Anna DeStefano's Blog

What does it take to go beyond the basic description of a character’s goal, motivation and conflict and make their deepest desires and fears come to life on the page? Brainstorming and critiquing with someone who knows your writing and is willing to put time into helping you dig down to the heart of your story is a highly recommended approach. And since Jenni and I are talking all things critiquing and brainstorming on How We Write Wednesdays, let’s take a closer look at how we’ve done that a time or two (BTW, check out the list of upcoming topics at the end of this post for the skinny on what we’ll be talking about next).

In each of our HoWW posts, we’ll start with the simple, then dig a little deeper–which, you’ll soon notice, is Jenni’s and my overall paradigm for growing your craft and asking other hard-working writers for their take on your work. You can always dig just a little deeper.

Pretty much anyone can understand the basic terms and techniques that fiction writers work with. There are countless experts to remind you what motivation is. There are great books to read. You can even take a class or two. But until you try to weave the concept of motivation into your characters and their stories, you can’t really understand how complicated and convoluted it can become, moving a character through a range of actions and emotions and the challenges of a tightly plotted story. Turns out…this writing thing isn’t so simple after all.

So, basic motivation is the following: I teach in my Plotting Through Character workshops that in each scene, chapter, act of a novel, a character must have a defined motive that drives her to achieve a certain goal, and there must be tangible, on-page, escalating conflict that prevents her from achieving the ever-evolving series of goals that takes the reader on a journey and dumps everyone into a final, climatic, breathless confrontation where “all hope is lost” just before the resolution of the story.

Sounds pretty simple, right? I mean we all want something, and putting stumbling blocks in a character’s way is easy enough. Why not just write one scene and see where it goes and build motivation and conflict from there?

Let’s dig a little deeper, using a critique experience Jenni and I shared, which she so HILARIOUSLY alluded to in her post last Wednesday. Here’s how we passed the better part of an hour, after I’d read a pretty big chunk of her work-in-progress that she thought was darn close to being in tip-top shape, only there might be something minor amiss with her heroine…

“The writing’s great, and the action, and the banter between the characters,” I say, “and I love your heroine’s dark past and gritty attitude. But what I don’t know while I’m reading these chapters is what she really wants. I mean, she’s doing a lot, and everyone’s reacting to all this great stuff, but–”

“Well, she’s in danger and hates needing to depend on anyone for help,” Jenni says.

“Right. That’s why she’s so cranky with the hero.”

“She’s a bitch with the hero.”

“Right. Great characterization. But why? What does she want that’s driving her to keep putting herself in danger and rejecting everyone’s help?”

“She’s not going to give up. She’s going to keep fighting.”

“That’s plot, Jenn. What does she want?”

“I told you, she’s still messed up about her (insert details about her past here). So she pushes everyone away.”

“Yeah, but that’s backstory. What does she want now? What’s motivating her now. What’s her goal?”

By  now, Jenni’s gritting her teeth at me. I could be a smile. But it’s not. I think she’s channeling her heroine.

“She wants them all out of her way,” she says, ”so she can figure out what’s going on herself.”

“But that makes no sense.” It’s possible I’m not exactly smiling anymore, either, because this meandering conversation has been going on for a while already, and we’re not making any progress. Which is my fault as much as my critique partners. This is good stuff, but it’s not working, and my job is to help my buddy discover what she’s missing. “Your heroine clearly can’t figure it out herself. Scene after scene, she can’t figure it out for herself. So what’s motivating her, in the here and now, to push away the help she needs to get her where she thinks she needs to go? Why is she standing in her own way? Does she really want something else, besides the obvious goal she thinks will make everything better.”

Jenni sighs. She grips her keyboard. Looks tempted to bash me upside the head with it. But she doesn’t. Because HER goal is to get this manuscript right and get it sold, and she knows there’s something off, and she’s asked me to dig into her beautiful work and help her rip it apart until it’s right. She just didn’t think “right” was going to feel this yucky. So she sighs again, then she blinks, and I can almost see light begin to sparkle again in her eyes. She smiles.

“Wait a minute,” she says. “You’re saying the motivation for her bitchiness doesn’t make any sense, that I have to give her another reason for it. But you’re NOT saying that I have to change the way she’s acting.”

“Of course I’m not. I like the way you’ve written her.” I smile back, because it really is good stuff. “It just doesn’t make any sense. Yet. Something else has to be going on to make it worth it for her to torpedo her overall goal. Something that will motivate her short-term behavior, become an obstacle she has to overcome to move forward, and ultimately get her going in a different direction later so she can achieve what she really wants.”

Jenni’s grip loosens on her keyboard–I’m relieved that we haven’t come to blows after all ;o) Then she’s typing. And smiling some more. Because she has a new idea. An idea that we happily brainstorm for another hour, making her story stronger and tighter and her heroine even more believable than before…

So, back to my original point. Tuns out, it’s not so simple, making character motivation (and goals) clear once you’re in the thick of a novel. Even for someone like Jenni who’s finished and published several novels. The rules aren’t enough at this point, because it’s how you apply the basics that make all the difference. What you need once you’re buried in a story is help seeing what you’re doing and what, if anything, isn’t working for the reader. For the characters. And THAT’s where it pays off to critique and brainstorm and work with other hard-working writers who’ve been exactly where you are and found their way out.

Really, we’ve just scratched the surface of motivation, but here’s what we have so far, from the trenches of digging deeper into Jenni’s story:

• Motivation isn’t plot.
• It isn’t backstory.
• It isn’t a character’s static determination to do one thing, one way, throughout the entire book.
• A character’s motives can (and should) be based on escalating, even conflicting goals, and can (and should) shift as her goals do.
• A character’s motive can (and should) actually feed the conflict that requires new motivation and goals to be adopted–propelling the plot forward.
• The kind of story layering we’re talking about doesn’t always (ever?) happen organically while you write the first draft of your book, even when you understand the basics of how to write your characters and their scenes. It takes a lot of rewriting, and often a fresh perspective when you can no longer see the details of what you’re doing. Enter your critique partner. 

I mean, really, who doesn’t need someone else’s take on how well she’s pulling all of the things in the above list (and more) together? I know Jenni and other writing buddies have saved my bacon many times, asking annoying questions like I threw at Jenni, over and over until I could finally understand what I’d been missing all along.

Like I said, Jenni and I will talk more about motivation. As much as you like, if this post turns out to be helpful. And we have other topics we want to be sure to cover while we’re delving deeper into the beautiful thing that a good critique and brainstorming partner can become for your writing.

Here’s some of the other things we have in mind for HoWW Wednesdays. Things we’ve worked with other writers on, in the trenches of our own books–stories that wouldn’t have been nearly as good without another writer’s help.

• character arc
• plotting/sub-plotting
• theme/symbol
• setting
• relationship arc
• backstory/motivation
• conflict (internal/external)
• pacing/story flow

Let us know what you think, and ask any questions you have in the comments. Then come back next Wednesday, when Jenni takes the reins again and digs a little deeper over on her blog  ;o)

Tags: Anna DeStefano, brainstorming, character growth, characterization, critiquing, fiction, fiction writer, narrative structure, novel, novel structure, plotting, publishing, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 19th, 2011 at 6:00 am and is filed under How You Write. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.