The Writer's Digest Sourcebook for Building Believable Characters

Informative, but only skims the surface really. For new writers, this is a good beginning resource. But for more experienced writers, this will not be of much help as it really does not go too deeply into its claim of Building Believable Characters.

Ask anyone who is someone in the writing field and they'll tell you: one the most (if not "the") most important aspects of fiction writing, is the way you, as a writer, present your characters. Well, if you are among the evergrowing community of writers, you simply can't do without this book. This is very much a Bible for character building and I can certainly guarantee that you'll come up with darn good profiles and a very organized outline to begin any story. The book is divided into three sections. The first one is a transcript of a discussion among six currently published authors and their advice on character building. The second part is my favorite in the book: a "character questionnaire", that lets you build an extremely detailed profile for your main characters in a novel, so that you don't make any mistakes in the narrative. Seems very much as detailed as an FBI file must be, including everything from name, height, eye color; to political ideas, opinions on abortion, favorite dress-code and restaurant, etc. The third part is the thesaurus, geared specifically towards characterization: body attributes, foreign names, types of nose, etc.Keep this volume beside your word processor. Use it often. It's a tool that could make all the difference, especially if you are a begginning writer.

If you are a beginning writer, you NEED this book. I've critiqued a lot of manuscripts, and without exception, the authors could benefit from this book and did, once I suggested they buy it. Of the three writing books I keep beside my computer, this is the most used. I love it!

Use this for every important character in your novel and you'll have living, breathing people on the page. The character questionnaire is worth the price of the book.

It used to be that I would sit down, and I would write a story. At the beginning of the story, the character would be a 30 year old female with brown hair, green eyes, and a black beard... And at the end of the story, she would have evolved to a 13 year old boy with blue hair, purple eyes, and a pink dress... Well, o.k... I admit, I may be exhaggerating a small amount. But, when I had no sort of organization for my characters, many times, I would find that my characters were not consistant and therefor lost appeal to the human eye. But, then my fairy god-mother came along and dropped this book on my front porch. I planted it in the ground and suddenly my thoughts began to grow. It gave shelter, and I whole meaning of life to my characters. It gave them personality, it gave them strength. It gave them everything they needed to be believable. This book is in all sense, a gift of heaven. The Character Questionnaire is well-thought out and makes room for the writer to fill in all aspects needed for characters in the story. From the color of one's eyes, to whether or not they smoke, flatulate in public, etc. And then, there are lists, which you can browse through, which I found to be well-organized. I could find anything I needed for my characters. It was more of a connect the dots, and yet, the list were so comprehensive and large, that you could never run out of characters to make. You are still doing most of the creation, but the book just guides you through the process. I deffinately recommend this book to all new writers. However, even the most advanced of writers can benefit from this and I urge them to give it a try. At least try checking it out from the local library for a test-drive. Until next time, write well and have a wonderful life!