Lois Winston Dishes on Character!
I am a huge Lois Winston fan! Not only do I love her Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, but I learn so much from everything she has to say about the art and craft of fiction writing. Below she talks about the intersection of plot and character, and the key questions we need to ask to fully develop the characters in our stories:
Four Essential Character Questions
By Lois Winston
Without a good plot and well-developed characters, writers don’t stand a chance of selling their manuscripts, no matter how well they’ve honed their technical skills. A writer can have the most beautifully crafted sentences the publishing world has ever seen, but if the plot is mundane or the characters are cardboard, the chance of publication is nil.
Plot is story, and story is about what happens in a book, specifically what happens to the characters who populate that book. Characterization is what drives the people who populate the story.
Every scene in a book needs to do one of two things – advance the story (plot) or tell the reader something essential that she needs to know about the characters (characterization) at that moment. If a scene does neither, it’s filler and doesn’t belong in the book.
Plot and characterization go hand-in-hand. Even though some books are more plot-driven and others more character-driven, a well-written book needs both.
The plot and the main characters in a novel must feature growth. The story needs a beginning, middle, and resolution. That’s the plot arc.
When it comes to characters, a story that begins and ends with the main characters having the same attitudes and in the same place emotionally and psychologically (and sometimes even physically) is not a successful story. The main characters need to learn and grow from both their experiences and the impact the other characters have had on them throughout the course of the story. 
Another way to look at plot and characterization is to break them down in terms of the characters’ internal and external goals, motivations, and conflicts. Plot deals with the external GMC; characterization deals with the internal GMC. All characters in a novel, no matter the genre, need both internal and external goals, motivation, and conflict. Without GMC you have melodrama, not drama.
Ask yourself:
- Who are the characters in the story?
- What do they want?
- Why do they want what they want?
- What’s keeping them from getting what they want?
You need to answer these questions for all the major characters in your story, both the hero and heroine or protagonists, as well as any villains or antagonists. Once you break the story down in this manner, you’ll either see that you’ve crafted a solid plot and characters or that some areas of the manuscript are weak and need more work.
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Embroidered Lies and Alibis
An Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery, Book 15
A Stitch in Time Could Save a Life…
When Anastasia’s mother Flora is offered a free spa vacation from Jeremy Dugan, a man connected to her distant past, Anastasia and husband Zack suspect ulterior motives. After all, too-good-to-be-true often spells trouble. Their suspicions are confirmed when the FBI swoops in to apprehend Dugan. However, Dugan isn’t who he claimed to be, and his arrest raises more questions than answers.
The Feds link Dugan to a string of cons targeting elderly single women across the country, but his seemingly airtight alibi leaves investigators stumped. Then, shortly after his release on bail, he’s kidnapped. A certain segment of New Jersey’s population is known for delivering deadly messages, and the FBI believes Dugan received one of them.
Meanwhile, bodies begin showing up in the newly created public garden across the street from Anastasia and Zack’s home. With two baffling crimes, no clear suspects, scant evidence, and every possible motive unraveling, both the FBI and local law enforcement are once again picking Anastasia’s brain. This time, though, her involvement is far from reluctant. Will she stitch together enough clues before she or someone she loves becomes the killer’s next victim?
Craft project included.
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BIO:
USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com. Sign up for her newsletter to receive an Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mini-Mystery.
Lynn, thanks so much for hosting me today.
Disqualifying myself from the promo, just wanted to agree with Lynn that Lois Winston knows her stuff. 🙂 Also to add Embroidered Lies and Alibis is terrific. And Anastasia has her hands full once again;)