Put Meat, Not Fat, on the Bones of your Characters

Janet here. When we write stories, we need to grab readers immediately. A great hook in the opening is important, sure, but if readers don't care about our characters within the first few pages, they won't buy or finish the book. 

A sure way to make readers care about our characters is to give them goals that create problems. Problems that aren't easily resolved. Problems that add tension.

Characters that aren’t fleshed out are skeletal, bones, dry bones. Not a very appealing image, especially for a romance novel. To put meat on our characters bones we need to give enough description, introspection, back story, goals and motivations (Conflict may come later.) and faith issues that these people pop off the page. But we don’t want to fatten them up so much that we bog down the pace.

To have to flesh out characters early on may feel rushed, but we writers can’t be leisurely about it. If readers don’t see our characters as real people, they won’t care about them.

The hero fleshed out too much, too early
    

This hero needs some meat on his bones.

These two guys are extremes we're not aiming for. So how do we put meat on their bones without overdoing it? 

We put an ounce of meat here, an ounce there, small snippets and details that will connect the reader. 

Those snippets may be vague, even unclear, but they should intrigue.

I suggest making one thing very clear and that’s the characters external goal, what s/he wants. Be specific. Early on. (The external goal is something specific, tangible and achievable.) Then show why this goal is important. What is the motivation that drives the character to achieve it?

I’ll be sharing examples of putting meat on Carly and Nate’s bones, the heroine and hero in The Bounty Hunter’s Redemption, my giveaway today. If you've already read it, perhaps you'd like to try to win it for a friend or relative. 

1. Open the story with a hook: Create a couple of lines that intrigue the reader and show the character. If you'd like to study opening hooks, go to Amazon and look at opening lines of some of your favorite authors. Usually there's a peek inside or the publisher gives the first scene. Copy and paste these and study the different approaches. I'm guessing the good ones come back to the character. Some danger she's in. Some problem she's facing. Some hint at her wound. 

Here's the opening line of The Bounty Hunter's Redemption: I tried to write a line that would grab readers, but also set the tone and give a peek at Carly's situation.

A woman should mourn the loss of her husband. Or so Carly Richards once believed.

2. Add Details that Matter: The scent of spring and a graveside service are strong contrasts but by tying the scent of spring to Carly's dead husband, I gave a peek at her marriage.

Though the air carried the scent of mowed grass, spring flowers and fresh-turned dirt, the vile odors that had clung to Max filled her nostrils still, as if he stood at her side, not laid out at her feet.

3. Add introspection: Use the character's thoughts to put meat on their bones, to show them. Avoid long passages of introspection. Break thoughts up with action or dialogue. 

          Folks edged toward her, giving her and Henry a hug, mumbling condolences, avoiding her gaze, then hurried toward the wrought-iron gate in quiet groups of three and four, eager to escape. Not a single soul grieved Max. He had no family. No friends. At least none Carly knew of.

Add Actions/Reactions: Flesh out characters with actions. In this case, Carly's son Henry's action shows him and reveals his feelings about his father.

Her son gave a nod then stepped to the dirt piled at the edge of the grave and stomped the soil with his scuff-toed shoe.

Once. Twice. Three times.

4. Add Dialogue:

Henry pivoted back to her, lips quivering, eyes welling with tears. “He can’t hurt you now, Mama.”

5. Add Snippets of Back story: Use back story to reveal the wound, the trouble, in the character's past.

An oppressive weight slid from her shoulders. She’d no longer dread Max’s footfalls after weeks of unexplained absences. She’d no longer dread that every word out of her mouth could trigger his fiery temper. She’d no longer dread what the next day, the next week, the next month would bring.

6. Give the external goal: The external goal is something tangible, something concrete that the character wants. Here Carly thinks about her goal, to take care of her child and her shop. 

Whatever awaited Max, his eternal future was up to God. She would take care of herself and Henry. She’d run the shop. Earn a living. What she’d always done.

7. Give the internal goal: The internal goal is something intangible, not concrete.

She’d been a fool to hitch herself to Max Richards. She’d never trust a man again.

Never.

I hope these examples from the opening scene make Carly come alive, that you could slip into her shoes and feel the emotion of her situation and care.

