More Recent Posts…
26 Ways to Write “Instantly Likable” Characters
Want to make your story impossible to put down?
Create instant sympathy with your characters.
There are tools chapter one (or better yet, page one) you want to make sure your readers:
…readers will get addicted to your characters, and beg for more.
How Brandon Sanderson Motivates His (Incredible) Main Characters
I can’t stop telling my friends about Brandon Sanderson’s books.
The last six hours of my life were dedicated to finishing Words of Radiance, the second book in his epic Fantasy Series, The Stormlight Archives.
Could. Not. Put. It. Down.
This dawned on me as I neared the climax of the story:
Sanderson writes deceptively simple characters. They’re easy to follow, yet surprisingly deep.
Let me show you how Brandon Sanderson writes compelling characters with powerfully conflicted motivations:
7 Secrets to Powerful Character Motives
Characters with Powerful Motivations will steal your clock.
- They’ll reach up
- pull it off the wall
- and smash it.
When you can write a character with a strong motivation, you will steal hours away from your readers…
…and take them on exciting, emotional journeys that they will never forget.
Ready to see how it’s done?
These are the seven secrets to writing powerful character motivations:
5 Ways to Describe Your Character (Without Actually Describing Them)
How do you describe your characters?
Here’s an amazing writing trick:
Go to the mirror, write what you see, and…
…never, ever do that again.
Because describing your characters with a checklist is BORING:
- Her eyes were brown
- And her hair was brown
- Even her teeth were brown
- She really should brush more often
If you want to describe the physical appearance of your characters, go see how J. K. Rowling does it.
Otherwise, keep reading. I’ll show you how to make your characters come to life…
…without writing dull, immersion-breaking, “this is how they look” paragraphs:
How Can You Write Diverse Characters (without Stereotyping)?
In this age of extreme opinions, it’s hard to write diverse characters…
…which means you should write them anyway.
We live in an age where the most dramatic opinion always gets attention:
- Extreme social justice movements on one side
- And horrendously disrespectful ideologies growing (should I say mutating?) on the other
Right now, writing about other cultures and backgrounds feels like a minefield.
Should you write characters from outside your own background or culture?
…and how do you do it?
In this article, I’ll give you a few guidelines to navigate through the minefield.
These guidelines will enable you to respectfully portray “other” characters – without making them plain, boring, or predictable. read more…
A Blog Made for Writers
Hi there! I’m P. S. Hoffman.
This blog will give you the writing secrets and techniques I’ve discovered on my journey to become a published author.
Click here to read more about my writing journey or to contact me!
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