Character Building

All of my writing begins with the characters and in the Ben Kingdom books I’m especially proud of the cast of heroes and villains I’ve been able to create. Authors often talk about their

characters ‘living on the page’ and ‘finding their own voice’; characters can even surprise authors by taking the story in unexpected directions. This might sound strange, but I’ve found it to be true.

On my school visits I’m often asked about how to make characters come alive like this. Here are two techniques I use that you might like to try in class.

(i) Know It All

You can’t know too much about the characters in your story. As the writer – as the characters’ creator – it is your responsibility to know everything about what makes your characters tick. Very often all these details won’t be revealed in the story itself, but having thought about them and assimilated them, they will go a long way towards developing characters that readers will care about and root for. They also often act as a springboard, giving new ideas for the story itself.

Here is a checklist that you can use as a starting point… Have fun!

Know Their Physical Characteristics

This is often where a lot of character development begins and ends. What your character looks like is important… but not as important as the emotional and historical elements of a character profile.

● Age – is your character young or old? Is it something that makes them the odd one out?

LITERACY

● Hair colour / style – this can say a lot about your character, without adding extra narrative. For example, consider these hairstyles and what they might say. His hair had been parted as if with a knife, a clean sharp line down the middle of his head. Her hair was matted and greasy, twisted into funky dreadlocks that shook like a mane when she turned her head.

● Height / size – is your character tall or short? As lean as a scarecrow? As solid as a rock? Even if your character is normal /average height, what does that say about them… Do they blend into the crowd or is there still something special about them that makes them stand out?

● Peculiarities / quirks – story characters, especially the heroine or the villain, are larger than life. You can have fun by adding some unique features; Professor Carter, for example, has his claw, Lucy Lambert has one eye. Does your character have a scar? One green eye? Nose studs? A birthmark or mysterious tattoo?

Know Their Family life

Knowing this back story is crucial to knowing your character. Think about these questions and how you can use them to build your own story.

● Who raised / cares for your character? Parents? Strange relatives? Older siblings?

● How does your character feel about them? Love? Fear? Detachment? Resentment?

● Do they have brothers / sisters? Older or younger? How do they feel about them – protective, competitive, compassionate?

● What key events shaped their early life? Here you really can let your imagination run wild. These deep memories will definitely have an impact on how your character acts… for good or ill.

Here are a few suggestions to get you started. • He was trapped in a well for hours and didn’t think they would ever get out.• She saw the car coming, but didn’t react quick enough to warn their sister. • He found his mother’s letters hidden in the drawer. • She kept the kitten secret all summer. • He didn’t want to know his best friend’s secret, it burned inside him, trying to get out…

Know Their Personality

Use this tick list as a starting point, but really the choices are endless. Remember to include a mix of good and bad characteristics. The best heroines have faults, the most memorable villains have some admirable traits.

Are they…?Kind? Generous? Gentle? Quiet? Brave? Unselfish? Reckless? Angry? Mixed up? Bitter? Pessimistic? Hopeful? Proud? Cowardly? Greedy? Ambitious? Spiteful? Tender? Thoughtful? Hard-working? Deep? Cunning? Rude? Funny?

Know Their Hopes and Fears

This adds yet another layer to your fully rounded character. We all have hopes and fears, most of which we keep private… However, readers can know these secret feelings even when other characters in your story are oblivious to them. This will also help your reader to empathise – feel for – your heroine or hero.

Again, this list is just a jumping off point.

Hopes and dreams:• Acceptance / popularity• Fame / success• Wealth / treasure• A special friendship… that boy, that girl• A mended relationship… to know that the father does love them after all• To be proved right• To find out where they belong

Fears and nightmares:• Animals – spiders, snakes, rats etc• Heights / depths / confined spaces• Loneliness• Failure• Being found out!• The past• Themselves• It all happening again…

Remember, with all of these characteristics, don’t tell the reader, show them; if you want your character to be kind have them do kind things and your reader will work it out for themselves.

As an alternative comprehension activity, take one of the characters in The Battles of Ben Kingdom and then deconstruct them – see if you can find my original list of characteristics. Read Chapters 1 and 8 of The Claws of Evil. Consider the different aspects of Ben’s personality that are revealed.

