Pick a character, any character. It could be your main character, but it doesn’t have to be. Pick someone who could use a little TLC from their creator (that’s you).

What does the reader need to know about who this character is (or was) before events pull(ed) them into the story? How did they think? What kind of things did they do?

If you’re thinking this sounds like a character introduction scene, I suppose it is. I am thinking of those opening scenes in private investigator-type stories, the ones that lay out what the main character’s day usually looks like, the more typical cases they work on–the scenes that show us how they would be spending their time if this particular and fascinating story didn’t come along to make things more interesting. But your scene for this prompt doesn’t necessarily have to be the story’s opening scene. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be from the character’s perspective. Just a scene that puts some flesh on a character, any character, to give the reader some sense of a before shot.

Where are they? What are they doing? Who’s there with them? If applicable, what does the POV Character think of this character? In what ways are they right or not?

How does this place and these actions/perspectives reveal or help reveal what the reader needs to know about this character?

Got it?

Write the scene.

That’s it for me!

What about you? What things do you consider when trying to show the reader what they need to know about a character? Tell us in the comments!

If you found this post helpful, please . . .

1. Like it and share it! There are share buttons below . . .

2. Subscribe to the Blog to receive the Tools in your inbox as soon as they post:

3. Subscribe to the Newsletter. It’s a monthly-to-quarterly-ish (that’s still vastly overstating it) newsletter to share news and free worksheets and whatnot. Your welcome email will include the 19-page Character Development Workbook. You can subscribe here.

4. And if you found it particularly helpful . . .

Also, people have been hiring me to review their loglines with the kind of analysis seen here and here, and I’m enjoying it. So, if you think your logline (or something else!) might benefit from a looksie and want to hire me to review it, email me at writeswithtools @ gmail dot com.

Thanks!