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Friday, September 6, 2013

Creating Memorable Characters (and early Halloween book costume suggestions)!


We all strive to create memorable characters while writing, hoping that our protagonists, antagonists, and supporting characters are three-dimensional and "real" enough to jump off the page and wriggle their way far into our readers' minds and hearts.

With that in mind, I'm very excited about my next couple of Friday posts. I'll be interviewing two wonderful middle grade authors (Shelby Bach!! Anne Ursu!!) and picking their very creative brains about 

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT IN MIDDLE GRADE FICTION

If you missed my interview with the amazing Linda Urban, it's definitely worth reading~ she gives some wonderful advice on character development.

Until next Friday, I'll leave you with the links on the upper right of this blog (Memorable Characters Link List). Also, since the stores seem to think Halloween is around the corner, and I'm sure those of you with kids are already hearing, "I wanna be ____ for Halloween! No, I wanna be ___!", here are some links to popular costumes based on book characters:



60 FAVORITE BOOK CHARACTER COSTUMES 

33 comments:

  1. Can't wait to link to the book character costumes! And the memorable characters link sounds great too.
    Have a good weekend, Jess!

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  2. I had to stop by again to tell you that I love the NPR link. And naturally, I've added a few books to my must-read list!

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  3. What a fun idea: dress up like book characters. I'm so used to skeletons, princesses, and pirates on my doorstep at Halloween. I'd love to see Alice or the Mad Hatter for a change. (But the kids have fun no matter who they pick, so it's always nice to see them show up.)

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    1. I'd love to see an Alice also! And you would think with the Tim Burton movie out, somebody would be dressing up as the Mad Hatter :)

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  4. I'm definitely checking out that list! Thanks for doing the leg work ;)

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  5. Characters are so important. That's why I make a detailed character outline before I even write an outline. Character costumes is a cute idea.

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  6. Villains make characters memorable in my opinion.

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  7. My favorite literary Halloween was the one when we all dressed up as Harry Potter characters, including the baby as Hedwig. :-) This year my daughter's planning to be Athena - that's sort of literary, right? - and I'm thinking about getting a blue wig and going as Karou. My husband wants to be Zorro - was that a book first? Off to go look ...

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    1. OMG, a baby Hedwig??? Awesome. Karou and Zorro would make quite the pair :)

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  8. Thanks for all the links. I'm looking forward to your two upcoming interviews.

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  9. Yes, thanks for the links and I love that NPR list - maybe I can get it together and have us dress up as something more memorable than a ballerina for the sixth year in a row...:)

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    1. My little one is partial to ballerina costumes~ I blame Angelina Ballerina :)

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  10. Looking forward to seeing your series on character development in middle grade fiction. I am working on that now, as I shift gears after writing six YA novels (most of which didn't make it to publication) to writing three books in a MG series.

    The series has MG, YA, and adult characters in it -- all of whom need appropriate character arcs. Yes, the older characters should develop too, I think, but they need to develop in a way that is appropriate/meaningful for MG readers. Hmmm.

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    1. Wow, Dianne! Congrats on the MG series! Sounds like you're really going about it right from a craft standpoint. Hopefully something in the interviews will be helpful!

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  11. There's so many cute costume ideas. I need to join Pinterest. :)

    I finished Breadcrumbs last weekend and it's so wonderful! I'm looking forward to your interview with Anne.

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    1. So glad you enjoyed Breadcrumbs! I knew I would like it the second I heard the description and saw the cover :)

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  12. I'm just entering the middle grade reader area but my story The Cactus and The Sunflower probably won't be made into costumes! LOL

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    1. I would love to see a cactus or sunflower on my porch asking for Halloween candy :)

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  13. Thank you for the links and I can't wait to read your interviews. I've read Breadcrumbs and loved it to pieces.

    ~Akoss

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    1. Yes, Breadcrumbs is one of those books that makes me want to be a better writer :)

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  14. Love the costumes! I'll check back for the interviews.

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  15. Jess I just saw your great news in PW! I had no idea! I was skimming thru and said, "wait a minute!"
    This is so fantastic! I feel like I've missed so much being away in my writer's cave. :S

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    1. Thanks Pk! Pretty crazy, huh? And there's nothing wrong with being in your writer's cave :)

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