(ii) Borrowing from the Classics

Another technique on character development is to take an established character and then develop your own version. An example from my work is Jago Moon. I make no secret of my love of the Sherlock Holmes stories and Jago Moon is my version of that character… Sherlock Holmes reinvented as old, grumpy, blind, from the East End of London and looking more like Ray Winstone than Benedict Cumberbatch!

Your class can use this technique too. Take a character that you love and know well and then subvert and recreate them. • Lara Croft…but in a wheelchair• Doctor Who, if he was a girl from your school instead of a Time Lord from Gallifrey• Frankenstein, if he was your neighbour

Plot Development and Story Planning

(i) The Stories in the Back Story

Your class will probably have come up with dozens of story ideas already, just by thinking about this character development process. Some of my favourite parts of my own stories are where these ‘back stories’ get told. For example in Chapter 25 of The Feast of Ravens, we learn something about Claw Carter that changes the way we think about him for ever. Similarly in The City of Fear, Chapter 18, Lucy Lambert reveals an entirely different side to her character… and as the author I knew these shocking facts before I had even begun writing the first book.

(ii) Fact is stranger than fiction

Another major tool that lots of writers use for plot development is to take inspiration from their research. For The Battles of Ben Kingdom I spent eighteen months reading about the Victorian era to ensure that my story setting was 100% accurate, and story ideas sprang naturally from that research. I was particularly influenced by the life of Dr Thomas Barnardo…especially the fact that he wanted to provide shelter for homeless children who were sleeping in the sewers and on the rooftops of London – that was the germ of an idea which developed into the Watchers and the Legion.

As a class you could take any topic that you are currently exploring, and search out the events and revelations which really get your imagination going. Alternatively, you might want to read through today’s newspapers. Talk about the stories that really resonate with your pupils; the sad ones and the funny ones. The headlines as I write these notes are A spy has been poisoned; a passenger jet has been shot down by mistake; Lego is washing up on a Cornish beach. Any one of these might be developed into a story of your own. You might place your own fictional characters into the middle of a real-life event, or you can take the facts and turn them into your own story.

(iii) Location, Location, Location

Setting can often be an element of school story writing that is skimmed over or ignored, but in my experience a great story setting can help lift your writing to the next level. In The Claws of Evil, for example, the story is about Ben finding the Coin and choosing which side he belongs with – the Legion or the Watchers. However, consider how much impact the Victorian London setting has on that story. The rooftop chases, the tunnels of the Under, the familiar locations that Ben visits (the British Museum, Tower Bridge) and the climax on the frozen river Thames, all flow directly from my choice of setting. As an exercise, take one story premise – a girl is accused of a theft she didn’t commit; a boy must overcome his bullies – then consider a range of different settings and how the story would be different in each of them. As a class you might want to expand on that idea – all write the same basic story but choose your own original setting, then compare.

Here are a few settings you might like to try:• A medieval village.• A remote island (this might be tropical, or Scottish).• An innercity tower block.• A submarine.• A haunted school.

Each of these different settings would create a vastly different story, even with the same starting point and same basic story elements.

Settings also bring unique and specific elements to your story. Choose one setting then consider these three headings:

● Threats – These are the unique extra dangers that only apply to your setting choice. For example there might be wild animals in an island setting, the strange old woman who lives on the second floor of the tower block, or perhaps villainous raiders in the medieval village.

● Atmosphere – Your setting will dictate the backdrop to your story; this can be both physical and emotional. This includes the weather, and its impact on the characters (I’ve used snow in Claws of Evil, fog in Feast of Ravens and torrential rain in City of Fear – all of which add extra challenges for Ben and the Watchers to overcome). The atmosphere also enriches the story by giving a prevailing tone. For example, on a submarine the characters might feel claustrophobic and trapped; in the haunted school the tone of the writing might emphasise the sense of disquiet and unease; on the island it might seem desolate and isolated.

● Unique features – Your choice of story setting also brings with it some exciting unique elements, only fitting to the backdrop you have chosen. These might be physical – the castle looming over the village; the engine room that might explode at any time; the headmaster’s office, where the chair spins all by itself; the lift that breaks down with your hero trapped inside.