In the next scene, I flesh out hero by putting some meat on his bones.

When writing a romance novel, both the hero and heroine are protagonists. The story may be more about one than the other, but the reader wants to see and care about both. I try to give an equal number of scenes in each point of view and make sure both have goals, motivations, conflicts and wounds. They both should have faith issues and should grow and change so their "happily ever after" ending feels real. 

The reader first sees what Carly looks like from Nate’s description of her in the opening of his scene. Nate doesn’t just notice her hair and eye color, he sees her attitude during this first encounter. Whenever possible, make descriptions do double duty. 

1. Add details that matter:

A woman stood between Nate Sergeant and a young boy like a petite, beautiful fortress. Pink lips, flushed cheeks, her fair complexion in sharp contrast to her coal-black hair, the delicate female couldn’t outweigh a hundred-pound bag of grain. Under slashing brows, dazzling blue eyes met his, sizing him up, her expression wary, alert.

2. Add introspection: I used action and dialogue to lead to Nate’s poignant thought, and a peek at his wound.

The widow groaned, rolling her head from side to side.

Her son gazed up at him, panic sparking in his eyes. “Something’s wrong with my mama. Help her! Please, mister!”

“I’ll help her, I promise.” As soon as the words left his lips, Nate knew he’d made a hasty promise to stop the boy’s pleading. A promise he couldn’t keep.

Once again. Another failure. More lives ruined.

3. Add actions/reactions: The actions they take should reveal something about them. In this example, I reveal Nate's tender side and give the first hint of attraction.

He brushed a tendril of hair off the widow’s pale cheek. Under his fingertips, her skin was soft as silk.

4. Add dialogue: What the characters say enables readers to see them more clearly. The last sentence reveals Nate's external goal, something tangible, concrete. He intends to take Carly's shop.  

          “Ma’am.”

          She turned back, eyes wide, as if surprised to find him standing there instead of heading for the door. “Yes?”

          A gust of air escaped his lips. No decent man relished bringing a woman trouble. “I’m afraid I have bad news.”

          “Worse than killing my son’s father?”

          At a loss for words, Nate merely stared at her.

          “I’m sorry, Mr. Sergeant. That was uncalled for, but I have a boy who needs my attention and a shop to run.” Her gaze traveled to the door, her desire for him to walk through it abundantly clear.
           No point in putting off what he’d come to say. “This shop is mine,” he said, settling his Stetson in place.

5. Add snippets of back story: Carly faints and triggers a bigger peek at Nate’s past and the wound that drives him. 

Nate caught her before she hit the floor. With the pale woman in his arms, his mind zipped back and remembered another woman.

“Mama!”

Nate’s head snapped up, his vision cleared.

Eyes wide with fear, the son ran toward them. “Is she dead?” he said.

Rachel was dead. Not this woman.

6. Add the motivation: Later in the scene Nate gives his motivation for seeing that his sister gets Carly's shop. 

A temptation to give back the deed slid through him. Only for a moment. Nate couldn’t sacrifice his sister’s future. Not after what she’d sacrificed for him.

Once Mrs. Richards had time to think about it, she would know, as he did, she’d lost the shop. Though he didn’t relish the pain he would cause, Nate would not help the widow as he’d promised her son.

All he would bring Carly Richards was trouble.

I didn’t put Nate's internal goal into the first chapter, nor did I give Nate's equally important goal of finding the killer he’s been after for years. Not everything has to be there but we have to flesh the characters out enough in the opening pages for readers to care, yet not so much that we ruin the pace with too much information. 

There are a variety of reasons for having trouble bringing characters to life.

• We may not know the characters well enough. 

• We may not have the plot figured out. 

• We may not have given them strong enough goals to cause them trouble. 

• We may not have made their pasts (their back story) bad enough to wound them and impact their lives now.

Even when I plan, I learn more about my characters and the plot when I write. That may necessitate going back and fleshing them out even more.  

For breakfast I brought a ham egg bake, fruit, coffee and tea. Enough food to give us strength without putting fat on our bones.   

Let's talk. Share an opening line that hooked you and reveals something about the character. 

Or share a thought, action, snippet of dialogue that fleshes out characters.

Leave a comment for a chance to win a copy of The Bounty Hunter's Redemption.