Excitement is all well and good, but your book won’t be much of a crime novel if you don’t have an assortment of interesting and credible characters. Populating your story is probably one the most enjoyable aspects of writing crime fiction. Just imagine creating your own world of characters from your own mind! Make sure that you have fun making them up; they won’t only be credible, sooner or later they’ll also seem like old friends.
Character description
There’s a whole list of things that an author can use to describe a person:
- Dialect – Special expressions (e.g. occasional Englishisms, sayings, swearing, etc.)
- Tone of voice (whiny, resonant, etc)
- Smell
- Clothing
- Posture
- Appearance
- Characteristic gestures
- Job
- Age
- Similarity with someone (a younger version of X, for example)
- Hobby
- Marital status
Using all these at the same time to describe a person would, however, be a little tedious, to say the least. So exploit the preconceptions we have when we judge other people. Three or four details can be enough for readers to fill in the blanks and create their own consummate picture of your characters. For example: If you write that a man collects stamps for a hobby, the readers make a whole load of other assumptions about what he’s like. Be careful, though, not to simply create stereotypes, so make sure your characters are a little more subtle than that. You can also make use of prejudices to surprise the reader. In the above example, you could make the stamp-collector a real hardboiled cop, with a mouth like a sewer and a penchant for giving villains a good drubbing – but who in the peace and quiet of his own home is a dedicated philatelist.
Be consistent and think about how each personality type would probably react in different situations. If you do, it will make your characters’ behaviour emerge more spontaneously – provided, of course, that you really get to know them. If it doesn’t come naturally, although I often find it does, sit down and “interview” them. Help and support as regards what you can ask can be found in the first part of your assignment; I’m sure you’ll come up with many other questions as well. You might find the two links I’ve added helpful too.
EXERCISES:
Choose a friend, family member or someone else close to you, and describe him or her on one side of A4 WITHOUT using adjectives (beautiful, old, pale, etc.). Instead, use things like actions to give the readers an impression of the person you’re describing. (Example: “He grasped the solid oak desk and hoisted it over his head with ease” – In other words, he’s strong, but you haven’t had to describe him explicitly with that word.)
Describe a person who’ll be meeting his or her killer within an hour. Fill in these descriptions:
• Name:
• Sex:
• Age:
• Nationality:
• Voice (husky, soft, tense, deep?):
• Height:
• Skin colour:
• Colour of eyes:
• Weight:
• Physical characteristics (limps? Big hands? Sticky-out ears?):
• Posture:
• Brothers/sisters:
• Education:
• Financial situation:
• Religion:
• Sexual orientation:
• Favourite food:
• Favourite film:
• Favourite novel:
• In a relationship?:
• Job:
• Children?:
• Living alone?:
• Driving licence?:
• Car(if drives)?:
• Temperament:
• Size of social circle:
• Bad habits:
• Favourite place:
Use the person described above. Describe a scenario in which he or she is sitting at home just before the killer arrives. The murder is to end the piece, but before this happens, make sure the reader gets a good, rounded idea of the character – the victim. Be sparing with the details, and instead of just giving a straightforward description of the character, try to “sneak in” descriptions into the last hours or minutes of your character’s life. Unlike in the first exercise, you can use adjectives here, but do so with discernment and care!
Note that you’re not supposed to get in all the details you’ve listed above – that was to help you draw up a clear picture of the person in your mind; the second part of the exercise is to give you a chance to select the character details that you think best convey this picture to the reader.
Suggested reading:
1. Författarskolan by Göran Hägg, pages 80-85 (in Swedish)
2. Att skriva romaner och noveller by Lars Åke Augustsson, pages 69-78, 103 (in Swedish)
3. Writing mysteries by Sue Grafton, pages 49-55
4. How to write crime novels by Isobel Lambot, pages 53-66
Link: http://www.eclectics.com/articles/character.html