Young Writers Society

So, this is a character profile I came up with. It covers a wide range of things and is really good to go to and fill in when you're stuck on writing the plot or the actual novel. Anyway, hope this helps!

Name:

Breed:

Sex:

Age:

D.O.B.:

Occupation:

Residence:

General mood:

Appearance:

Eye colour:

Hair colour:

Pets:

Relationship:

Friends:

Family:

Favourite colour:


Favourite foods :

Hobbies:

Phobias:

Faults:

Hates:

Secrets:

Memories:

Goals:

Powers:

History:

Role in story:

Notes:

Sometimes a character needs just a basic core, and everything else will develop as the story develops. Sometimes it's easiest to just choose an actor and describe his physical characteristics, slap on a basic horoscope personality, and let the scenes of the story add the rest details.

I have a mixed opinion.

I like using questionaires to really add chunks of depth to my characters, like, for phobias I'd answer from my characters perspective and say "What am I afraid of? I don't know. I guess I'm afraid of .... because when I was a kid I had a dream about .... and even though I know it was a dream the fear stayed with me."

It creates an entire host of memories that can be used as emergency plot mechanisms or as interesting asides to throw in.

Also, the main reason I think these (and this is a fairly good one) are important because it's far too easy to start out thinking you know your character and then they'll very quickly turn into Marysues because we haven't taken the time to develop them properly.

Character questionaires act as kind of like a checklist to say 'hey, I know you like this character and all, but do you actually know what their role is?' or 'This guy lives in a mansion and his friend from work can't afford new jeans? What on earth does he do for a living?' Not all questions are relevent to all stories but each is relevent to at least one genre or type of story.