Just like the rest of us, novel characters has wounds in their past, hidden scars they carry with them wherever they go.

Our pasts are filled with experiences, both good and bad, which teach us who to trust, what to believe in, and what to avoid. The painful experiences—the wounds—influence us so deeply that we will do almost anything to avoid feeling such pain again. That past trauma is likely to affect our future behavior as well.
​
As writers, how do we create characters who feel realistic? By mirroring real life as much as possible. That includes developing a backstory for each character that lets us understand him/her on the deepest level. Knowing who and what influences a characters gives us insight to what they fear, desire and need most of all. Sometimes even if the character doesn’t know himself.

Bradley Cooper in American Sniper. He's the image in my head when I visualize my killer (sorry, Bradley). 

Emotional wounds are more than just painful memories. Inside each wound is a seed of doubt. Was it my fault? Could I have prevented the outcome? Was there something else I could have done? It’s human nature to second-guess decisions that result in a bad outcome, to rationalize tragedies, and to try to make sense of them. Many times we blame ourselves for what happened, even when events were out of our control.

Because of this internalization, a lie is born.

When a person is wounded, he wraps himself in emotional armor to keep his feelings safe. Flaws develop, working under the rationalization of protecting himself from getting hurt further. Oftentimes, instead of keeping the person safe, these flaws limit him, preventing him from building healthy relationships, or putting a filter of distrust on all he sees.

Do you know anyone like this?
​
This year I’ve had my novel antagonist under the microscope, examining his backstory “wounds” and focusing all his hurt and pain into a single moment in his past that explains his motivation (and rationalization) to kill. 

​This excerpt from my upcoming novel, Crescent Moon Crossing, shows the killer’s motivation: 

The man in the driver’s seat removed his baseball cap and rubbed his sweaty head with a bandana. He hated this monochrome desert landscape and its searing temperatures. It reminded him of Iraq. Made him feel exposed and twitchy. The glare brought back his blinding headaches, and the nightmares too. The ones that jerked him awake in a cold sweat, reaching for his rifle. 

But he had a job to do.

When Jace came out, the man put down his black coffee and raised binoculars to his eyes.  He watched Jace unlock his metallic blue Mustang. The bastard was whistling as he slid behind the wheel. That smug face, seemingly right in front of him, thanks to the magnified lens, made his breath catch and stomach acid bubble up and burn his throat.

e squeezed the binoculars until his fingers ached. Breathing hard, he imagined his hands around Jace's neck, squeezing, squeezing, until that cocky smile disappeared, replaced by terror.

Chances were Jace wouldn't remember him. He’d lost weight and was dressed as a civilian in a dark ball cap and a Black Sabbath t-shirt. But his old squad leader hadn’t changed a bit. Still slim, buff and full of himself. Still the lady’s man.

He shut his eyes as his nostrils filled with the old-penny scent of blood. The car, the heat, the sleazy motel faded away. Instead, he imagined what those last hours must have been like, while his wife was on the operating table, her belly clamped open, blood filling the cavity faster than the nurses could suction it out. He imagined the tiny body of Baby Emily, still attached, while the surgeon worked frantically to get her out and save her mother. He imagined the still form disappearing, its face submerged in blood.
“No. No. No.” He trembled as terror seared his guts and the flashback engulfed him. His arms, of their own volition, reached out to touch his wife, to help lift his baby daughter’s head above the blood, to clean out her nose and throat and force her to breathe.

The rumbling of Jace’s turbo-charged Mustang brought his thoughts back to the motel. He relaxed his cramped hands from the binoculars and massaged his chest. Just my luck to have a heart attack in this dusty, shit hole parking lot. His face was wet and tears had soaked the neck of his tee shirt. 

Anger boiled away his tears, as he thought about Jace Merrick, the self-involved asshole who made him miss his wife’s delivery. She lost her life and he lost his career. But Jace? Nothing. A night in the stockade for starting a bar fight, that’s all.

Soon after Barb and Em’s death, they told him he’d suffered a psychotic break during a night patrol. He was convinced people were trying to kill him.

“Of course they are, you jackass,” Jace had said. “We’re in the middle of a war zone.” He slapped him on the helmet and sent him back out on patrol the next night.

So he continued his normal duties and buried it all. Or tried to. But who wants a sniper with the shakes? He looked down at his trembling hands in disgust.

“All Sarge’s fault,” he mumbled, cursing his platoon leader in his mind with all the dirty words he could think of. “All your fault.”

He knew he was sick. The over-exposure to violent deaths had infected him like a toxin. His shakes got worse, and his CO noticed. Told him he had no choice but to remove him from active duty.

