notes and other

Writing a Smart Character

The answer to "how to write a character who is ________" is always the same:

This is just as true when writing about a character who knows more about something than you. :)

Having said that, there are some steps you can follow that will make this research easier...

1) Figure Out What They Know

Most smart people aren't smart about everything. They may appear to know "everything," but chances are they just know a lot about particular subjects. They may be street smart or life smart because they've had a lot of unique experiences, they might be "book smart" because they've read a lot of books, they might be really good at math or science, they might know a lot about history or architecture, or they might have an incredible understanding of how machines work. Or, they might just be really witty and know a lot of unusual trivia and big words.

2) Figure Out How Their Knowledge Plays Into the Story

There's no point in having a character who's super smart just for the sheer heck of it. Your character's knowledge will come across in the things they say and do, and will more than likely impact the decisions they make and impact the plot. So, it's important to think about your story and understand when and how this character's smarts will be on display. In what scenes will they have dialogue and what will that dialogue need to be about? In what ways will their knowledge affect their actions/the plot? Once you know, you can look at those specific moments and figure out what you need to research.

3) Research Dialogue/Plot Points

Let's say your character is a brilliant doctor, and you know there's a scene where they need to have an argument with a non-medical expert about a medical subject. Once you know what that medical subject is, you can research it and figure out exactly what the argument is about and what the character needs to say. Or, let's say there's a scene where your character, who is a gifted mechanic, needs to sabotage someone's vehicle in a non-dangerous/non-harmful way. You would need to do some research about the type of vehicle they're working on, research ways to disable a vehicle, and figure out which way would be the least harmful. If your character simply knows a lot of useless trivia and is a witty conversationalist, you'll need to find some interesting trivia for them to know (hint: it'll probably be related to subjects that are already coming up in your story's dialogue) and do some research on witty banter. (For witty banter research, you can't beat watching a TV show or movie with a lot of witty banter.)

4) Look Around You For Help

The world is full of people who know things about stuff. Truly. Once you've done your research, look around you for people who can double-check your work. That might be a sensitivity reader, someone you find online who's knowledgeable about a particular subject, or even someone you actually know.

If you ever read the acknowledgements of a novel, you'll find they're always filled with thanks to various experts who vetted whatever the writer came up with through their research. In the acknowledgments of Six of Crows, Leigh Bardugo thanks a magic expert who helped her understand how beginners learn magic. Another person walked her through some of the medical stuff. N.K. Jemisin thanks the NASA-funded workshop (and people involved) in her acknowledgements for The Fifth Season. In the acknowledgments of These Violent Delights, Chloe Gong thanks her parents for helping her translate historical documents written in Chinese.

You never know what knowledge is lurking in the minds of people you know, so it's always a good idea to check.

Here are a couple posts to help with your research:

WQA’s Guide to Internet Research

Writing About Difficult to Research Topics

Best of luck with your research and story!

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I’m guessing that you mean in terms of dialogue, since you ask specifically about character voices, though ‘voice’ is also used to refer to the particular stylistic quirks of authors, that’s a different thing. If you DID mean to ask about narrative/ authorial voice, just drop me another ask!

I did answer a question recently about writing witty dialogue [HERE], and I’ll reiterate some of the salient points from that and then elaborate a little.

Think about your characters, their individual quirks and personalities, think about how they say what they say.

As to what your character is going to say, you need to know what the content of the discussion is, what the goals of each character are, and the approach that each of them is taking to the conversation. 

Why are they discussing this? Is it a simple exchange of information or pleasantries? Are they friends passing time and entertaining each other?

Thinking about how someone speaks is thinking about background and experience. The way that a character approaches any given conversation is going to be informed by their personal history, it may help to consider what similar conversations they might have had before, or, what makes a conversation different to the kind of interaction that they are accustomed to having.

How educated are your characters? And how important is it to them that people around them know that they are educated? Are they the kind of person to drop polysyllabic words into daily conversation? Do they make an effort to have the things they say be understandable to the layperson? Or are they undereducated for their social context? Do they have difficulty with concepts that might be seen as basic by most of the people around them?

What kind of social status does your character carry? Are they very upper class? Middle class with aspirations? Working class? What do they think of their social status/ are they going to try and rebel against it or transcend it? (Think of the tropes of the upper/upper-middle class teenager showing rebellion by engaging in working class activities/ fashions/ colloquialisms/ music scenes, or of working class teenagers striving to ‘better themselves’. Both common narratives.)

