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Creating Compelling Characters Cheat Sheet

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taylorhood3214
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12 views2 pages

Creating Compelling Characters Cheat Sheet

Uploaded by

taylorhood3214
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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CREATING COMPELLING CHARACTERS

sharing my character creation process


This is a worksheet sharing the outline that I use to create
characters. As a note, this is just the process that I use
which I hope will be helpful to you, but it is obviously not
the only way. You can also feel free to tweak this sheet. If
you want check out an indepth explanation of how I use
this, watch the accompanying YouTube video (there are
captions!). There is also a fillable Word Document version
of this sheet here without the notes below. Finally, on the
second page, I include an example of the sheet filled out.
@lisellesambury

Character Name

The Lie: the lie that the character believes about their life or world, can also be thought of as
the fatal flaw, but is essentially what the character is struggling with that prevents them from
achieveing what they need

Want: what the character wants and thinks will solve the problems in their life, usually related to
the external goal of the novel

Need: what the character actually needs to solve the problems in their life, at least at an internal
level

Effect on home life: discuss how the lie they believe/their fatal flaw affects their home life from
housing situations, to conflicts with family, etc.

Effect on school/work life: discuss how the lie they believe/their fatal flaw affects their school or
work life from performance, to conflicts with authority within, etc.

Effect on relationships: discuss how the lie they believe/their fatal flaw affects their relationships
with others in general from how they make friends, to romantic relationships, to working with
others etc. You may also want to specifically highlight the relationship with the b-plot character.

Shard of glass: backstory on how/why the lie developed. This may or may not be revealed in the
novel depending on the character

Quirks: behaviours/mindset of characters that you may want to keep track of

Connection to MC: for non-MC characters, how they connect to the main character

Additional notes: a place for notes or scenes or anything else

w w w. l i s e l l e s a m b u r y.c a
Initial Premise:

From the POV of a ghost girl who does the least amount possible to try and scare those who
come to the house. When she makes friends with a young child who becomes possessed by one
of the ghosts, she’ll have to do her very best to combat her fear in order to help her friend

Sylvie [Last Name]

The Lie: the strong always beat the weak

Want: to help save young child from being possessed by ghost and having his whole family killed

Need: strength is not only measured by physical prowess, and those considered weak have the
ability to rise up with hidden strengths

Effect on home life: spends most of her time hiding, doesn’t not engage in conflict with others,
she doesn’t try to help the living, goes through the motions of pretending to torture the living in
order to fit in and protect herself

Effect on school/work life: afraid to draw attention to herself so she doesn’t speak in class or
answer questions despite knowing the answers, sees a bully tormenting a classmate and she
doesn’t intervene

Effect on relationships: struggles to form friendships because she has little loyalty due to fear,
avoid people who remind her of her family, she is a people pleaser. Avoids being close with little
boy because he reminds her of brother and she knows she can’t help him

Shard of glass: her family was attacked in the house where they lived, and she and her little
brother were hiding together, and she was supposed to look after him as the older sibling, and
she wasn’t strong enough to protect him. And he was killed first, and she was killed after. The
man who killed their family was shot by police and also died in the house, and he’s a ghost there
and continues to assert power over the others in the house. She remains afraid of him and unable
to do anything to help others. She’s the only one stuck in the house, not the rest of her family, feels
divinely punished for not being able to save her brother because she was too weak.

Quirks: always knows a good hiding place, really sharp hearing for guessing threats, really
standoffish, act more tough on the outside than she is inside, nail biting, sweaty, likes pink

Connection to MC: n/a

Additional notes: “It is not a pleasant existence to be a ghost who is afraid of other ghosts
trapped in a house full of them. Furthermore, being dead is very boring.”

*Note: this is a sample story for the purposes of this exercise to show how to craft characters, not for the
purposes of being an amazing mind-blowing story idea

w w w. l i s e l l e s a m b u r y.c a

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