 He snuck into the CO’s office and read the medical discharge. “His sense of reality is fragile in the extreme,” it read. “For his own sake, and for the safety of his squad mates, he needs rest and in-patient psychiatric care.”

He disagreed. What he really needed was revenge.
 
I think his backstory will help make this killer tragic and relatable, and he’ll also have a redeemable moment at the end of the book.
Thank you for reading!

I just finished taking a writing class with author Simon Wood. Actually, I’ve taken two from him so far, with a third one scheduled in October.

This one was on writing point of view, and the direction he gave was so heartening to me. In the past, I have heard agents say to limit the number of POV characters in your novel.  They suggest no more than two points of view, for example, the male and female leads in a romance novel.

But I can name any number of novels written from the viewpoint of multiple characters.

So I did some more checking. Turns out there are as many opinions as there are plotlines. 

Jane Cleland, in Mastering Suspense Structure and Plot (I highly recommend, by the way), points out the mysteries and suspense often use the multiple perspective structure, allowing both the hero and the villain their say, and sometimes, the victims, too.

​Here’s an example from Robert B. Parker’s Night Passage. You’ll see that each chapter is told from one character’s POV:

• Chapter 1: Jesse Stone, the protagonist
• Chapter 2: Tom Carson, a victim
• Chapter 3: Jesse Stone
• Chapter 4: Hasty Hathaway, the antagonist
• Chapter 5: Jesse Stone
• Chapter 6: Jo-Jo Genest, the villain
• Chapter 7: Jesse Stone
• Chapter 8: Carole Genest, a victim
• Chapter 9: Jesse Stone
• Chapter 10: Jo-Jo Genest
• Chapter 11: Jesse Stone

Night Passage continues to follow this pattern, changing perspective chapter by chapter, with minor characters having their voices dominate fewer chapters than major characters, and no character presented more than Jesse.
 
I’m following a similar pattern with my book, giving POV perspectives of the protagonist (Sheriff Cooper Jones), as well as the female lead (Rumor Vargas) and the three murder suspects. I’m introducing the POVs in an alternating order, with the Sheriff, rotating between the others.
 
Despite the multiple perspectives, the story still follows a chronological structure. This technique allows the reader to observe how various characters think, to witness cause and effect, and to feel the rippling tension of growing suspense as deadly events are set in motion.
 
Before you jump in, though, consider some of the ways the multiple POV tactic can go wrong. 

• Readers may lose interest in your plot if they discover who the villain is before the protagonist figures it out.
• It’s easy to reveal too much, too soon.
• If you switch perspectives too often or too quickly, you may interrupt the narrative flow.

Multiple POV is not for the faint of heart. It’s hard work and requires a lot of planning. Here are a few rules to follow when working with multiple POV:
 
#1.  Make sure you have a good reason to be writing multiple points of view. That reason should come from the story itself. Ask yourself the question: ‘Why does this story need to be told from multiple points of view?’
 
The answer could be that there is more than one ‘main’ character whose perspective is vital to the story, or that the scope of the story or world is large and using only one perspective would be limiting. Two excellent examples for the need for multiple POVs are Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult. For very different reasons, too.
 
Decide what’s driving your plot. You have two main options with multiple POVs and plot. One, you can write about a single set of events from different perspectives. Or two, you can use several sets of events that move from place to place and character to character without a lot of overlap.
 
#2. Give each POV character a clear and distinct voice. You must develop each individual voice so that all the perspectives presented are clearly distinct from one another. The livelier and more individual the better. Everything about a character—from their dialogue, speech patterns and actions, to their internal thoughts and motivations—can be used to develop their unique voice as a POV narrator. For fun, try distinguishing each character by using a different dominant sense they use the most.
 
#3. Create complete character arcs for each POV character.  This includes identifying goals, stakes, and pitfalls, and how those move the story forward. THIS, by the way, is usually my motivation for making a character have his/her own POV: They have their own subplot woven into the main story, and that subplot needs a voice.
 
#4. How many POV characters? Unless you are George R.R. Martin (or maybe even if you are), too many POV characters can overwhelm or confuse readers.  Some experts and writing coaches say no more than 3 to 5 POV characters is a safe bet. That way, you can develop each character fully, and tie their subplot story lines together succinctly.
 
#5. First Person vs Third Person. You have three main options when writing a novel from multiple points of view.
 
Option #1 is to use first-person POV for each character. Each character receives its own narrative. But, and a big BUT. If you do this, you must create a distinct voice for each character. As a reader, I should know who’s speaking with blatant clues (i.e. this is Tom speaking). You will need to channel each character when writing in first person, regardless of how many POVs you have. First person is close-up and personal.
 
