What Does Your Character Want?

Guest Post by Claudia Mills

            One of the most powerful questions for launching a story is: what does my main character want? So simple and obvious - and yet even experienced authors can forget this.

          

            As I was writing my most recent book, Nixie Ness, Cooking Star, set in an after-school cooking camp, at first I focused only on Nixie’s predicament. Now that her mother has a job outside the home, Nixie has to attend an after-school program, which means she’ll no longer be spending afternoons at home with her best friend, Grace, which means Grace will be spending afternoons instead with Nixie’s nemesis, Elyse. But what should happen next? I was stuck until I asked the crucial question: what does Nixie want? Well, she wants her life to be the way it used to be. But this is such a vague and hopeless desire. The story came into focus for me when I gave a different answer: Nixie feels she is losing her best friend, and she wants to get her best friend back again.

            Once we know what our character wants, the plot is driven by what she does to get it. If her first attempt succeeds, we have a very short and skimpy story. But if her first attempt fails, and her second attempt fails, and even her third attempt fails, her ultimate success is much more satisfying.

            If your students are stuck for a story idea, encourage them to think of what a character might want. They might start by thinking about what they want. A bike? A dog? A sleepover with a friend? A special family vacation?

            Then lead them in brainstorming how someone could try to get this thing. With brainstorming, even preposterous ideas are welcome. Remember it’s good if the first ideas end up failing! One of Nixie’s failed friendship-saving ideas is to get fame and fortune by starring in the cooking-camp video. Another is to bribe her friend with yummy camp-baked treats. A third is to pretend to be sick at camp in order to guilt her mother into quitting her job.

            For young writers, simple wants, simple strategies, and simple failures can work best.

            Your character wants a bike.  How could he get a bike?

1.     Find a job and save up money to buy one.

2.     Win one in a contest.

3.     Get a friend to trade his bike for something he wants even more.

Then, the really fun part: How could each of these ideas go wrong? Failure can be one of the most comical things to write about – and one of the saddest. And then the success that follows is sweeter still.

Nixie ends up keeping her best friend, but in the process she realizes Grace can still be her friend even if Grace is now friends with Elyse, too. It’s fine if a story ends with a character coming to a new understanding of what she wants.

But knowing what your character wants is where a story begins.

Claudia Mills is the author of almost 60 books for young readers, including most recently the Franklin School Friends series from Farrar, Straus & Giroux, and her new After-School Superstars series from Holiday House.  In addition to writing books, she has been a college professor in the philosophy department at the University of Colorado at Boulder and in the graduate programs in children’s literature at Hollins University in Roanoke. Visit Claudia at www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

“All Talk and No Action”

guest post by Claudia Mills

          Oh, that boring word said. We do need to have some way to know which character is speaking in a stretch of dialogue, but to hear said, said, said, said, said, said is almost unbearable.

          The only thing worse, alas, is to switch out said for a bunch of “fancy” speech verbs. An occasional shouted, whispered, complained, retorted is a welcome relief, but a long string of hundred-dollar speech verbs calls attention to itself much more than plain old said ever did. Worst of all is modifying each said with an adverb: said sadly, said angrily, said wistfully.

          Solution: introduce brief bits of action into dialogue. Letting us know what characters are doing as they speak not only identifies speakers, but places readers fully in a scene. Instead of talking heads, we have living, breathing, moving human beings.

          For example, in my recent book about an aspiring seventh-grade writer, Write This Down, here are some instances where a speaker is identified simply by my showing what she is doing as she speaks:

 “That isn’t funny.” Now Kylee’s distressed enough that she puts down her knitting.

Or:

Kylee shrugs. “Okay.” But she crinkles her forehead in a skeptical way.

           One way to demonstrate this technique to your students is to create a short dialogue, written as in a play, just the words spoken. Here’s one I use when I teach:

“How are you?” 

“I’m fine. How about you?”

 “Just okay.”

“What’s the matter?”

“It’s my mom.”

“What about her?”

“I think she’s sick, like really sick.”

“Oh, no!”