How old is your character? Are they in the social milieu that is going to be using the most up-to-date slang? Or are they slightly outdated? Or in the comfortable middle ground? The older we are the more difficult it is to adopt new speech patterns, while younger people tend to ‘play’ with language and develop new words or assign new meanings to words.

What kind of job does your character do? Some vocations will come with a vocabulary, and it may affect the way they speak outside of work (some military people might have some verbal patterns that stay with them after service, teachers or professors will sometimes slip into a ‘teaching tone’ outside of class, even something like customer service can leave you with a few rote replies to certain phrases!)

Who else does your character hang around with? People are very easily influenced by the company they keep, and as part of socialisation we pick up on verbal patterns that people we like use.

And most of all, personality, is going to affect the way your character speaks. Do they want to conform to what others are doing? Do they want to stand out for the way they speak and the words they choose? Do they want to communicate clearly? Do they resent having to speak at all? Do they just start running at the mouth when given a space in conversation?

How your character feels about and reacts to the situation they are in will influence how they speak and what they say. Having a thorough understanding of your character’s goals, motivations, desires, dislikes, etc, both overall and as it pertains to the specific interaction they’re having right now will go a long way to figuring out what they’ll say and how they’ll say it.

Remember to read aloud the dialogue that you write, so that you can see if it feels natural when spoken, and I think the reading suggestions in the post linked above are still a pretty good selection for this one too.

- Neil Gaiman

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Start With Broad Subjects

When you begin a story that is heavy with technical detail that must be checked for accuracy, the most efficient way of going about it is approaching the first draft with a general sense of the topic. Then, as you write more and more, keep note of details you don’t have or facts you need to find. When you reach the second and third drafts, turn that general idea into specific detail. You’ll know what you need to know at that point, and you won’t waste valuable time doing unnecessary research instead of revising.

Keep Track of Your Resources

Hoard. Your. Sources. Not only so you can cite them to any editors or beta-readers whose knowledge may conflict with what you’ve researched, but so you can refer back to them if you decide to elaborate on the part of the story that required that information in the first place. Always keep a list of links in a document with the specific information you’ve gleaned from it, listed in a way where you can easily navigate and revisit sources and information.

NaNoWriMo starts in just a week. One month, 50,000 words and a lot of caffeine. Several bestselling novels started as NaNo projects by unknown writers (well, not any more). This includes titles like Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern and Cinder, Scarlet and Cress by Marissa Meyer.

About 350,000 writers sign up every November to write a novel in 30 days. What fascinates me is that only about 40,000 writers complete the challenge. Why is that? What do those who make it have that others don’t? And how can we make that number higher? A lot higher.

Of course, writing is hard, but is it really something that only a fraction of people can do? I don’t buy that.

I believe that the writers who finish simply have the tools, habits and support they need to overcome resistance and get words on the page.

That’s why I built Writing Analytics — an editor that gives you the tools to get your words done and create a sustainable writing routine. If you’re doing NaNoWriMo this year, I believe it’s the best app to get you over the finish line.

Try Writing Analytics for FREE During NaNoWriMo

The best part is that Writing Analytics will be free to try from today through the whole of November. Use the link below to create an account that will be free to use until 4 December 2021:

Create Your Free Writing Analytics Account for NaNoWriMo

No hidden fees or gimmicks — you can always access your drafts and data even after your account has expired. You can also easily export all your drafts whenever you want.

While I can’t afford to be an official NaNoWriMo sponsor yet (🤞 for next year!), I’d like to support writers in the small way I can. That brings me to my other point.

NaNoWriMo Winners Get 50% OFF Writing Analytics

Need some extra motivation to complete NaNoWriMo this year? If you write your novel in Writing Analytics and win NaNoWriMo, you’ll get 50% off your subscription for a year!

Send your NaNoWriMo 2021 Winner’s Certificate to [email protected], and I’ll sort you out!

How Writing Analytics Works?

So why is Writing Analytics the best editor for NaNoWriMo? It combines several productivity tools that successful writers use into a simple writing app that you can use on your laptop or phone.

While you write, the editor tracks a number of metrics behind the scenes. This includes how many words you write and delete, how long each writing session takes, how focused you are and how much time you spend typing.