Option #2 is to use third –person POV for each character. This option is subtle; you can glide from following one character to another. You’re limited to only what that character knows and experiences, but your narrator voice doesn’t need to shift as it does in first person. I still recommend using chapter or scene breaks to switch between characters, to avoid a jarring transition.
 
Option #3 is to use a mix of first and third-person POV. For example, have one main character in first person and shift to third person for supporting characters. Keep in mind, it’s not always easy to transition from first to third and back again throughout the novel. It can feel like whiplash for your reader, especially if your scene breaks aren’t well delineated. I recommend you switch to a different POV at the end of a chapter (not scene).
 
In Harlan Coben’s Gone For Good, all the scenes featuring the protagonist POV are in first person, while all the other POV characters are in third-person for their scene. The first-person narrative brings the reader closer to the protagonist because it’s intimate storytelling, while the third-person narrative perspective keeps the reader at arm’s length from the other characters.
 
#6. Stick to a one-chapter-per-POV approach as much as possible. When you’re writing multiple points of view, you need a way to clearly transition between perspectives. The most common method is shown in the Robert Parker Night Passage example at the beginning of this article. Writing one chapter from one character’s perspective, the next from a different character’s perspective, and so on. A scene break may be more appropriate if the chapter continues in the same moment or includes something where a chapter break might be too harsh a transition. Regardless of the reason, if you do switch POV characters without ending a chapter, there needs to be a clear scene break or marker to distinguish between the two perspectives.
 
When starting a new POV chapter, you must orient your reader as quickly as possible so they know whose perspective they’ve switched to. You can do this by titling each chapter with the POV character’s name, although I am not a fan of this approach. I’d prefer to make it clear, preferably in the first chapter, whose head we are now in.
 
#7. Choose carefully which POV you write each scene from. This may be clear in some parts of your story, but less easy to decide in others. If several of your POV characters are present in the same scene, ask yourself these questions to narrow down your decision:

• Which character has the most at stake in this scene?
• Through which character’s perspective will the scene have the most impact?
• What do I want to convey with this scene, and which character will help me do it best?

Try to avoid retelling the same scene from different perspectives (unless this is a special device you’re using to reveal important new information). Even then, tread lightly. You know, ground hog day stories grate on many readers.
 
#8. Consider choosing one “main” POV character. Here one character receives more screen time (i.e. more POV scenes) than the other POV characters, and his story and character arc is the overall focus of the novel. (See the Jesse Stone example earlier). Simon Wood even gave us a formula in our class, depending on how many POVs you use, but the basic rule of thumb is to give your protagonist roughly half of the POV scenes.
 
#9.  Examine the Action
Take a look at what you know about this story. Where is the plot going to take the characters? What’s going to happen? Which characters are going to be present at the most important events?
With a little ingenuity, it’s amazing how much action you can successfully convey to readers without needing a POV character to be right on there on the scene. But it’s best to examine the overall needs of the story’s plot before choosing POV characters.

#10. Examine the Climactic Moment
With the obvious practical considerations out of the way, take a moment to consider which POVs really matter to your story—on a thematic level.

How do you know? Look at your climatic moment. Which characters are involved in this final confrontation that definitively decides your conflict one way or another? These are (or should be) the characters who are most inherent to the story’s thematic arc. These are the most important characters in your story. These are your best and most obvious choices for POVs that will meaningfully contribute throughout the story.

This does not, of course, mean all the characters present at the climactic moment should be given POVs. But if they’re not present at the Climax, you have to question if they’re really important enough to get POVs earlier in the story. 
 
Knowing other characters’ roles in the climax will also help you determine how their POVs should be structured—or if they should be given a POV at all. The climax is where every piece of your story will prove itself either part of a cohesive whole, or a random, ill-conceived loose end.
 
Knowing how your story’s conflict ends will give you a huge clue into the right choice for just about any POV question you need to resolve.
 
Writer friends, tell me your opinions! Have you written stories with multiple POVs? How do you determine which POVs deserve to be included in your story? Tell me in the comments!
 
Until next week, happy writing!

​ “Your heart is slamming against your rib cage, your fingertips are moist and you turn another page. The antagonist is setting a trap. You wish you could do something to prevent the protagonist from walking into it, but you can’t. You’re helpless, totally at the mercy of the writer. All you can do is turn the page.”

That’s how Simon Wood (The One That Got Away), one of my favorite suspense writers, describes what he’s going for when he writes his novels.

Do you read suspense? Mystery? Or do you prefer thrillers?

First, let’s understand the difference between the three genres.