          Have the students name the two characters. Now edit the dialogue (on the board) with each line tagged with, e.g., “John said” or Mary said.” Read it aloud so the students can hear how deadly this is. Next try replacing each said – every single one – with a fancy speech verb, or speech verb plus adverb. Read it aloud. Ouch!

          Ah, but now let the students offer suggestions about where the dialogue should take place: in a shopping mall, at the pool, in the school cafeteria? Once a setting has been established, a few of the speech tags can replaced by brief bits of action, specific to that setting. Vary their placement by sometimes having action precede a line of speech and sometimes follow it.

“How are you?” John asked Mary, as they walked toward the pool.

“I’m fine,” Mary said. “How about you?”

“Just okay.” John fiddled with the towel draped over his shoulders.

Mary stared at him. “What’s the matter?”

After a long pause, John said, “It’s my mom.”

“What about her?” A kid on the high board dove into the water with a huge splash, but Mary didn’t turn to look.

 “I think she’s sick, like really sick,” John whispered.

          “Oh, no!”

          Don’t let dialogue be “all talk and no action.” Small bits of interspersed action make the talking real. Action makes talkers come alive.

Claudia Mills is the author of over 50 books for young readers, including How Oliver Olson Changed the World (an ALA Notable Book of the Year) and The Trouble with Ants (which received a starred review in Publishers Weekly), as well as the Franklin School Friends series of chapter books from Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Claudia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her family and her cat, Snickers. Visit her at www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

Learning from Fictional Child Writers

Guest Post by Claudia Mills

          Just as it can be inspirational for young writers to have a published author visit their classroom, it can be inspirational to read about child characters who love to write and who take seriously the development of their craft.

          My most recent middle-grade novel, Write This Down, stars Autumn Granger, a seventh-grade writer who is determined to impress her scornful older brother, Hunter, by achieving her dream of publication. She is taking a middle-school journalism class from a charismatic teacher. I put various bits of writing advice into the mouth of Ms. Archer and showed how Autumn responded to them in her own writing.

          In Chapter 4, as the class begins their study of the personal essay, Ms. Archer opens with the provocative statement: “A personal essay is not about you.” Instead, “people read personal essays to learn something about themselves.” A personal essay is more than a report of what happened to somebody; it’s also about its larger significance for a more universal audience –what that incident means. She then has the class do a free-write on the topic: “The worst – or best – gift you ever received.” Autumn comes up with her own list of best and worst gifts, finding herself grabbed by one that leads into a reflection on her troubled relationship with Hunter and the bond between siblings.

          This scene could be a jumping-off point for asking students to write their own list of best and worst gifts. Autumn thinks, as she begins her brainstorming: “Bad things are always good to write about.” Ask your students:  Is this true? If so, why is it true? Might it be because the heart of a strong story is some problem or conflict? Autumn writes about a best gift instead – but one that leads her into dark early childhood memories.

          As students work on their lists of “best gifts and worst gifts,” encourage them to do more than simply think about what a disappointment it was to receive, say, an electric toothbrush (as Autumn received one year from her dentist father), or joy to get a coveted video game. What does the best or worst gift say about the relationship between giver and recipient? (When Autumn’s Aunt Liz gives her the same book three years in a row, what does this say about Aunt Liz?) Does a “worst” gift show indifference on the part of the giver? Or desire to send a not-so-subtle message about who the giver wants the recipient to be? Why might the same item be the best gift for one person but the worst gift for another? Why might what seemed to be a bad gift turn out to be a wonderful one, after all?

          Autumn learns that even a simple list of best gifts and worst gifts can lead to powerful personal reflections on the nature of families, love, heartbreak, and healing. Maybe this same exercise can lead your students there, too.

