The single most important aspect of writing fiction is properly developing your characters. This is particularly important for longer works of fiction, such as novels; however, even in a short story character development is central, as it is through your characters’ thoughts, speech, and actions that your story is told. Your characters must be real to your readers; they must be believable. Without proper character development, no other element of your story will be able to come through, and even a very stimulating, engaging plot will be lost. What’s more, regardless of how stimulating your plot is, it is your characters that will stay with your audience even after they have finished reading your story.
Building your characters should go well beyond telling your readers what color hair they have, how nice and big their breasts are, or how hard their cock is, etc. Your readers should feel like the characters in your story can make their own judgments, form their own opinions, etc. They should believe that the characters in your story are really speaking to and interacting with each other. Your readers should feel like they know personally, or can relate to personally, all or one of your characters.
So, to begin, the first step in writing your story is simple cognition, basically the notion that a story exists somewhere in your mind. Then, you have to come up with a setting. The third step, when you fully form your characters, is the most important, and then after that you can explore your plot, technique, and story structure. Finally, you begin actually laying our your story on paper.
Your story will consist of plot, setting, characters, dialogue, point of view, theme, and style. It is dialogue that will make your fiction characters real to your readers. However, unnecessary dialogue can slow down a story and take away from it, as can overuse of dialogue. Dialogue should be used to more fully reveal your characters to the audience, as well as to help advance the story. It should not be used just for the sake of hearing characters talk.
First person point of view is when the main character is telling the story him or herself. The use of “I” is an indicator of this, and a story told from this perspective can at times be very limiting, as readers’ opinions of other characters is heavily influenced by the main character’s, or narrator’s, own feelings. However, a story told from this point of view also creates an extreme amount of intimacy, which is both appropriate and beneficial depending on what your, the author’s, main objectives may be. A third person point of view can be either objective, meaning the narrator simply describes spoken dialogue and actions but cannot reveal thoughts and feelings, or omniscient, meaning the narrator can reveal thoughts and feelings of all the characters, as well as reveal their spoken dialogue and actions.
Going back to the third step, in any story there are several different kinds of characters: protagonists, antagonists, sidekicks, romance interests, informed bystanders, complications, assistants, and clowns, just to name a few. However, in writing erotic fiction the presence of each of these types of characters is not necessary, but they are important to keep in mind, as they can often add a little something extra to your story. Also, you can make one of your characters a sidekick, a clown, a complication, etc. Rather than just two people who are sexually attracted to each other, it may be fun to sometimes typecast your characters and let your plot form accordingly.
For example, say you want to write a story about John Smith, a romance interest, and a complication. The complication could be the romance interest’s wife or husband, or he/she could be John Smith’s partner, or a third wheel that came along to spice things up. As with anything in fiction writing, the possibilities are always endless so it is good not to limit yourself to stories only about two love interests.
Characters can come from just about anywhere. They can be people you know very well, people you sort of know, people you want to know. They could be people you have read about in books or magazines, people from your history book, or they could be completely, 100% original characters you form in your own mind.
Characters all have different aspects to them as well. In longer works of fiction it can be more important to fully develop your characters and give detailed descriptions of all aspects. With short fiction stories, especially erotic fiction, often it is not necessary to lie out and describe all parts of your characters. But do keep in mind that the more fully developed a character is for your audience, the more real that character feels and thus, the more your readers can relate to the story and the longer it will stay with them.
1. A general description of your character includes where they are from, what nationality or ethnicity they are, where they are sitting or standing when your reader is first introduced to them, etc.
2. A physical description….well this one is a no-brainer, especially in erotic fiction. This is where you talk about how big their breasts are, how hard their cock is, how nice their ass is, etc.
3. The personal description involves their social class, religious beliefs, education background, etc.
4. Finally, an emotional description entails their mental and emotional capabilities.
Now with each of these descriptions, remember that in order to give one, you do not necessarily need to lay it all out there in narrative form. For example, you can give an emotional description of a character by presenting a dialogue that character has with another character. Another example, you can give a physical description of a character by having two of your other characters engage in a discussion about that first character. Or, you can give a physical description of a character by having that character describe him or herself as they are, let’s say, taking a shower, getting dressed, and/or putting on make-up. Once again, there are endless possibilities.
A good way to develop your characters in your own mind first, once again before you actually start writing your story, is to build a character profile. Basically this is just a factual sheet of information about your character. For example, how old are they, what is their gender and sexual orientation, what do they look like, where will they meet your other character(s), etc. A basic character profile will help you only to develop a rough sketch of your character. In order to create a more detailed, fleshed out character, you must ask very specific, somewhat unordinary questions. For example, does he fall asleep quickly at night, or does he need to have music or the TV softly playing in the background. Does he keep little scraps of tickets and movie stubs to remember special occasions by, or does he just throw everything away? Does she normally have to have her hair done just right and a full face of make-up on before she leaves the house, or does she just get dressed and go quickly?
Also, you may think about constructing a character interview. A character interview is much more complex than a character profile, but it can also be a lot more fun. When doing this, get out a paper and pen and just start asking your character questions. To do this properly and effectively, you really have to just let your mind go, or your character’s mind. Do not worry about spelling or grammar, simply ask questions and write as you think your character would respond. Now, I know this sounds silly…How can you interview a person that exists solely in your own imagination? But trust me, it really works and it can be very helpful. Often times when doing this your original plot will be completely altered, as a new plot will begin to unfold as you continue asking your character questions. Afterwards, you can look at what you wrote, and start thinking about how to form your interview into a story.
1) What would your character say or do if someone had just lied to them, or betrayed them? Act violently, cry, yell and scream, ignore them, ignore the incident all together?
2) What makes your character laugh? Cry? Smile? Get angry?
3) Who is your character’s hero? Who do they look up to? Who do they most admire?
4) What is your character’s idea of a fun, enjoyable way to spend the evening? Watching movies alone or going out to a loud party with a group of friends?
5) What does your character wear on a day-to-day basis?
6) What was the last thing your character bought for him or herself? For another person?
7) Who was the last person your character made a telephone call to? What was it in regards to?
8) What are your character’s mannerisms? Do they talk with their hands? Roll their eyes?
9) What do they do? Do they like their job?
10) Do they have a lot of friends? Lovers?
11) What is their idea of success? Of happiness? Of love?
12) What is the scariest thing that has ever happened to them?
Finally, remember that you may not need to include everything you yourself know and understand about your character in your actual story. The point is for you to know and understand your characters completely, not necessarily for you to reveal everything about your characters directly to your audience. If you, the writer, know your characters deeply, your story will be enriched to a much larger degree than if your characters are mere acquaintances. For example, how can you convey your characters to your readers if you do not know them yourself?
- Be very specific and add lots of detail in your writing. The more detail oriented, the more real the story becomes to your readers.
- Revision is important. Proofread and edit your own stories several times before submitting them.
- Write fiction that you yourself would enjoy reading.
- The shorter your story is, the more important each word in it becomes. In other words, choose your words carefully.
- Do not simply tell a story. Rather, recreate it for your audience.
