Character Shaping

When I was young, I used to take bits and pieces of junk and fashion them into the shape of an animal or person. I struck a big hit with my cheese wax people and JUJYFRUITS disembodied heads. I failed miserably at making popular the bony owl pellet animals. However, all my creations were not without merit. Each had been laboriously endowed with a personality, sets of moral codes and ethics, a past, and names before destruction. The more complicated the character, the less likely I was going to share this creation with anyone who might reject it.

Now, we skip to my adulthood as an author and I realize that I have not changed from my younger self in this respect. I still attempt to protect these very special characters by never fully integrating them into my stories as main players. There are any number of reasons that I could give you for not placing them in the foreground of the story. The single most telling reason is I do not want the story's environment and plot direction to change the character that I have grown to know so well in my head. This is not an unfounded fear, neither is it irrational. But, I am taking a pledge right here and now that I will no longer allow myself to indulge in this behavior with my writing. So, we will see what is to come from here on out. We will see how close I can get to making my people literary flesh and blood from what, at first glance, seems to be cognitive garbage.