The One Thing

I am learning that while publishers will forgive some weaknesses (pacing, length, even a few technical errors), the one thing they cannot work with is poor character design.

And it makes sense really.

As a first-time novelist, I have many thousands of things to learn about writing a book, and I can take criticism--I can. But as my many (very patient) editors have torn The Wielder apart, the one thing they couldn't really help with is, you guessed it, character design.

How could they? They had no idea how to 'fix' the people I wrote about. It isn't their job. It's MY job to people my little world with likable, believable personalities.

It's odd, really, because as a mystery writer, I'm usually very good at characters. But I think when I wrote Wielder I made the 'New World' my main character. Oops. The setting should never be the main character--unless you're writing a travel-log.

The moral of the story? If you can't write a good character--don't bother. That doesn't seem like a positive, encouraging moral, does it?

Okay, let's try this: characters drive the story--end of story.

My book is a YA fantasy about jewelry and "magic" powers, right? Sort of, but that's the filling. (yummy cream filling, but still just filling)

It's really about three young cousins, each with their own neurosis, who learn to trust each other and understand that if you don't choose your path, life will choose it for you.

Good to know.

But do you see why, if the characters are poorly written, everything else falls apart?

And this is why I just spent the last month and a half painstakingly rewriting each of those three cousins and giving them life and sparkle.

Now I just have to cross my fingers that I can write interesting, likable characters.

Here we go again. :)