Creating Your Cast of Characters

Authors hope that their fictional characters will engage a reader emotionally, compelling them to devour chapter after chapter. But how, as writers, can we create characters who feel real enough to do this? I think there are two parts to this: 1) not to think of your characters purely as made-up creations, but as people just as real as anyone you might know – with all the depth, complexity and contradictions that go along with that; 2) getting to know those characters inside out, so their authenticity sings off the page when you write them.

In my case, it was the main character of the Fireborn series (HarperCollins 2021), Twelve, who was the first spark of the story for me. She sprang into my imagination with her axes in hand and full of a fiery anger that took me by surprise. She immediately felt strong – but getting to know her thoroughly took a while. I started by asking her questions such as: Why are you so angry? Where is your family? What are those axes for? Through this, Twelve’s personality, back story, and many features of the fantastical world of Ember pulled into focus.
When I started writing my first draft, I thought I knew Twelve well. But by the end she was vastly different – not purely because of the journey she’d been on, but also because I’d got to know her better through the act of writing her story. She was no longer abstract; I’d seen her in a variety of situations and discovered her responses to different characters. She felt more complete, more authentic, more three-dimensional.

Once you’ve achieved this deep knowledge of your main character, it’s time to start thinking about their story arc through your book. How will their experiences change them? How will they grow? This might be immediately obvious or take some careful thought, but your character’s emotional journey is every bit as important as their physical one. It’s worth thinking about it in conjunction with your plot to make sure these two crucial aspects of the story are working together to draw your reader ever onwards. In Fireborn, Twelve is haunted by her past, tormented by the guilt of what happened to her family and obsessed with thoughts of revenge. I knew almost immediately that her arc needed to be a journey towards acceptance and self-forgiveness, one that would allow her to open up enough to allow friendship to blossom.

Creating believable characters is at the very heart of what we do as writers for children. Through your characters, young readers will experience ways of thinking and living that are different to their own – and perhaps, through that lens, they’ll make more sense of their own lives and beliefs.

This is an abridged version of an article taken from the Children's Writers' & Artists' Yearbook 2023.

Aisling Fowler is the author of Fireborn: Twelve and the Frozen Forest (HarperCollins 2021), her debut novel. Fireborn: Phoenix and the Frost Palace, the second book in her middle-grade fantasy trilogy, is due out in Spring 2023. Aisling worked as a support worker and then as a nurse, before rediscovering her childhood love of writing. Follow her on Twitter @fowler_aisling and Instagram @aislingfowler