On Sunday afternoon, I finished enough of a draft of Apathy’s Hero to send it to the kind people who volunteered to read it. Not all of them. There are still two names on my list who don’t have it, but they’re signed up for the post-revision round 2.

Anyway, that means that I’ve finished (for now) both of the books I wrote last November. They had something else in common, too. They’re both ideas I’ve had for a long time, populated with characters I’ve known for even longer.

I’ve been told how well I know them shows in the way I write them. Which is fantastic because it makes it really easy for me to figure out how they react in certain situations.

So with those two projects out of the way, I’m plotting something new. I’m not doing any writing yet, I’m still in the outlining stage. But this story is unique from any novel I’ve worked on in a long time…The characters are new.

It’s an odd feeling trying to work with characters I’m not super friendly with. I have an idea as to their likes and dislikes, their temperaments, the basics like appearance and surface talents. But I don’t know them.

So as I outline and plot and try and weave in a more complex story structure than I’ve ever worked with before (this is seriously boggling my mind because I’ve had to step outside the familiar ‘this world revolves around these three people’ box), I’m also trying to get these people to tell me about themselves.

They haven’t been as stubborn as I feared. Not so far. I have a vague idea of their childhoods…it’s a start. But I suspect it will take me another week or two to finish sketching this thing out, and I’m hoping while I plot, they’ll keep talking to me.

I do know this so far. Taylor and Max (Taylor’s the guy, Max is the girl – they insisted these were their names) are rapidly moving toward the top of my ‘favorite’ list. The old characters may have to be careful if they don’t want to be replaced ^_^

What’s the most effective way for you personally to get to know your characters?