A Character Development Writing Exercise
The Dinner Party
Who are the three most unlikely people your protagonist would have dinner with? Why? Write the scene.
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Similar exercises
Get your creative juices flowing with these similar writing prompts.
A Tall, Dark Stranger
Write a scene where your character is speaking to a complete stranger. Immediately after, write a scene where your character is speaking to a loved one. Notice how their behavior changes.
Two Kinds of People
"There are two types of people: those that talk the talk and those that walk the walk. People who walk the walk sometimes talk the talk but most times they don't talk at all, 'cause they walkin'. Now, people who talk the talk, when it comes time for them to walk the walk, you know what they do? They talk people like me into walkin' for them," said Key in the 2005 film Hustle and Flow. Which of these two types are your characters? Write down an exchange between two of your characters that confronts this very difference between them.
"You"
Second-person point of view is an intimate way of looking at a character's thoughts. As an exercise, take a scene from the book you're writing. Choose a character, and then re-write the scene entirely from a second-person POV, noticing what details shift because of this perspective change.
In The Eye of the Beholder
Our individual perspectives define what we first notice about a person's physical appearance. How do your characters see those around them? Describe one character's physical appearance from the perspectives of three other characters. What does each beholder's description reveal about who they are?
Reputations
Have each primary character free-write what they think about the other characters in the story. This will also deepen the secondary characters.
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