Character Development 4: Get Disruptive

[Prof. Sky Alton]

Most stories involve a drastic change or disruption to a characters life. This could have happened shortly before the narrative starts or just after. Whenever it happens, it’s nearly always needed. You have to force your character into an unfamiliar situation in order to create a plot that will drive them forward. Though it’s possible to write an engaging story where your character is perfectly comfortable, it’s much harder than one where you drop them in at the deep end.

Think about the characters you’ve been writing about during these exercises and consider what disruptions might happen to them. It might help to think of an emotional disruption, a disruption to their circumstances and a wildcard disruption of any type that they couldn’t possibly have seen coming (you don’t have to have all of these in the same story, they’re possibilities for you to pick between). What do you think each of these curve balls would do to your character? How would they react? This should help you find a plot that will get the best and most interesting reactions out of your character.

Tell us about the changes you thought of and how you think your character would take them. Your notes should be 200 words but if you’re struggling to make it stretch, feel free to invent other disruptions or even to tell us which one you like the best.

You’ll earn 20 beans for completing this prompt as well as it counting towards the chance to snag our shiny Quill and Ink award.

There is no deadline as such for these prompts but if you’d like it to count towards your chance of earning the award for a specific year, we’ll need it by the end of that school year. If you’re comfortable sharing, then post below. If not, email your story to us via hol.bookclub @ gmail.com (without the spaces). Oh and remember it’s a good idea to check through your piece carefully for spelling and grammatical errors as they make it harder for people to properly enjoy your work.