BIO: Claudia Mills is the author of over 50 books for young readers, including How Oliver Olson Changed the World (an ALA Notable Book of the Year) and The Trouble with Ants (which just received a starred review in Publishers Weekly), as well as the Franklin School Friends series of chapter books from Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Claudia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her family and her cat, Snickers. Visit www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

CHARACTER HAIKU

Guest Post by Claudia Mills

      As a child I loved to write poetry. As an adult, I’ve felt too intimidated even to try, with one exception. I love to write poetry “by” the characters in my stories. I created child poet characters in a number of books, such as Lizzie at Last and Dinah Forever, and had tons of fun writing poems that Lizzie and Dinah might have written. There is something liberating about writing poems under an alias. It frees me from fear that my poem won’t be good enough, because after all, this isn’t really “my” poem, it’s Lizzie’s or Dinah’s.

        In my forthcoming book The Trouble with Babies, the third book in my Nora Notebooks series, the kids in Nora’s class are writing haiku for a poetry unit. So I had the challenge of writing haiku for each featured character in the class.

        Emma dotes on her cat, Precious Cupcake, so I gave Emma a cat-loving haiku:

Precious Cupcake

by Emma

My cat is the best.

White, soft, fluffy, blue eyes, tail.

She is the cutest.

Critter-loving Amy is disappointed that her mom won’t let her get a pet snake:

When I Grow Up

by Amy

When I’m a mom some-

Day, my kids can have ten snakes

And I’ll say “Hooray!”

          Tamara is the class dancer:

Hip Hop

by Tamara

When I start to dance

My feet have their own ideas.

My body follows.

          After explaining the classic haiku structural pattern of three short lines with 5-7-5 syllables, have students write haiku “by” the characters in a favorite book, or a book report selection, or a classroom read-aloud.

          If students will be using a common text, ask them collectively to recall as many characters as they can, listing the names on the board for easy reference. As each character is mentioned, have students refresh each others’ memories about key traits or scenes in which they appear. Then it’s time to start writing.

          It can be fun to compare student poems written “by” the same character. If the text is Charlotte’s Web, for example, all kinds of poems “by” Wilbur may emerge:

                              I may be a runt.

                              But I can be terrific.

                              And radiant, too.

Or:

                              I’m glad I’m a pig.

                              But I hope no one makes me

                              Into a pork chop!

Or:

                              The best kind of friend

                              Is a spider who can write

                              Words into her web.

Note that this last poem is about Charlotte, but written by Wilbur, as he reflects on Charlotte as wonderful friend. But if students get confused and write their poems about, rather than by, their chosen character, they are still generating poetry and linking it with their insights into literature.

          Once you get started writing this kind of short verse, it’s hard to stop. That’s the power – and pleasure – of character haiku.

BIO: Claudia Mills is the author of over 50 books for young readers, including How Oliver Olson Changed the World (an ALA Notable Book of the Year) and The Trouble with Ants (starred review in Publishers Weekly), as well as the Franklin School Friends series of chapter books from Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Claudia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her family and her cat, Snickers. Visit her at www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

VERB POWER WITH CLAUDIA MILLS

Guest Post by Claudia Mills

Verbs are action words, strong words that let characters make something happen in a story. But some verbs are stronger than others. Strong verbs don’t need qualifying adverbs to help them out. Strong verbs can stand on their own because they convey a distinctive shade of meaning.

Consider all the verbs that are variants of walk, meaning “go along on foot.” Just a few entries for walk in a thesaurus include: stroll, march, tramp, prance, saunter, race, roam, trek, parade, wander, amble, strut, plod, trudge, shuffle, stalk, pace, plod, sprint, tiptoe. Each one conveys a different kind of gait, for a different kind of character, in a different kind of mood. You could write “Jane walked slowly” or you could write “Jane trudged.” You could write “John walked quickly,” or you could write “John raced.” A little girl showing off her new hair ribbons might prance; an old man worried about falling might shuffle. Someone who is leaving a room angrily stalks away; someone who is walking along dreamily wanders or meanders. With a strong enough verb, the adverb is unnecessary.

In the first chapter of my recent book Simon Ellis: Spelling Bee Champ, a video game character springs over a string of fireballs and then plunges into space; a pet ferret scrambles out the door and scrabbles up someone’s arm. In later chapters, a dog bounces after a kid; the enthusiastic principal pops into the classroom one day and and bounds into it on another; one girl trails after another (showing reluctance to go). All of these are verbs that move a character from one place to another, but they do so in such vividly different ways.

