Sometimes when you’re writing a story, your characters can all seem to blend and congeal together. Their opinions, reactions, and personality start to become indistinguishable from each other.
But don’t let that happen! Different characters with different perspectives and attitudes are exactly what make stories great.
If you want to make sure that your characters are coming through strong, clear, and different from each other, then there’s an easy way to test it out: write a conversation between them using dialogue only.
During the last stream, at the request of several viewers, we did an exercise where we wrote a story using dialogue only.
I really like this exercise because it’s like running with weights on. When you strip away all dialogue tags (“he/she said”) and narration, your characters’ personalities have to be as strong as possible for us to know who is talking when.
Then, when you take off the weights, your writing will be all the stronger for your efforts!
You can see what we did here, including some great
stories from chat, or scroll down for highlights.
First we had chat come up with a bunch of characters, vote, and pick the three who would have a conversation with each other.
They decided on: (1) Peter, a teenage boy who never actually knows what’s being talked about, but he tries to sound like he does. (2) Donkey, a talking donkey with a bright and positive personality who struggles to find a friend. (3) Jack, a cranky old man in a wheelchair who complains about movies.
Here’s what we came up with:
“Ooh! Guys. Have you ever seen The Hunger Games? I’d love to watch it with you. It’s so exciting and—”
“That movies sucks. It’s all just about a bunch of people going hungry in some poor old country. And it’s in black and white. Totally garbage Oscar bait, if you know what I mean.”
“What? Are you sure? That’s not that movie I thought I saw.”
“Ah, cut it out you two! We’re not watching that modern-day trash. That’s just junk food for the brain, sugar right in the eyeballs, as my wife used to say.”
“Okay, no problem! How about this one then? The Green Mile. It has Tom Hanks in it. He’s such a fun guy, I love everything he does.”
“Oh please! The Green Mile? Yawn. It’s just about that stupid historical walk that one guy made, what was his name? Even Green? When he walked a mile down some street in New York with two broken legs, trying to raise awareness for polio. If I wanted a history lesson, I’d just actually show up to Mr. Kloog’s class sometime.”
“I do like that Mr. Hanks. My wife and I, we used to watch Forrest Gump and Apollo 13 together. The day before she passed, she was smiling along to watching him in Saving Mr. Banks. But now, without her … it just … it just doesn’t feel right.”
“Did you know that the best way to get over the loss of a loved one is to print out a cardboard cutout of them? Then you can just stay in denial, since it’s the first stage of healing. Denying anything is wrong means you’re on the path to healing!”
“Peter! Cut that out. Can’t you see Jack is hurting? Here Jack, how about this: why don’t you pick out which movie we’ll watch tonight?”
“Let me see… there’s nothing here but modern trash… oh! Now here’s a nice one. A good Jimmy Stewart classic, It’s A Wonderful Life. You guys’ll like this one.”
“Ugh, a black and white movie? I can’t believe they went through all the effort back then to put everyone in gray makeup and cover everything in ash just to make it look old fashioned. Really kind of pretentious of them.”
Could you keep track of who was who throughout the dialogue? It was probably pretty easy, and that’s because the characters’ voices and personalities are so strong.
If you’re writing your own story, take 3-4 of your characters and write a short scene of them talking, using dialogue only. If some of them sound similar, then that may be a sign you need to differ them up a bit more.
After that, chat voted that we write this prompt: “Write about taking a gamble on something.”
Here’s what I came up with:
God damn I hate my bowels. Why, of all times, did they have to act up right now? I was in the middle of a Skype interview for the job of my dreams, a digital artist for a game company, and I don’t know if it was nervousness or the meatball sub that anxiety made me scarf down twenty minutes before the call started, but something was begging to be released from my backside.
The only problem was, I didn’t know if it was of the gaseous or liquid variety. Was I willing to take a chance? Was I willing to play the most dangerous game?
Yes. Yes I was.
“Okay Mr. Goush,” said my interviewer with a smile, organizing his papers. “We just have a few questions to finish off here with if you don’t mind.”
“Sure,” I eked out. The only thing more clenched than my teeth were my quivering buttocks. Something bad was brewing inside of me. I tugged on my intestines like marionette puppet strings attached to greasy hams. A bubble wormed its way through me, right to the opening, where surface tension kept it alive like a soap globule at the end of a plastic bubble-blowing stick.
“If we were to offer you a position with us, would you be able to relocate nearby?”
Poised over the edge or relief versus regret, I tried to deduce what would happen if I let the boogery blob pop. Would I be covered in slick stains of self-disgust, or would it be released in silent steamy satisfaction?
There was only one way to find out.
“Well,” I said, opening both my front and back holes at the same time. “I would be happy to. You see….”
Oh no.
Ohh nooo.
I had played the most dangerous game. And I had lost.
Sludge spewed forth from within me, as if I were back in diapers screaming for a bottle. A big puddle of Chef Boyardee filled up my pants, as warm as if it had come right off the stove. The smell clawed its way up my back and breathed its nasty breath out of my suit collar, clogging my nostrils with its spoiled-milk smell.
I coughed. Cringed. Cried. The interview had to go on.
“You see… I’d be happy to relocate… immediately.”
“Great!” said the interviewer, oblivious to my agony. As a child playing in a school playground when a man in the hospital across the street dies from a heart attack, as a husband and wife curl up by the fireplace while a homeless person freezes to death outside, so was I alone in my suffering.
“Are you sure, though?” he asked. “You look a little sad at the prospect.”
“Nope!” I choked out, the toxic tides beneath me shifting as I readjusted myself. “They’re just tears of happiness at the thought of working for you!”
The man chuckled. “Glad to hear! Well, thank you for your time today, Mr. Goush. We’ll be in contact soon, I’m sure.”
“Thanks.” I snapped my mouth shut quickly, to inhale the least amount of noxious fumes as possible. With a final wave, I clicked the button to end the call.
You know how thunder always takes a while to come after you see the lightning?
Well, then came the thunder.
An inhuman rumble that probably registered on some middle schooler’s seismograph project erupted out of my backside, shaking my chair and spewing forth Pompeii levels of muddy magma into my already-soaked slacks.
As I fell to the floor from the sheer force of it all, and the diarrhea lava sprayed up into my torso and sleeves, coating my arms and stomach, and making me question my digestive health, I could only smile.
I’d actually won the most dangerous game. My Skype interviewer had no idea I’d crapped myself, but if I’d let loose with that rip-snorter instead, who knows what would have happened.
I guess that sometimes, in order to win, you have to get your hands dirty.
If you want to join us and help write a story by trolling in chat, or share your own writing for feedback, then we’d love to have you. We stream on Twitch every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday at 6:30pm-10:30pm (U.S. Eastern Standard Time).
And you missed the stream, you can still watch them on the YouTube channel or watch the full stream reruns.
Hope to see you next time, friend!
Scott Wilson is the author of the novel Metl: The ANGEL Weapon,
forthcoming March 2019.
Featured image: Pakutaso (Edited by me)