You can set goals and track your progress across all your writing projects. You can share your dashboard with your friends. They’ll be able to see your stats and you can keep each other accountable.

Writing Analytics also comes with a built-in habit tracker. You can build streaks and earn rewards for reaching important milestones on your writing journey.

Seven Days to Go!

NaNoWriMo is only a week away. I wish you the very best of luck if you’re planning to participate this year!

It will be intense 30 days. Writing 1,666 words per day for a month is no joke. If you’re a slow writer like me, it may even seem ridiculous, but I’d encourage you to think about it as an experiment — a way to try something new.

A novel in a month — the insanity of that goal may well be what breaks through the assumptions that you have about what you’re capable of as a writer and becomes the defining moment of your career.

Remember, you don’t have to publish your NaNo novel. You only have to finish it. At the very least, NaNoWriMo is a fantastic opportunity to write some garbage. Real garbage — stuff that you’ll be too embarrassed to even read back.

That’s how you get to writing the good stuff.

About the Author

Hi, I’m Radek 👋. I’m a writer, software engineer and the founder of Writing Analytics — an editor and writing tracker designed to help you beat writer’s block and create a sustainable writing routine.

I publish a post like this every week. Want to know when the next one comes out? Sign up for my email list below to get it right in your inbox.

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Past Editions

#217: Don’t Save Your Best Ideas for Later, October 2021

#216: Take Back the Time to Write, October 2021

#215: Writing for the Right Reasons, October 2021

#214: It Doesn’t Count If You Don’t Finish It, September 2021

Back when I was doing my MA program, I typed up a guide to writing query letters. It’s the post from this blog that I’m most proud of: a thorough step-by-step guide that combines days and weeks of research, and dozens of sources, into a neatly packaged 1,800-word post.

And I have to admit, I didn’t write it for tumblr. I needed to write a query letter myself for a publishing class, and my post was little more than compiled homework notes, saved as a Tumblr post for posterity. 

I’ve actually had pieces of this in my drafts for years, but now I actually have to write a synopsis and I’m piling up the research, so I thought it was finally time for the sister to my query post to be published here.

But first…

What is a synopsis?

A synopsis is a 1-2 page summary of the events that transpire in a book, either proposed or already written. It’s used to give people who haven’t read your book a quick overview, so they know the story that’s being told in the book without having to read it.

When is a synopsis necessary?

Some literary agents request synopses along with query letters. More often, they’re used slightly later on in a writer’s career, when they have an agent or an editor and they need to submit a proposal for a new idea or project. A synopsis can also be used later on, in situations that don’t involve the author. For instance, when an editor pitches the book to the marketing and publicity team, who may not have time to read every book they’re working on. Unlike a query letter, the book doesn’t necessarily have to be written when you’re submitting its synopsis.

Basic Style

The job of a synopsis is to lay out the story with little fuss and no frills. They let the person you’re pitching know what they’re going to find in that giant stack of pages on their desk or in that obscenely long Word document (or else in the Word doc they’ll eventually receive).  

Most professional synopses follow these rules:

They’re told in third person

They’re told in present tense

Characters’ names are CAPSLOCKED at first mention.

They are double spaced.

They tend to avoid descriptions longer than this sentence.

They focus on the central conflict and the protagonist’s emotional journey

They spoil the ending

They should be 500 words or less. (That is 1 page single-spaced, 2 pages double-spaced.)

HOW TO WRITE YOUR SYNOPSIS

The plot

Writing your synopsis, you have one goal: to tell a 50,000-100,000 word story in 500 words. It can be a little difficult to do this right. A great way to do this is to identify the key turning points in your protagonist’s story.

Do you remember those little plot roller coasters you’d make in elementary school? They’d usually be pointy witch’s-hat shaped things labeled with the terms: “beginning, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution.” 

Those turning points are the events you should be including in your synopsis.This is the structure you want to emphasize to your reader. You want to make abundantly clear that your story works like a story, that the events of your book have a beginning, a middle, and an end, that there’s an intriguing beginning, an exciting climax, a satisfying conclusion. You don’t want to just list out the events of your novel, but highlight the function of those events. X moment is important because it’s the inciting incident, the moment that takes the protagonist from their normal life and throws them into the story.