Take my list of motion verbs, above, or a list you’d find for the entry “walk” in any good thesaurus. Invite kids to come to the front of the room to act out each one. Have them strut, march, saunter, amble. Where they don’t know the meaning of the word, you may have to join in the acting yourself, or provide a sentence to give context: “Andy was so proud of his new football jersey that he strutted to the front of the room so that everyone could see,” or “Ellie felt the weight of the world on her shoulders as she plodded to the car.”

Give the students a list of motion verbs qualified with adverbs: walk quickly, walk slowly, walk happily, walk sadly, walk confidently, walk fearfully. Ask the students to find a substitute stronger verb to take the place of each verb + adverb combination.

Finally, invite the students to speculate on why a person might be strutting, marching, sauntering, ambling, pacing, plodding, or sprinting. What just happened before this moment to make him or her walk in this way? Where is he or she trying to go? And why? What is going to happen next? Strong verbs don’t just contribute action to a story. They can be the start of a story, too!

BIO: Claudia Mills is the author of over 50 books for young readers, including How Oliver Olson Changed the World (an ALA Notable Book of the Year) and The Trouble with Ants (which just received a starred review in Publishers Weekly), as well as the Franklin School Friends series of chapter books from Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Claudia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her family and her cat, Snickers. Visit www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

SHOWING CHARACTER THROUGH ACTION

by Claudia Mills

          One of the cardinal rules of writing is “Show, don’t tell.” This means that rather than telling readers that your character is bossy, you need to show her actually being bossy. Rather than telling readers that another character loves to daydream, you need to show her lost in reverie – and show us what the content of her fantasy is.

          

             In my new series, Franklin School Friends, my characters are defined by their interests and passions. Kelsey (Kelsey Green, Reading Queen) loves to read. Annika (Annika Riz: Math Whiz) loves math. Izzy (Izzy Barr, Running Star) loves to run. You get the idea! In each book, my challenge is to find a way for the girls to support one another (in trying to win a reading contest, a Sudoku contest, or a race) while using their own distinctive talent and abilities.

           So: as Izzy is trying to win a 10K race, Kelsey inspires her with the story of Atalanta’s famous race in Greek mythology and Annika helps her calculate how fast she needs to run each kilometer to beat her rival. When Kelsey suspects her rival, Simon, of cheating during a schoolwide reading contest, Annika figures out how many pages Simon would need to read in an hour to make good on his reading claims; Izzy spies on Simon with the plan of running fast if she gets caught.

       

   Here’s a way to share this characterization challenge with students.

1)    Let students pick a fun activity to be the focus of a scene. Examples might be: running a race, baking a cake, building a snow fort, starting a lemonade stand.

2)    Choose names for three characters to be part of the scene, preferably with a mix of boys and girls (and not using names of any kids in the class).

3)    Give each kid a character trait (e.g., shy, imaginative, clumsy, funny, determined, impatient, reckless, conceited, talkative). Or: give each kid a passion/talent (loves sports, science, math, music, reading).

4)    Then: how can we SHOW this in the scene? If our characters are baking a cake, what would the shy character be doing? The imaginative one? The clumsy one? The funny one? What would the sports-lover contribute to the baking? Maybe she’d volunteer to use her arm muscles doing the mixing or she’d be jogging in place as the cake bakes. What would the scientist kid contribute? Maybe wondering how differently the cake would turn out if they left out the flour or baking powder? What would the musical kid be doing? Maybe making up a cake-baking song for them all to sing?

The takeaway point for the students is: character is shown through ACTION. We know what kind of person someone is by seeing what he DOES. So: provide a fun activity, gather together a group of imaginary kids, and let them reveal themselves to us!

Claudia Mills is the author of over 50 books for young readers, including How Oliver Olson Changed the World (an ALA Notable Book of the Year) and The Trouble with Ants (which just received a starred review in Publishers Weekly), as well as the Franklin School Friends series of chapter books from Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Claudia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her family and her cat, Snickers. Visit her at www.claudiamillsauthor.com.