel what the characters are feeling.

How to do it

If you want to use conflict to create or enhance the feeling a story brings:

1. Decide which feeling the story should portray.
2. Choose a conflict that would make the protagonist feel that way.
3. Make the protagonist face that conflict.

An example

Last September, I wrote a short story called “Pine.” It was actually a project I did for a writing prompt. I had to write something inspired by a certain photo of a house. But I knew I didn’t want to write about just a house. Because no matter how much I dressed it up, that would be boring. I knew I needed a conflict. So I chose a romance story revolving around a first love.

Here’s the beginning of the story:

Each morning Jace walked by her house on his way to school. Each afternoon he passed it on his way home. Sometimes, he would also pass at other times. Occasionally he would catch a glimpse of the bright-faced girl with wavy blonde locks. She sat under the two conifers that towered overhead. But as far as he knew, she never noticed him.

The house itself, a grey Stick Victorian with brown trim, spoke of a happy family. Its expansive porch took a jaunt through the sweet-scented yellows and reds of the flower garden. Little gabled alcoves jutted into the world, embraced by the overall form of the structure, as if its gables were parents looking after their offspring. A squat wall of white stone stood before this all, making up in intensity what it lacked in stature, a formidable protector to all within.

But the trees were even more special, for under these Jennifer would read. Or sometimes she would just be sitting quietly or humming softly a tune Jace didn’t recognize. Jace paid her no heed, or else she might see his admiration. But out of the corner of his eye, he noticed her shapely form, and he fought to keep breathing. And in his imagination, he felt the softness of her pink cashmere sweater in his delicate hands. He felt her fingers running through his thick, dark hair. Her chocolate eyes and his ordinary brown ones got lost in each other. Perhaps his finger stroked the line of her eyebrow, following her face around softly-curved cheek and jaw, finally resting under her chin.

But Jace said nothing, made no motion out of the ordinary. He merely continued walking, as nonchalantly as possible for a big-footed, lanky teen in a grey tee and worn khakis.

You can read the whole story at my LiveJournal.

-TimK