Hopefully, having tried this exercise you will share my thrill in choosing exciting settings for my writing. As an alternative comprehension activity, you might like to choose a chapter from the Ben Kingdom books and read it, looking in particular for the story elements that I have developed from my setting.

(iv) The Rule of Ten

I’m often asked about whether I plan my stories in advance, and my answer is a very big ‘YES’. Some writers choose to set out with no clear ending in mind, Agatha Christie was famous for that, but knowing my own writing style, and my desire as a reader for the story to have a really satisfying and dramatic conclusion, I am definitely the sort of writer who maps stories out in advance. Now that I have three published novels, and am working on some new ideas, I am even more in favour of story maps. Having gone through the processes I have described already – creating my characters and their lives, selecting my setting and developing it to its fullest potential – I am ready to get down

to story planning. This usually starts with a one sentence description of the whole story. I was advised early in

my writing career that if it takes more than ten words to describe your story, then you probably don’t know what your story is. My ten words for the Claws of Evil are: Ben must choose sides, the Watchers or the Legion

(actually, that’s nine, but you get the idea). For the Feast of Ravens the story is: Ben makes a terrible mistake, can he

forgive himself? (If you’ve read the book, you know just how terrible his mistake is!)You can apply the ten word rule to any story, even massive ones like The Lord of the Rings – Frodo must destroy the ring before it destroys him. As a class you might want to look at a range of familiar stories and try that ten word rule. It will really help you to sharpen your own ideas before you start writing. When somebody asks you what your story is about, you need a tight snappy response… if it takes you twenty minutes, then you are probably rambling and your story might ramble too.

(v) The Story Map

You will no doubt be very familiar with a basic story map. Different schools have different styles, but they all contain the classic ‘three act structure’ – a beginning, middle and an end; or more helpfully, the introduction, the problem and the resolution. The introduction is where you reveal your characters and setting (ideally in the most exciting way possible – in all my writing I try to start with a real bang! to get my readers hooked early on). The problem and the resolution are the real meat of the story. Every story has a problem. It might be a physical one – Ben must get rid of the Coin – or it could be emotional – will Ben ever win his father’s love? In my writing, I like to include both!

But whichever you choose you must make sure that it is your hero or heroine who actually solves the problem! It is much more exciting for your hero to confront the villain for themselves, rather than telling the police or a grown up and letting them do it for them. Once I have my ten word plan, I then build it up into that introduction/problem/resolution structure.

My first outlines will only be a few sentences long, but I build them up until I have a three page synopsis that I’m really happy with. At that stage I’m now fortunate enough to have an editor and an agent to share it with – that sharing is a vital part of the writing process, because a second pair of eyes reading your work will help to identify not only the parts that don’t work or don’t make sense, but will also let you know if your story will engage a reader. Just a brief aside there, as a teacher I am always asking children to map and plan and write, reminding them of their writing targets, whether they are a use of connectives or interesting adjectives or use of speech, and in all of that there is a danger that we forget why we write stories in the first place – to entertain a reader. If you have written something that you wouldn’t want to read, then you know something isn’t right! So, from a three page synopsis, I then build that into a full chapter by chapter breakdown. For a trilogy like Ben Kingdom, I actually knew the basic outline of book 3 before I even started on book 1. Once everyone is happy with my chapter structure, that’s when the real fun begins for me, and I starting writing the book proper. In your class you probably won’t be writing whole books but will instead be focusing on short stories, which are, in fact, really hard to do well, as any writer will tell you. Rather than repeating the sort of story map that you will find elsewhere, I’d like to offer you my favourite exercise that I have used as teacher and as writer. Hope you enjoy using it in your own story telling.

(vi) Die Even Harder Still

I don’t make things easy for my characters, in fact I try to make them as hard as I possibly can! You might like to put your characters through some sort of misery…whatever you chose as the problem in your story, trying throwing up as many obstacles as you can think of!

Escaping by car? Make it break down. Got to get in? Can’t find the key. Need to keep the plan secret? Make sure the villain knows.

You might like to take this list of story problems and come up with your own ways to make the situation a thousand times worse. Please excuse me while I pause for a maniacal laugh…

• The handsome prince needs to be rescued!• The thief must be found!• The bullies have to be stopped!• The secret papers must be returned!• The truth must come out!