The question I’m always asking is: has the author gone deep enough into what’s really behind these actions and decisions?

Here’s some tips and ideas for uncovering the deepest layers of your main (and other) character’s backstory.

A common issue in developmental edits is characters making choices, decisions, or coming up with an idea that stops the reader in their tracks. 

The reader thinks, Hang on… where did that come from?

We want twists and turns, of course, but those twists also need to be rooted in and connected to the lives of our characters long before they even stepped onto the page.

There’s a lot to unpack around this topic, and as with many structural elements of DE, these aren’t rigid rules or codes to follow. They’re tools we can use to identify weaknesses and problems, alongside reflecting on whether our characters have any of these missing pieces.

More often than not, the answers are already there, but the author has them locked away in their head. When they aren’t shared on the page, the reader can feel the narrative is flat or they are unsure how to interpret the character’s internal logic. 

My job, as your gay and queer fiction developmental editor, is often to help locate the moments where bringing these ideas forward will have the greatest payoff.

Origin Stories: Once upon a time… Over to Bob to gain some insights! 

Wound

A wound is a specific event that leads to psychological pain and a paralysing belief that it could happen again. Often these wounds are carried into adult life. 

At some point in Bob’s life, during his in childhood, he picked up on something an older person, caregiver, or parent does, and he internalised their approval or disapproval as the way the world works.

Fear
From that wounding, a specific fear emerged. The character’s actions shift in an attempt to prevent that fear from becoming real again. A flawed belief forms, which creates a broken theory of control and a whole chain of resulting actions.

Emotional Shielding
This fear leads to flaws, defensive habits, biases, and a generally negative or protective outlook. It becomes “the lie the character believes”.

If Bob received praise for something harmful, like standing up to bullies with his fists, he might come to believe that using his fists is the route to approval and safety. That belief becomes part of how he survives.

Unmet Need
Underneath all of this sits a core psychological need. Safety and security. Love and belonging. Esteem and recognition. Self-actualisation. Other… 

When these needs are unmet, a warped view of the world develops.

Bob might grow into the belief that violence is a justified solution to a problem. The plot then throws up mirrors: characters and situations that test that misbelief. Sometimes the story will confirm it; sometimes it will disprove it. 

Gradually, by the end, the misbelief is challenged so often that it finally shatters.

Much of a story’s tension comes from that misguided belief. There’s a fine line between a character being wrong or closed-off and the author not having gone deep enough into the reasons behind their actions.

This can be a tricky part of the process, but it’s never wasted time to try drafting these origin scenes with your two(+) love interests in a queer romance, or with your crime fiction antagonists if they take human form.

Sometimes a misbelief is straightforward, other times complex, but it should always be personal, specific, and deeply embedded in your character’s mind.

Tips:
For character background, it’s always worth digging into who they are, and perhaps playing around with drafting or writing moments off page that influence them as an on-page character.

Write out origin stories in the first person, even if your main story is third person. You can get closer to their true feelings and sense that way. (This backstory material can be great marketing copy for the future!)

Keep asking Qs, and keep going deeper and deeper to grasp what is really going on underneath it all: https://audreycefaly.substack.com/p/the-five-whys-of-character-creation

Wired for Story and Story Genius are excellent books on this topic. Enjoy!

Self-editing is a great way to hunt down these issues yourself but handing your manuscript over to me at the developmental editing stage means I can help you track, locate, and improve all these parts and more. 

Manuscript evaluations are a great place to start, and you get structured feedback, and you can always move to a full dev edit if needs be. 

Image by Tobi Berger from Pixabay