You know the basics about your character. You know their age. Where they live. You probably have some vague ideas about what they look like and what’s happened in their past.

But how do you go beyond surface-level character building to develop a character people will actually be interested in?

There are a million character development exercises out there. And you should use them! But, if you want to get to the bones of what makes a great character in as few steps as possible, all you need are five questions.

How to Create a Character (People WANT to Read About)

Engaging characters aren’t just interesting. They aren’t just unique. Those are good aspects to include, but they aren’t what makes your readers connect with your character.

If you want that true engagement that keeps readers turning the pages, you need to look beyond personality. You need to take a deep dive into desires, fears, and flaws.

Once you hash these three things out, you not only end up with a great character but you get the bones of the perfect plot, as well.

It may sound like a lot to bite off, but the truth is, all you need to get started is to ask yourself these questions.

1. What does your character desire?

Consider where your character is in their life right now (i.e. the beginning of the story). What are their goals? What are they missing? What do they want?

Try to focus on the external here.

True, internal desires are more important in character building than external ones. But representing these inner yearnings through external wants is more engaging for the reader. Especially at the beginning of your story.

Showing your hero push aside the nice shy girl to talk to the hot bitchy blond is more interesting than telling the reader he believes he will be happiest if he scores the hottest chick in the room.

Most external desires are just tangible recreations of internal wants. And often, it is easier to start with the external and then examine what is really going on beneath the surface.

Common external desires in the real world include:

• A better job
• A new house/new town
• A significant other
• More friends
• More money
• Fame

Remember, this want is likely different than your character’s goal at the climax of the story. This has to do with the difference between internal and external wants–we’ll get into how this dynamic works in a bit.

For now, focus on what your character desires early on in the story.

For example, I know my character Adeline will eventually have the goal of saving her entire family of misfits from the evil small-town mayor. But her desires at the beginning of the story are more typical of a homeless teen.

She wants a consistent source of food and adequate shelter so her misfit family can continue to live free on the streets. (This grows from an internal desire to keep her family safe because she views the foster system as dangerous.)

2. What does your character fear?

Giving your character fears is a great way to make them more relatable and more interesting.

But for this question I want you to think beyond claustrophobia and arachnophobia. Instead, think of fears in terms of “anti-desires.”

What is it your character really, really does not want?

Oftentimes, a character’s anti-desires are already established when you name their desires.

For instance, if your character desires a bigger house that may indicate a fear of inadequacy. If your character wants more money that may be a reflection of a fear of returning to the poverty they knew in childhood.

As you can see, these anti-desire type fears often tend toward the internal. And that is what we want. Internal conflict is what all great characters have in abundance.

For example, Adeline the gutterpunk’s fears might include: Fear of abandonment. Free of losing her freedom. Fear of returning to a system that only caused her pain.

All of these fears are what drives her to desire a sustainable life on the streets with her misfit family.

3. How is your character flawed?

Everyone is flawed. This is an unfortunate fact in the real world. In the literary world, it is a useful tool.

Without flaws, our characters wouldn’t have the chance to learn and grow. And that is what your audience wants.

They want to connect to a character because they are interesting, relatable, and on a mission to accomplish something (their desire). But if they aren’t flawed, then the journey to accomplishing that desire will be short and boring.

There is always the possibility that an unflawed character could still have a long journey because things get in their way. But remember, things happening to your character are never as engaging as things happening because of your character.

A passive hero that is just along for the ride isn’t interesting. Even if the building they are in blows up and the train they are on derails. So long as they aren’t affecting the world around them, the reader won’t be taken by their plight.

On the other hand, an active hero, especially one who is always getting themselves into trouble, is not just interesting, but alluring.

We’ve all screwed up a good situation by doing something stupid. Because of this shared human experience, we all inherently want to see others overcoming their flaws to achieve their goals. Because if they can do it, we can too!

So what kind of internal flaws does your character have that will help them appeal to your readers?

Here are some common examples of character flaws:

• Stubborn
• Selfish
• Easily manipulated
• Addictive
• Vein
• Ignorant
• Lazy
• Guarded
• Self-destructive
• Naïve
• Impulsive
• Overly optimistic

There is no limit to the number of flaws your character can have. But the flaws they do have must be rooted somewhere.

