Focus on Him, Not It

      Dr. MaryAnn Diorio at Christian Fiction Factor defined five points that are essential to writing fiction. As her first point, she writes:

Just as people still argue over the proverbial question, Which comes first, the chicken or the egg?, writers of fiction argue over what comes first, character or plot?

We Christians know that the chicken came first since God directly created the chicken. The egg, then, comes out of the chicken. The same is true in the best fiction--the kind of fiction that most impacts lives. The author creates the character, and the plot then comes out of the character. Think about the best stories you've read. What comes to mind first--a character or the plot? Most often, it is a character who remains branded in your memory, long after the plot is forgotten.

       For my first Craft Talk post, I’ll be looking at the first point in depth with five points of my own.

 A story environment, no matter how exciting, can be heightened with a developed character

      You are writing your story about someone doing something around someplace during sometime. Ideally, all of the above will be fleshed out, but the readers care about the someone. Having a hero cross through a dragon-infested valley is an exciting plot, but since we don't know much about the hero, the excitement is limited to the venomous lizards behind the rocks. However, what if the hero has had problems being brave for his whole life and yet feels the responsibility of his leading his middle school class influencing him to continue? Is he the kind of man who will leave the children to the horrors awaiting them, or will he fight his fears and lead his pupils to safety? Depending on what characteristics this teacher has, the reader will either want him to succeed, fail, be rewarded, be punished, be eaten, etc. Put a different way, the author can control how the readers feel, purely by who the writer chooses to put in the story. 

No matter how well-developed your character is, it is useless if he's invulnerable

         Imagine the story of the middle school teacher taking his students to safety. Wouldn't it be boring if all the dragons feared his superhuman ability to crush lizards within sixty feet? For today's audience, a story is all about the conflict involved. The less conflict, the more of a chance that the reader will lose interest. When was the last time you read a story where absolutely nothing bad could happen to the main character? Did you enjoy the read? Even Sherlock Holmes--with his powers of deduction and proficiency as a boxer--was challenged by criminals, investigation obstacles, and even by other investigators. The bottom line is that a reader will have a hard time being interested in a character that can't feel pain, fail, or even have fears.
If your character has a weakness, it must be believable, understandable, and conquerable

          Similar to the previous point, if your main character is a bundle of problems, vulnerability, and weakness, your reader will lose interest almost as quickly as if she was perfect. Imagine a story where the heroine is a poor, frail, easily frightened, unintelligent, clumsy, unfeeling person. In most cases, the reader will have a hard time finding reasons to continue reading. Nobody in the world is perfectly invulnerable, nor are they perfectly vulnerable. While I agree that writers should strive to create characters with weaknesses, those weaknesses should not be so large that they cannot be overcome by the hero in the end. For example, if we decided to make our middle school teacher into a walking pile of jelly, and he is still a coward at the end of the book, the reader will feel cheated. So while you should give your hero a weakness, make sure that it is not larger than life.

Nine times out of ten, your reader will feel cheated if your story isn't a conflict centered around your main character

       Apart from "why am I reading this story?" authors should keep reader from asking, "why is this character even here?" In the excitement of creating characters that we care about, one can easily forget that--as Dr. Diorio put it--plot comes from the character. If the main character is not involved with the conflict, they become extraneous. If you've chosen this character to be the hero of your story, make sure the story is focused on him. This does not mean, however, that you should only tell the story from the main character's point of view (point of view will be discussed later). I simply mean that the story should be the main hero's problem / battle, and the author will do well to keep the author fully engaged in it.
Although your hero doesn't have to bring around the resolution, he or she must be involved in it in some way 

         The fairy godmother might have provided the glass slippers, but it was Cinderella whose feet fit them in the end. In the end, as I mentioned above, it is the hero's battle, and the resolution (or conclusion of the action) must either bring it about, or be involved. One of my favorite books, The Bedouin's Gazelle, disappointingly ends when the reportedly evil sheik simply decides to let the girl out of his clutches. The author's excellent main characters had nothing to do with the decision and only breathed a sigh of relief when it turned out well. The reader has faithfully kept to this character because they like them and want to see them overcome the obstacle. Don't cheat the audience with outside help. It is the heroine's battle, and should therefore be her strength that overcomes the opponent.