{"id":882,"date":"2014-08-27T10:13:56","date_gmt":"2014-08-27T17:13:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/?p=882"},"modified":"2014-09-12T16:22:18","modified_gmt":"2014-09-12T23:22:18","slug":"write-your-novel-step-by-step-15-outlandish-characters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/write-your-novel-step-by-step-15-outlandish-characters\/","title":{"rendered":"Write Your Novel Step by Step (15) “Outlandish Characters”"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the last step you added some unusual characters to your story, but not so unusual that they couldn\u2019t easily be explained.<\/p>\n

In this step we\u2019ll pull out all the stops and list some completely inappropriate characters that would take a heap of explaining to your readers if they showed up in your story.<\/p>\n

Example:<\/strong><\/p>\n

In our example story set in an old western town, such characters might be:<\/p>\n

Richard Nixon<\/p>\n

Martians<\/p>\n

Ghost of Julius Caesar<\/p>\n

Pretty \u201cout there,\u201d right? Although you’ll likely discard these characters in our pruning step down the line, the process of coming up with outlandish characters can lead to new ideas and directions for your story.<\/p>\n

For example, the town Marshall might become more interesting if he was a history buff, specifically reading about the Roman Empire. In his first run-in with the gang, he is knocked out cold with a concussion. For the rest of the story, he keeps imagining the Ghost of Julius Caesar, giving him unwanted advice.<\/p>\n

Now\u2019s the time to let you Muse run wild and drag some truly outlandish characters into your story. Don\u2019t hold back, you can always axe them later, but you might just discover the most memorable character you\u2019ve ever created and perhaps a truly original way to use them as well.<\/p>\n

In the next step, we\u2019ll begin the process of transforming your characters, even the outlandish ones, into real people, preliminary to deciding which ones stay and which ones go.<\/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 last step you added some unusual characters to your story, but not so unusual that they couldn\u2019t easily be explained. In this step we\u2019ll pull out all the stops and list some completely inappropriate characters that would take a heap of explaining to your readers if they showed up in your story. Example: […]<\/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-882","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-ee","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882","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=882"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":918,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions\/918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}