Q&A Worldbuilding: Tips on writing believable Characters and Settings

When writing a story, writers tend to start with the characters or the hook. They think of the twist or plot the course for the protagonists. They come up with all the ideas they want to see and do their best to add prose, metaphor, and all the pretty words they can. However, if people do not like or understand the motivations of your characters, the book is going to be put aside to collect dust. You must have believable and relatable characters. I'll start with character tips, then finish with settings.

One tip is something I've mentioned before... Enneagram tests! There are multiple websites where one can take these tests that dive deep into one's personality. Get into the mind of your character and then take the enneagram test. Take note of the results and then look into the plethora of data that exists for that combination! There are tons of things you can learn and add to your character notes. It's amazing how much you can learn about your character by taking a test AS them.

The BIGGEST tip for a believable character is FLAWS. You simply MUST make sure that your character isn't perfect. If you took the enneagram, the results will give you perfect options for flaws you can give. Other flaws can come from their backstory. When you make notes about your characters, include how they speak. You can add phrases they use, terms that are improper that they'll say. Your character puts their shoes on and looks for their grocery list. Are they "Fixin' to go," "Bout to bounce," or would they most likely say they are "preparing to leave"? For a full immersion, you need to make sure each character has their own, unique voice.

My last piece of advice on the characters is about their role. I know it's easy to say "Penny is the smart one, Andrew is the sporty one, Genie is the popular one, and Kerry is the funny one," but you can easily overdo it if that trait is all there is to their personality. Also, if your character is too 'one-note' they will be too predictable.

When you think "world-building" and "settings" you probably can easily get advice about wording. They'll tell you to use the character's perspective. I even took a post-it and wrote "sight, smell, hear, feel, taste" to remind me to use the character's senses to take in the environment. All that is good, but my personal favorite piece of advice is far less... professional sounding... and requires a kiddo.

One of the best pieces of advice I have for both of these topics is to to talk about your story to a little kid. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING fills in the blanks better than answering all the questions a pre-teen will ask. Get yourself a six to ten-year-old and tell them about your world. Do your best to reel them in and get them hyped about your world and the next thing you know, they're going to ask you questions as if your world is flushed out. They're gonna ask you why something is the way it is, what grows there, "who does this" and "why would they do that?" One day, you're going to have a seven-year-old to thank for helping you catch a plot hole you never would've noticed. If you liked the advice or have some of your own, please let us know in the comments!

To the dude that asked this question, I hope that helps! If anyone else has a question for me, please feel free to text me on all the apps!