50 Tips for Writing.
37. Character profiles
Those character profiles where it basically goes something along the lines of -
Name:
Age:
Hair Colour:
Etc etc? AVOID AVOID AVOID! Firstly, they are BORING. No one wants to read a huge contract thing on each and every single character, especially not at the very beginning before any introduction on the story itself is done. How about you introduce your character and insert their profile data all in at the same time? Start off with, something like 'Amelia Lincoln was a very bubbly little fourteen year old girl with strawberry ringlets and pale green eyes. She was a very quiet girl and incredibly shy, many mistake her shyness for snobbiness. Amelia loved to play soccer, it was her secret passion,' etc. You see? It's better than doing the whole
Name: Amelia Lincoln.
Age: Fourteen.
Eye Colour: Pale Green.
Etc etc. You can do your character profiles if you really want to but my advice is, don't do them. They're boring, no one can really be stuffed reading and remembering the profiles of a bunch of characters shoved under their face in one go and those character profiles might be good building blocks for your character persona but your readers don't care, they want a story, not bits and pieces of your blue print.
Name:
Age:
Hair Colour:
Etc etc? AVOID AVOID AVOID! Firstly, they are BORING. No one wants to read a huge contract thing on each and every single character, especially not at the very beginning before any introduction on the story itself is done. How about you introduce your character and insert their profile data all in at the same time? Start off with, something like 'Amelia Lincoln was a very bubbly little fourteen year old girl with strawberry ringlets and pale green eyes. She was a very quiet girl and incredibly shy, many mistake her shyness for snobbiness. Amelia loved to play soccer, it was her secret passion,' etc. You see? It's better than doing the whole
Name: Amelia Lincoln.
Age: Fourteen.
Eye Colour: Pale Green.
Etc etc. You can do your character profiles if you really want to but my advice is, don't do them. They're boring, no one can really be stuffed reading and remembering the profiles of a bunch of characters shoved under their face in one go and those character profiles might be good building blocks for your character persona but your readers don't care, they want a story, not bits and pieces of your blue print.