Character

Harry Potter goes to Garden State Mall on Black Friday. Tony Soprano participates in The National Dog Show in NYC on Thanksgiving Day. Tyrion Lannister goes to Atlantic Ctiy. James Bond walks into Kohls. Sam and Dean Winchester attend a Haunted Night of Terror at your local garden center/farm. Walter White appears on one of the Food Network contest shows. Goku takes a job at Dick's Sporting Goods. Or, drop a character into a well-known fictional setting other than theirs. Frodo Baggins winds up at Hogwarts. John Wick in Quahog, Rhode Island, Captain Kirk or Captain Picard as owner of the Millenium Falcon. You get the idea? Who is a character that you know well? Huckleberry Finn? Buffy The Vampire Slayer? Atticus Finch? Lorelai Gilmore? Where's the last place you'd expect to find her/him? What would this character do in this situation? Would they stay there? Why, and what would they do? Would they try to get out? What would be their strategy? Put them there and see what happens!

This exercise is all about considering characters' personalities, backstories, and motivations, and this can lead to gaining skill in developing one's own characters. It also works how to illustrate the major belief that character drives plot.

Keep this between two to three pages, but otherwise, let it go where it needs to go! Do your best to keep the focus on character, try not to let plot become your concern. Pick a character that is well developed, one you can easily hold in your mind, one you "know." If you think it is a character I might not know, tell me where she/he is from, and I can then do a little research before reading your piece.