There are tons of great story roadmaps out there, that go into more specific story elements. The Hero’s Journey is the most famous example of a detailed, and mostly universal, story structure. There’s also the three-act structure that’s famous among screenwriters.

Find a structure that fits your story the best and use that to identify the events of your story that need to make it into your synopsis. I’ll link to different sources at the bottom of this post that will give you variations of story structure.

If you can correlate key scenes in your novel to the descriptions of these plot points, you’ll find an easy roadmap to navigating the many events of outlining your novel.

Your protagonist’s journey

Your protagonist is the heart of your story, and should be the heart of the synopsis, too. The protagonist’s emotional journey may not string all of these plot points together, but it’s going to be what makes them matter to the reader. The human element of your story has to be represented in your synopsis.  

There’s no room for long descriptions, so you’ll have to be smart about finding a few terms that not only tell your reader who the character is, but what their story will be. For instance, if your story is about someone trying to get their critically-panned paintings in the Museum of Modern Art by breaking into the museum and installing the pieces themselves, you may want to introduce them with a sentence that begins like so: “When IGNATIUS, an ambitious and untalented struggling artist, discovers his work is rejected from yet another gallery…”

In addition to these descriptive terms, you should spell out what your protagonist wants (or wants desperately to avoid) and their stake in the events of the story. 

Along the way, tell us how these key aspects of their persons change due to the events of the story, or else how they influence the events of the story. Tell us about how after raving reviews for his DIY MoMA exhibit came in, Iggy realized that though he still liked painting, his talents actually lay in performance art. Untalented to talented, struggling to successful, all because his ambition pushed him to try new and daring things.

Tips:

As in query letters, you only name the most important characters and locations outright. If you’re writing a synopsis for Harry Potter, you’ll want to use Harry’s name in the query, but most other people and places can be referred to by their function in the novel. Ex: Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon can be “his cruel relatives.” Hermione and Ron can be “his friends.” Even Hogwarts can be a “school for people with magical abilities.” This makes it easier for a reader to understand what’s going on in your story. Too many names in such a small amount of space can be overwhelming.

All telling, no showing. This is one piece of writing where you’ll want to tell, instead of show. You need to get to your point as quickly, as clearly, and concisely as possible; this isn’t the place for creative storytelling.

Oftentimes, synopses are given along with other materials, such as pitch letters and sample pages. While a synopsis should be captivating in-so-far that it’s well told, and it should maybe be a little stylish, being captivating and stylish aren’t its main goals. Additional materials like sample pages and pitches have more room for creative flourishes and can do a better job of selling the story, while the synopsis focuses on telling it.

Your synopsis should show that you know how to tell a story. While a synopsis doesn’t sell a story like a query, it should still illustrate the fact that you have an interesting, unique and well-structured plot. When finished, your reader should be able to think to themselves “that’s a good story. I want to read that.”

Your first draft will be too long. Your first draft of a synopsis will always be at least a page or two longer than it should be. Identify the sentences and paragraphs where you explain why a thing happens and ax them. Identify sentences where you repeat yourself and ax them. Identify descriptors that aren’t vital to understanding of the story and ax them. Once you make your first painful cuts and see that the story still makes sense without those things, you’ll start to get a better understanding of what can and cannot be taken out of your synopsis.

Bibliography:

6 Steps for Writing a Book Synopsis

How to Write a 1 Page Synopsis

The Hero’s Journey

Learn How to Write a Synopsis Like a Pro

How to Write a Novel Synopsis

The Secrets of Story Structure

Three Awesome Plot Structures for Building Bestsellers

7 Ways Write Plot Outline

Synopsis for “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure”

How to Plan Your Novel Using a 3 Act Structure - ex. “The Hunger Games”

Some of my most popular posts on this blog have to do with Chinese names. It seems like a lot of people who reblog those posts enjoy writing and are saving the posts as resources for naming their characters. So, I wanted to share some additional resources that I’ve found and used.

Resource #1: Name104

This site reflects names from Taiwan. It has quite a few different pages/features to explore. Just make sure you only enter in traditional characters–it won’t work properly with simplified characters.

First is the name generating tool (線上取名工具軟體).

You can specify the surname, if you want a one character given name, the second character of the name (aka first character of the given name), number of strokes, and things relating to luck. The specify second character feature is really useful for if you want a common 字辈 across names. The site will generate a bunch of names, and you can click each to learn more.