Some flaws are easy to accept as genetic traits (stubbornness, laziness). But most are a reflection of a person’s past (being guarded, self-destructive, impulsive).

If you have already created a past for your character, use this to endow them with some flaws.

For example, Adeline lost her parents at a young age and then lost more relatives as she grew up. This opens her up to a whole list of flaws: abandonment issues, addiction, self-destructiveness, self-centeredness, and more!

If you haven’t thought up a past for your character, then choose the flaws that work best for your story (see question 4) and then build a past where those flaws are likely to be nurtured.

4. How do your character’s flaws prevent them from getting what they desire?

Flaws are great for complicating your story and creating conflict. But what they really need to do is keep your character from getting what they want.

There may be a lot of things getting in your character’s way. There’s the evil villain who has kidnapped half the town. The asteroid headed for Earth. And the lying boyfriend who keeps stringing them along.

These plot conflicts may prolong the quest for what your character wants, but it should be their flaws that truly keep them from attaining it.

Maybe their impulsive nature has them turning away from their goal at the very last minute because fighting a supervillain sounds more exciting. Or maybe their self-destructive streak keeps them pursuing the toxic boyfriend even as their best friend continues to prove to be the partner they’ve always wanted.

Consider what your character wants and what they fear. Now consider how their flaws can push them toward what they fear and away from their desire.

This may be a simple delineation, such as a fear of commitment leading the hero away from the girl he has always wanted and into a pit of lonely despair.

Or it may be more of a jagged journey, such as a fear of commitment leading the hero into a night filled with emotionless sex that then leads to an unplanned pregnancy with a stranger, then to a marriage-shattering fight with the love of his life nine months later.

For Adeline, her self-centered tendencies and alcohol fueled self-destruction pushes her misfit family away. She wants to provide a stable life on the streets, but constantly acting to fulfil her own impulses puts all of them at odds with the local authorities.

With each conflict, she grows closer to achieving what she fears most–a lonely life in the foster system–while drifting further from what she truly desires.

5. How must your character grow in order to overcome their flaws?

Even in a tragedy, there is always one last chance for the hero to redeem themselves at the climax of the story. To do this, they must grow and overcome the flaws holding them back.

Like characters who don’t act, characters who don’t grow are boring.

Consider your character’s flaws again. What kind of growth would it take to negate their flaws and allow them to attain their desire?

An impulsive character can learn to consider the consequences of their actions. A naïve hero can grow into a sage soul from their experiences. A vein person can find a reason to embrace humility.

For Adeline, saving the ones she loves means growing away from her selfish ways and sacrificing herself to save them.

But just because your character overcomes their flaws does not mean they will achieve their original external desire.

By making that sacrifice, Adeline does not get what she thought she wanted.

She started her journey wanting adequate food and shelter so she could live with her misfit family on the streets. In the end, she is able to keep her family safe but none of them live the way they used to and she ends up alone.

External desires are tainted by character flaws. Growing away from flaws often means the character is no longer interested in their original external goal. But they are still able to achieve their true internal desire.

Wanting to keep her friends on the street with her was selfish of Adeline. But her original internal desire to keep them safe was not.

The growth heroes undergo means their original desires may no longer satisfy them.

The character who wanted to score the hottest chick in the room because he thought it would make him happy? He overcomes his vanity and self-centeredness and ends up with the nice shy girl.

He doesn’t achieve his external goal but he does end up happy, which was his internal desire all along.

Consider how your character’s original external goal may have been skewed by their flaws. Then consider how the growth they undergo will allow them to achieve their internal goal instead.

Aligning Character and Plot

You started with the vague idea of a character. Now you have a character with desires, fears, flaws, and a growth arch.

You also have the bones of a plot.

You know what your character is trying to achieve in the beginning of the story. You have some idea of how their flaws can lead them astray on their way to achieving it. You know how their growth will determine how they will act at the climax. And you know what they will accomplish in the end.

All you need now to round out the plot of your story is an inciting incident, a few more engaging characters, and the details about the conflicts they’ll run into along the way.

Let’s see those three-dimensional characters!

Show us the complex, engaging characters you came up with by writing a one sentence response to each question in the comment box below!