Characters vs Plot: Which Inspires Me First?
100 years ago (or 10-ish), my first book, Over the Edge, started as a speck of an idea. Essentially, a single scene came to mind, half-formed and disconnected from any plot. This was a number of years before I ever put pen to page. During the intervening time, the girl in that scene poked at my imagination and demanded more substance.
Slowly, a better picture of her personality, likes, and interests began to coalesce in my mind. Once I knew more about her specifically, I was able to see how her strengths and weaknesses could play out in the kingdom spy adventure that was even more nebulous in my thoughts. And I began realizing she needed other people to interact with.
Since I seem to be incapable of writing anything that doesn’t at least have a background romance, I knew she needed a love interest. After daydreaming until I got him right, I moved on to adding the other characters she would interact with on a regular basis. Her introverted self needed to be adopted by a bubbly best friend and a friendly someone from her past was necessary to help her transition into her new world. An antagonistic teammate also felt like the right move, so I fleshed out his character as well.
Once I knew who everyone was, I sat down to write the opening scene. After finally fleshing out the tiny dream that had been pricking at me for years, I promptly got stuck. I sort of knew where I needed to go, but I couldn’t move forward because multiple secondary characters needed to be named and granted enough personality to seem real.
So I paused again and worked to create profiles for as many characters as I could. What I discovered during the process was that the plot started to line itself up in my mind. When I went back to the computer, scenes flowed easily. For some, I knew what needed to happen, but didn’t have details. So I simply plopped the correct characters into the setting and observed what happened. By now, I was so familiar with each individual, I could write out any scenario they were placed within. This helped with the transitions between the scenes I knew needed to exist and the ones that occurred naturally over the course of the story.
My process has evolved since that first book. For my inclusion in the Beyond the Realms anthology, Fortune’s Fool, I had the plot more firmly in place before I began developing the characters. It serves as a side story for my series of fairy tale retellings, so certain things needed to be explained or shown. The fae realm received more exposure than the other books have portrayed thus far and I got to explore how the less powerful fae interact, or don’t, with the human realm.
Being confident that I knew what needed to happen, and in what general order, I was primed and ready to whip out a full manuscript in no time. Naturally, I was immediately thwarted by my lack of character knowledge. While I have gotten better at outlining the general plot of a novel and having an ending in mind, I still need to fully understand who I’m writing about before I can commit words to the page. As soon as I took the time to design and name the folks in this story, everything began coming together.
As long as I work with the way my particular writer’s brain functions, my books get written in a satisfactory manner and I feel productive. I run into trouble when I try to force myself to fit someone else’s process, or ignore what I know to be true.
Back to the original question: Which inspires me first, the characters or the plot? Both!
Initially, I thought that it was the plot, hands down. Then I realized that I very frequently invent characters first, then find stories to go with them. Additionally, even if I do have a plot first, I can’t complete anything without the inspiration that comes from knowing my characters inside and out.
Thanks for stopping by! Keep watching this space for more tidbits from the authors in Beyond the Realms.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Megan Charlie
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ABOUT THE BOX SET
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