Setting Up Character Growth

Writing a compelling story requires a lot of ingredients. One key ingredient is the character arc.

Compelling characters—especially protagonists—usually grow and change over the course of the story. They learn something about the world or themselves, and this knowledge changes the way they live their life. This is, of course, talking about a traditionally Western style of story, but if you're publishing in the Western market, you'll want to know this.

Character growth is compelling because we want to believe that people can grow and change—we want that for ourselves. It's compelling because the character has a dream and strives to achieve it despite all odds, and we love that. That's the kind of character we can root for and identify with.

What if you designed the character and obstacles in your story such that they are diametrically opposed? A pacifist must defeat a murderous dictator. A rebellious loner must trust others in order to stop a great danger. A nervous homebody must overcome their fear to rescue someone they love. The character is ill-equipped to face the obstacles in their way, and the only way to achieve their goal is to grow.

It's a compelling arc, which is why you see it everywhere in fiction. It might look like this:

1. A character believes something that has served them well their whole life. Neo believes he is nobody special. Shrek believes he's unworthy of love. Hiccup believes he is a bad Viking.
2. The character wants something that cannot be achieved with their old beliefs. Neo wants to understand the Matrix, but he must become special to survive. Shrek wants Lord Farquad to leave him alone, but he must rescue a princess to do it. Hiccup wants his father to accept him, but he has to be a good Viking to do it.
3. There comes a crisis point where the character tries to solve the problem the old way, and it fails them. Neo's mentor is going to die, so Neo tries to fight using what he knows. Shrek realizes he loves the princess. Hiccup is torn between pleasing his father and protecting his dragon Toothless.
4. At their lowest point, the character must learn something new. Neo nearly dies, until he sees the Matrix for what it really is. Shrek decides to risk everything for his love. Hiccup decides to be the kind of Viking he wants to be.
5. The story's climax shows the character stepping into this new way of being. Neo defeats the Agents. Shrek and his friends stand up to Lord Farquad. Hiccup and Toothless rescue Hiccup's father.

The character at the end is different than they were at the beginning. If the character-at-the-end had faced the same inciting incident, maybe the story would never have happened! That's true growth.

Of course, this is just one way to draw a compelling character arc. It's effective, but it's not a formula—merely a framework that you can customize for your story. Experiment. Try new things, and see what works for you.

And then do that.

The Pressure We Put On Ourselves

A lot of what I write here is projection. That is to say, a lot of my advice are things I need to remind myself. And one thing I constantly struggle with (as do many writers) is the fear that what I'm writing isn't very good.

This fear is paralyzing. It frequently makes me not want to write at all.

But here's the thing. The part of you that is afraid, that puts pressure on you to MAKE IT GUD OR WHAT'S THE POINT, is—believe it or not—trying to help you. It wants you to create amazing things, and it believes that you can! But it doesn't realize that the pressure it's putting on you is actually having the opposite effect.

That's because the pressure used to work. When you started writing, you pushed yourself to improve, to get your butt in the chair, to get the words out. That pressure is what got you on the writing path in the first place. (Probably. I'm definitely projecting now.)

But the pressure didn't stop, and people can't live under pressure all the time forever. Writing is a marathon, not a sprint, but that pressuring part of you wants you to run your hardest the entire time.

What I've had to learn is how to be kind to myself. I need to give myself permission to suck, of course, but I also need to be kind to that part that's yelling at me all the time. It's just doing what worked, and in truth, I don't want it to stop completely. I just want it to trust me.

For me, that involves a lot of self talk. Whenever I'm doing something hard, especially writing, I end up having a conversation something like this:

ME: This sucks. What's the point?

ALSO ME: It won't suck when it's finished.

ME: It'll take so much work to get there though.

ALSO ME: That's okay. We've done it before. We'll do it again.

ME: What if it never gets better?

ALSO ME: It will. It always does.

ME: What if this time's different?

ALSO ME: Then we'll figure it out when we get there.

And so on.

In the past, I would get depressed or angry with myself for not being good enough. Now, I'm trying to be kinder, to talk myself through it. I've written stories before, and I'll do it again. It's always hard, but I know how to do the work to make the story better. I know I can do it.

You can too.

Personal Updates

There has been a lot going on in my own life lately. I know many of you care about such things, so in lieu of writing tips today, I wanted to fill you in on some things.

On work. After a few months without steady work, I've secured a long-term contract as a narrative editor for an upcoming action RPG. It's really fun work, combining my experience in writing, editing, and branching dialogue. I also get to work with some pretty great people (and a stable paycheck is no joke).

I'm also still taking on private clients. When I restarted my editing services, it was with the intent of keeping them going indefinitely. Rebooting freelance work is hard, and ultimately, I'd like nothing more than to serve private clients full time if I can. So, if you need editing for your novel in any form, let me know!

On writing. This topic's harder. A couple of months ago, I lost my agent. It was nothing bad between us—Tricia Lawrence is a fantastic agent!—but the agency was restructuring, and she and I hadn't sold anything in a long while. I don't fault her decision one bit.

It's also been a while since I've been able to focus on my own writing. I've been doing more for the kids this past year as well as going through therapy for myself, both of which resulted in less mental, emotional, and temporal resources to create worlds. I'm still hopeful that I will be able to return to it soon (see "On life," below), but yeah, it's been hard.

I do still have one novel sitting with a publisher. It has gone through a rewrite and a couple of rounds of revisions. I'm hopeful something will happen with that soon, but without a contract, there are no guarantees yet. We'll see.

On life. There have been a lot of changes in my household in the last several months, and a few more coming. Many of you know that my real job is being the dad of many, many kids. And this past year, I have been the stay-at-home parent in addition to work, which (as stated) has contributed to a reduced ability to write for myself. (Current events aren't helping either.)

And even more changes are coming. Chief among them is that my first-born biological son has moved to the States, and several others (we have five boys within a year of each other) may be moving out soon as well. This is hard emotionally and comes with a lot of unknowns. Empty nest syndrome is real, folks (and yes, I recognize how weird it is to talk about an "empty nest" when three to six of them are still at home).

But who knows? Maybe once I've worked through the emotions of it all and solidified a new schedule, I'll be able to write some more. I certainly hope to. I have a lot of hopes for my near future, but right now, I feel like I'm in a liminal state, waiting for the end of the transition.

Until then, I'm gonna keep doing what I'm doing, working on my editing, spending time with kids who haven't left, and working on myself.

So, that's me...