The key difference between mystery and suspense is perspective. Both genres deal with a crisis event to hook the reader and keep the story going. But the storytelling approach is completely different.

Let’s say the crisis is the assassination of the president of the United States. 
In a mystery, the president would die in the first chapter, and the rest of the book would focus on the government agents finding the killer and bringing him to justice. Mystery is all about the puzzle.

New York Times bestselling author David Morrell (Brotherhood of the Rose and Rambo) says, “One crucial distinction is that traditional mysteries appeal primarily to the mind and emphasize the logical solution to a puzzle.”

Here are some of my favorite mysteries:

Louise Penny - How the Light Gets In (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series)

Alan Bradley - The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

Agatha Christie – And Then There Were None


Going back to the president’s assassination example, in a suspense story, instead of the actual assassination in the first chapter, an intercepted communique or a bungled weapons drop would take place, alerting the White House of an imminent threat. This time, the government agents would be charged with protecting the president while tracking down the would-be assassin. The story would climax at the point where the assassination attempt is thwarted.

Suspense creates drama before the crisis event and builds slowly. Tension builds gradually, we’re waiting for the next bad thing to happen, expecting the shoe to drop.

Often, the reader may know the danger is coming before the protagonist, so we go through the agony of waiting.

Suspense also allows the writer some freedoms not afforded the mystery writer. Writers can employ multiple point-of-view characters.

They can present the bad guy and his motivations, giving the reader insight into his character.

​ This allows the writer to actively pit his antagonist and protagonist against each other while the reader watches.

Think about Hannibal Lector, Thomas Harris’s character in Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs. 

Think about Hannibal Lector, Thomas Harris’s character in Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs. 

From torturing animals to killing people in gruesome ways and eating them, we come to know his character intimately. This is a villain who sends shivers down your spine. 

In a mystery, the author will never write from the bad guy’s point of view. The writer must purposely keep the bad guy’s identity hidden to maintain the mystery. The puzzle is the important thing for the mystery reader. 

​For the suspense read, it’s all about the mood. Alfred Hitchcock was a master of creating a mood of foreboding in his films

Stephen King often uses mood to foretell that something terrible will happen to his characters. He does this through internal monologue and increasingly difficult situations.

Read The Stand for a classic example of these techniques.

​In one of my favorite suspense novels, Shadow of the Wind (Carlos Ruiz Zafon), the main character is investigating a mysterious book that’s being hunted, leaving shattered lives in its wake.

Or, the suspense can be sheer creepiness.

​Try You by Caroline Kepnes.

You'll never look at dating the same again.

​Occasionally the author manages to create a sense of foreboding as well as challenging the reader with a puzzle. 

In Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu must solve a cryptex in order to find out why someone may have killed Sophie’s grandfather and is trying to kill them. Time pressure and physical danger play a role as well, but the reader’s prime focus is understanding the riddle. 

The Da Vinci Code also crosses into our third genre with its non-stop action: Thriller.

Where mysteries represent the most cerebral of the three major suspense genres, and suspense builds slowly, thrillers are out-of-control wildfires.  There is usually the threat of some catastrophe affecting whole communities, cities, countries, even the planet. The threat need not be total devastation—but the effect of the action must be profound. And the hero is under constant attack as he or she tries to prove the perpetrator’s guilt and/or stop the next atrocity. 

​Many times the antagonist appears at the beginning, and we know what he’s going to do.
Think of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels. At the beginning of each story, the reader knows who 007 is up against and what deadly plan he has to stop. Playing with their suspense cards on the table, thrillers create tension by inserting a strong good guy AND a strong antagonist. 

​Thriller plots can go an endless number of directions. The Killing Floor by Lee Child established wandering ex-military investigator Jack Reacher as a force to be reckoned with in the criminal underworld. 

Note: Did you notice that these thriller covers are have a similar look? That is not a coincidence.  Publishers print a lot of thriller covers with big splashes of red (danger!) and bold print. 

Tom Clancy has made himself synonymous with the tech-savvy military thriller.

​ The Hunt for Red October is where it all started and remains one of his best.

In Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton taps his mesmerizing talent and scientific brilliance to bring humankind’s thrilling fantasies to life…until something   goes wrong. 

​And, of course, in thrillers, something is always going to go wrong--with cataclysmic results.

​I personally enjoy mystery, suspense and thrillers. These genres continually find a way to create stories that are fresh, interesting and original. From cozy mysteries to edge-of-your-seat suspense, to high-octane thrillers, there is bound to be something for you.

Next time I'm going to begin telling you about my own in-the-works suspense novel, Crescent Moon Crossing. 
​
Until then, find yourself a new favorite suspense author, and dig in!