{"id":879,"date":"2014-08-25T06:10:08","date_gmt":"2014-08-25T13:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/?p=879"},"modified":"2014-09-12T16:21:45","modified_gmt":"2014-09-12T23:21:45","slug":"write-your-novel-step-by-step-14-unusual-characters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/write-your-novel-step-by-step-14-unusual-characters\/","title":{"rendered":"Write Your Novel Step by Step (14) “Unusual Characters”"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the previous step you added to your cast list some characters who would not raise an eyebrow if they showed up in your story\u2019s world.<\/p>\n

Now, let yourself go a bit (but just a bit) and list a number of characters that might seem somewhat out of place but would still be fairly easily explainable in such a story as yours.<\/p>\n

Example:<\/p>\n

In our example story of a small town in the old west, these \u201cunusual characters\u201d might include:<\/p>\n

A troupe of traveling acrobats<\/p>\n

Ulysses S. Grant<\/p>\n

A Prussian Duke<\/p>\n

A bird watcher<\/p>\n

You may be wondering why you\u2019d want to have such odd characters in an otherwise normal story. The reason is to prevent your story from being too<\/em> normal.<\/p>\n

Neither reader nor publisher will want to waste time or money on a book that is just a rehash of the same tired material they\u2019ve read over and over again.<\/p>\n

What they are looking for is something with a unique personality \u2013 something that sets itself apart from the usual run of the mill.<\/p>\n

Adding one or two somewhat unexpected characters to a story can liven up the cast and make it seem original, rather than derivative.<\/p>\n

Once again, you won\u2019t be married to all these characters. They are just a gene pool from which to select your actual cast in a later step.<\/p>\n

So, add to your list some slightly odd, offbeat, unexpected or quirky characters \u2013 no one too unusual, mind you \u2013 just folks who would not immediately come to mind in a story such as yours but could be explained with a little effort \u2013 folks to add a little color and interest to your story.<\/p>\n

In the next step we\u2019ll pull out all the stops!<\/p>\n

This article is\u00a0drawn\u00a0from:<\/em><\/h2>\n

\"wp040b08b3_06\"<\/a>Step by Step Story Development Software<\/span><\/h2>\n

\"wpc9342079_06\"<\/a>Build your Story’s World, who’s in it, what happens to them and what it all means with StoryWeaver! \u00a0With over 200 interactive Story Cards, StoryWeaver takes you step by step through the entire process – from concept to completion.<\/p>\n

Just $29.95 ~\u00a0Click here to learn more or to purchase…<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the previous step you added to your cast list some characters who would not raise an eyebrow if they showed up in your story\u2019s world. Now, let yourself go a bit (but just a bit) and list a number of characters that might seem somewhat out of place but would still be fairly easily […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-write-your-novel-step-by-step"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p36xpN-eb","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=879"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":917,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/879\/revisions\/917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}