The tool I find most useful is the name similarity tool (名字相似度查詢). You enter a given name, and it will show a popularity score as well as lists of common names with the characters you included. The score is people/million, taken from college (I think) entrance exam takers over a 15 year period.

The default name when you click on the page is 心怡. This one is pretty popular. If you know you really want a name with the character 怡, you can enter in 怡怡 so it will show all the most popular names with this character (both in the first or second position), like below:

When I have something Much to say, it takes me just as many words to say it. I say it with words that are each of them bland and common, unimaginative by their lonesome, with the hopes that if I stack so many together and squeeze a single drop of Much from each that it might flow into something meaningful.

When I have something to say, I say it twice. I say it three times. Because the first or second may not have captured the point. Because I do not trust myself to express the full essence saying it just once. Like just now, those last two sentences. I’ll repeat myself a third time for good measure - because I do not say it right just once or twice.

Poems say things in only a half, only a quarter. They choose single words worth more than ten of mine. I want to know how their minds shop for words. I want to distill myself like poets do. I want to trade in all my too many common words for the way they use an extraordinary few.

If I keep writing this, I’ll write it forever. I’ll explain myself again, as I have already, as I’m doing now. With more and different other words, with the hope of saying myself fully, like how all the hatched and messy wanton scribbles from a pen might finally color in a page. I want to change that. I want to not rip the page I’ve oversaturated by the tip of my pen.

Averting eyes, or looking askance

Feeling your face heat up

The term “Visibly flustered”, which can imply a whole lot!

Chest thumping, heart fluttering

Butterflies in the stomach

Peeking through lashes

Covering face or mouth with hands

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1. Pacing

A fight scene should be fast-paced and intense. Unless it's a final battle with numerous parties, a fight scene that's too long tends to take away suspense. To speed up your pacing, use active voice to describe movement and don't overdescribe your characters' thoughts. Excessive inner monologue will be unrealistic, as people usually have no room to think during intense combats.

2. Character mannerisms

Here's a point that people often overlook, but is actually super important. Through fight scenes, you should be able to reveal your characters' contrasting mannerisms and personality. A cunning character would play dirty - fighting less and making use of their opponent's weakness more. A violent character would aim to kill. A softer one would only target to disarm their enemies, using weakened attacks. A short-minded character would only rely on force and attack without thinking. This will help readers understand your characters more and decide who to root for.

3. Making use of surroundings

Not only the characters, you also need to consider the setting of your fight scene and use it to your advantage. Is it suitable for fighting, or are there dangerous slopes that make it risky? Are there scattered items that can help your characters fight (e.g. nails, shards of glass, ropes, wooden boards, or cutlery)? Is it a public place where people can easily spot the fight and call the authorities, or is it a private spot where they can fight to the death?

4. Description

The main things that you need to describe in a fight scene are :

• Characters involved in the fight

• How they initiate and dodge attacks

• Fighting styles and any weapons used

• The injuries caused

Be careful to not drag out the description for too long, because it slows down the pace.

5. Raise the stakes

By raising the stakes of the fight, your readers will be more invested in it. Just when they think it's over, introduce another worse conflict that will keep the scene going. Think of your characters' goals and motivations as well. Maybe if the MC didn't win, the world would end! Or maybe, one person in the fight is going all-out, while the other is going easy because they used to be close :"D

6. Injuries

Fights are bound to be dirty and resulting in injuries, so don't let your character walk away unscathed - show the effect of their injuries. For example, someone who had been punched in the jaw has a good chance of passing out, and someone who had been stabbed won't just remove the knife and walk away without any problem. To portray realistic injuries, research well. I have two posts about writing realistic pain and injuries back in my pink theme, check them out if you need any reference!

7. Drive the plot forward

You don't write fight scenes only to make your characters look cool - every fight needs to have a purpose and drive the plot forward. Maybe they have to fight to improve their fighting skills or escape from somewhere alive. Maybe they need to defeat the enemy in order to obtain an object or retrieve someone who had been kidnapped. The point is, every single fight scene should bring the characters one step closer (or further :D) to the climax.

8. Words to use

• Hand to hand combat :

Crush, smash, lunge, beat, punch, leap, slap, scratch, batter, pummel, whack, slam, dodge, clobber, box, shove, bruise, knock, flick, push, choke, charge, impact

• With weapon :