Such Horrible People

Last night I finally got back to reading another chapter of Mort Castle's and the HWA's Writing Horror guide, so I simply want to include a brief summary of Tina Jens advice, titled "Such Horrible People."

Jens first suggestion, which strikes me more like an ultimatum, is this: A writer should never plot out a story before working on character development. Her initial and introductory argument is basically that two dimensional characters plugged into a firmly plotted piece will ruin the entire work. The rest of her chapter gives good advice as to how to go about fleshing out those characters who will populate the story. Additionally, she warns against "plot hoops" -- those moments in a story when characters do something "so dumb and out of character" that the reader then "puts down the book, turns on the TV, or goes out to walk the dog."

Here are her suggestions to avoid "plot hoops," broken down into convenient bold-faced sections.

Find the Character First
1. Start with basic idea for the story
2. Find characters
------>1. Start with the "bad guy"
------>2. Give him/her flesh, drive, attitude
3. Back to plot, but just a little
4. More intense work with characters
Basically, what I got from this subsection was that, once the writer really KNOWS his characters, there's more of a chance for them to drive the plot in more believable directions. If characters are real, a horror story will be that much more frightening.

Borrow From Life
This subheading pretty much says it all. Jens warns, however, against using a close friend or relative as a character and drawing from his or her "bad side." Since this sort of thing might lead to relationship rifts and bad blood, she mentions looking to herself for good bad habits to write about.

Start a Picture File
Start a collection of interesting, well-textured portraits taken from any magazine or print source. Sometimes one can find a "perfect snapshot in which there is a fully realized, flesh and blood, full-of-attitude character." (This seems like a paticularly useful suggestion to me, but I'm probably too lazy to even think about it.)

Create a Character Sketch
1. Start with basic personality type.
2. Give character a name (nickname, too, perhaps)
3. Work on appearance
4. Mode of transportation
5. Clothing and attitude toward style of dress
6. Family History (mom, dad, best friend)
7. Place of birth, religious background
8. Residence: own or rent, and all that applies
9. Personal politics
10. Hobbies, talents
11. Pets?
12. General philosopy of life
13. Favorite music, personal theme or favorite song
14. State of well-being, health
15. Reactions: upset, happy, sadE, scared, etc.
16. Flaws? (Develop a collection for the character.)
17. Worst habit?
18. Annoying traits
19. Fears
20. Good traits (important for development of the villain, as well.)
---->Think about these things even if the information never comes to light in the story.

Jens ends the section with the question, "Why did I do all this work?" and provides the answer: To get to know your charcter. At some point you should have stopped making up random answers to these questions and the character should have started answering for himself. Your character has attitudes and opinions, a philoshopy and bad habits, moods and a physique. Your character should be talking back to you now. Which is what the character sketch work is all about.

Listen to Your Charcters
Go back to plotting once you have a fully-developed character and use his or her motivations to drive the story along -- instead of having something set in stone beforehand and attempting to force characters into the crevices. Sometimes those who start off as minor characters can develop into major players and take the story in another, perhaps better direction.

Use Anecdotal Evidence
Basically, write pictures of your characters and let their actions demonstrate their personalities -- do this rather than writing out a one-line summary/character sketch of the person when the story begins.

And one last piece of advice from Jens that I could definitely use: "Know and trust your characters so well that they'll goad you back to your computer and nag you to finish their story when you're being lazy and watching football on the couch."

***

Currently Reading:

House of Bones by Dale Bailey
Writing Horror edited by Mort Castle, HWA
The Flickering Mind by Todd Oppenheimer